In a big official UFC match or a boxing one, the winner usually takes home a big purse or winnings. Even if it was some type of show match between two famous people, and the more famous guy lost the bout, but took home a larger sum. Some might wonder if it all wasn't staged, and that the real winner was the person who came out richer. Someone who wins it big in the lottery is exceptionally fortunate, and someone else who has a high salary is well-off; but someone who loses all his or her money is a loser. It’s literally in the word ‘loser’: one who has lost. 

On a grand scale, some historians point to the inevitability of World War II because of the harsh war reparations that were enforced on Germany. Like Ancient Carthage paid to Rome for losing the war, or France paid to others after Napoleon's brutal conquests. And besides war-reps, pointedly, money that is stagnant is usually a net loss. Money that can be invested in one's own accounts can breed more money if done smartly. Likewise, money invested wisely in one's own country and children will eventually produce far more money and prosperity.

Thus, those who are the losers in a war are so more than once: because they are forced to pay monetary reparations, their own fund for resupplying their own arsenal is lower, if not gone entirely, while also filling the stocks of the enemy. Their own money is now funneled to a rival nation, halting or reversing their own development while helping to seed the future prosperity of an enemy. War reparations are damning in the utmost – and ultimately, if nothing else, they announce to the world that you who pays, are a loser. 

Recently, the New York Times reported on the ‘deal’ that the Trump administration is working on with Iran, and reportedly Iran is going to be forced to pay 300 billi– HA! Just kidding, Iran said that for peace, they would need to be paid somewhere between $225 billion–$1 trillion in reparations for reconstruction and rearmament, and so the White House is proposing a “$300 billion” “investment fund” to be paid to Iran to end the war. 

Republicans and Trump lambasted Obama for the $400 million that Iran had paid to the US to purchase weapons that were never realized, and he gave them back. Like anyone who pays money to a business and does not get the service they paid for, and so the money is returned, Obama was honorable. It was Iran’s money first. But $300 billion? The big “B" as in “Billion"~?! And it is not ‘Iran’s money, but your own taxpayer money going to fund as to what Donald Trump acutely described: "the Iranian regime is the world's leading state sponsor of terror." 

Your money, which you worked hard for, is now going to be gifted to the tune of $300 billion directly to terrorists, as war reparations hidden behind the shiny word “investment fund." In actuality, this ‘investment fund’ is a humiliation fund for the man who said about Iran, "Total and complete victory, 100 percent.” Total? Complete? We have records from ancient Samaria about some of the earliest recorded examples of war reparations: 2550 B.C. We have 4,575 years of human history that says you are the loser if you pay money to the other side for peace, no matter how the word is dressed up.

The financial expense and logistical strain of a war only increase in tandem with how massive the land area of a country is, with how large its military is, with how far it is from your own home country, with the technology level of your opponent, and with their topography. Iran is one of the hardest countries in the world to assail, with massive mountains that run the entire coastline and missile batteries all along the top for thousands of miles. They have millions of soldiers with the defender’s advantage (in warfare, there is a general rule of thumb that an attacker needs three times the number of soldiers to root out a defender). 

Quoting Senator Chris Van Hollen, “Netanyahu said that he’d been waiting 40 years for somebody to go to war with him in Iran. He found a president stupid enough to do it.” 

Hundreds of billions of dollars in U.S. munitions were dissolved into mountain rocks, and sure, missile batteries too. But what is it all for, if the White House is just going to give Iran $300 billion dollars? What~!? Is this a fiscally responsible Executive Branch? U.S. Soldiers died for what? Iran still hasn't handed over its Uranium and likely never will. It hasn't in the past. And if it doesn't? What is the U.S. going to do, throw more military-industrial-complex-priced missiles at mountainsides?

Austin Petak is an aspiring novelist and freelance journalist who loves seeking stories and the quiet passions of the soul. If you are interested in reaching out to him to cover a story, you may find him at austinpetak@gmail.com.

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