Development Projects Vs War on Terror

Countries are expanding budgets to fight terror. Money that can be used for development is going in war. Pentagon is going to expand its operations against terrorism and planning to increase aid to countries like Yemen to fight against terrorism. Major chunk of budget is going to fight against terrorism. Pentagon proposed $708 billion budget for the 2011 fiscal year. Insurgencies in Afghanistan and Iraq and growing power of terrorist groups in Yemen and Somalia are very lethal threats. Pentagon is preparing for a much broader range of security challenges.
Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI)’s reports indicate increase in world military expenses in 2008 to $1.464 trillion from 1.2 trillion in 2005; it is 45 per cent over the 10-year period since 1999. This amount corresponds 2.4 per cent of world gross domestic product (GDP). The USA military expenditures accounted for 41.5 per cent of the world total in 2008.
Figures indicate that expenses are increasing in this war on terror. All the suffering countries are spending a lot of money to fight against terrorism. The money that can be used to improve education, health and infrastructure facilities etc is going in this war. This war is taking lot of attention of the world politics. Much attention is being diverted to this fight instead of development projects for mankind.