The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-08-03
THE COSTS
 OF CONFLICT

Tt has been just two years today since France and Germany declareu war, and tomorrow will be the second anniversary of Great Britain's declar- ation against Germany. Just now much the war has cost in these two years of conflict it is impossible to state with any great degree of accur- acy, but those best able to make an estimate believe that the total IS in excess of forty-five billions or dol- lars. According to these figures, the military expenditures of the first year of the struggle were over $l7,0Oo'- 100000, while the second year or the war has cost at least $2S,OO0, ,OOO,OOo. These estimates stand merely for the military expenditures incurred In carrying on hostilities, and do not take
 into account the tremendous losses involved in the destruction of ship ping, railways, factories, warehouses, and buildings of all sorts, bridges, roads, and the partial or complete wreckage of cities towns and villages by the hundreds. The great decrease in agricultural and industrial produc- tion, the death or maiming of mil7 lions of men, the pensions to be paid
 
 numbers of unproductive survivors and their dependents-items sucn as these defy the statistician and stagger the imagination.
 For the amount already expended in actual hostilities 120 Panama canals could be constructed. The civil war in the United States, terrible and de- structive as 1t was, cost only about one-sixth of the amount already ex- pended by the warning powers of Eu- rope.
 For months past Great Britain has been spending an average of at least twenty-five millions a day, it is be- ueved. whereas at the end of the first year the daily average was placed at fourteen millions. France is not far behind with a daily expenditure of at least eighteen millions of dollars. more than twice as much as was spent in the first year of the war Rus sia's daily expenditure for strictly war purposes is believed to average about sixteen millions day. possible much more. About sixty millions a day it is believed, is spent by the AL lies.
 The cost of hostilities to the Central Powers and their allies, Bulgaria and Turkey, is thought to be about thirty million dollars day, or about half the amount expended by the Allies. Of this sum, about eighteen millions is probably provided by Germany. The German expenditures, however, have been very large from the first, while those of the Allies, especially Great Britain, have gradually increased.
 Figured according to population, the cost of the war falls heaviest on France, in which country, it is esti- mated, the cost averages about thirty cents day for each man, woman and child. The pro-rate cost to Great Bri- tain is figured at about twenty-eight cents daily, but Britain has back of her the vast resources of the empire. The cost to the Germans is figured at about twenty-three cents for each inhabitant. Russia's pro rata share is much smaller than that of any other country, being only about six cents
 Compared with the cost of previous wars, the present conflict makes its predecessors seem like child's play Germany and France expended only about two billions on hostilities in the Franco-Prussian war The Russo Japanese war cost both sides m the neighborhood of s2,150, ,0o0, 900. Ac- cording to Edmond Thery, the noted French economist, the total cost of European wars from the beginning of the Napo1eonic era up to the conn mencement of the present war was less than thirteen billion dollars-not a third of the amount spent in the last two years.
 Staggering and appalling as are these figures, yet even so monstrous a debt may be paid, in time. Cities may be restored. industries revived. the material scars of war gradually and painfully and by dint of tremen- dous labor removed But for the lives lost. the homes wrecked, the agonfes suffered. the tears shed, who shall nav and When2