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Not since similar no-fly zones were employed in Iraq and the Balkans during the 1990s has the Pentagon committed such expensive resources outside a war zone as it has in Libya. This is very small compared to what we're spending in Afghanistan right now," says Todd Harrison of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. He estimated the initial cost of a no-fly zone at $400 million to $1 billion, with weekly operational costs from $30 million to $300 million.

The United States ended the Cold War the way a master pilot lands a fighter jet, in a sort of ecstasy of precision and the gradual reduction of force. Today, that same jet is screeching around the runway, as our capacity for messy outcomes (Iraq, Libya, Egypt) expands before our eyes. One place where the potential for unparalleled damage has increased is the US. That is because there are more tools available to terrorists, extremists or just plain kooks now than in 2001/.../

Even in an era of staggering weapons costs, the price tag for a Tomahawk stands out because it's only used once. So, is the Tomahawk worth well over $1 million a shot?/.../ "They are expensive rounds, but they give you the potential to attack heavily defended targets up front," said Barry Watts, a senior fellow at the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. "How do you value not putting a bunch of pilots in harm's way?"

The mission over Libya already has run up a bill in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Though the intervention is limited when compared with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it still costs money -- for bombs, missiles, fuel and maintenance, among other things/…/A study released in early March from the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments estimated it would cost between $30 million and $100 million a week to maintain a limited no-fly zone in Libya. The study estimated it could cost up to $800 million up front to take out Libya's air defense systems -- though that estimate could run high since it assumed the United States, now part of a coalition, would bear most of the cost.

The United States spent at least $168 million hitting Libya’s air defense systems with Raytheon Co. Tomahawk cruise missiles and Northrop Grumman Co. B-2 bombers to open air space over the North African nation, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. To pay for the mission, the U.S. Defense Department is expected to tap its operations and maintenance budget and avoid using funds slated for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, according to defense analysts and former congressional aides/.../

With U.N. coalition forces bombarding Libyan leader Muammar el-Qaddafi from the sea and air, the United States’ part in the operation could ultimately hit several billion dollars -- and require the Pentagon to request emergency funding from Congress to pay for it/…/ The ultimate total that the United States spends will hinge on the length and scope of the strikes as well as on the contributions of its coalition allies. But Todd Harrison, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, said on Monday that the U.S. costs could “easily pass the $1 billion mark on this operation, regardless of how well things go/.../” The Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment report, a historical analysis of the price for similar operations, provided costs for several different scenarios, ranging from a sweeping and high-priced effort to impose and maintain a no-fly zone over the entire country to a much smaller no-fly zone with limited flyovers and few, if any, attacks on Libyan air defenses or ground forces. The current operation appears to fall somewhere between those two scenarios.Zack Cooper, a senior analyst at the think tank who coauthored the study with Harrison, acknowledged the operation’s costs are still too difficult to estimate because of lingering questions following the weekend strikes.“Since we don't yet know the length, magnitude, or degree of U.S. involvement, any cost projections are going to be very rough estimates at this point,” Cooper said.