US overseas bases cost taxpayers at least $71.8 billion annually

Evidence

By my very conservative calculations, the total cost of maintaining bases and military personnel overseas reaches at least 71.8 billion every year and could easily be in the range of 100–120 billion. That’s larger than the discretionary budget for every government agency except the Defense Department itself. And this number doesn’t even include spending on bases in overseas war zones. If we include the cost of bases and troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, in 2012 the total easily topped 170 billion. — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 29

Categorization

• QUESTION: How does the author derive these cost figures, and do they include full replacement value of overseas infrastructure? Worth checking his methodology for the calculation.
• corroborated: 4 independent passages support this claim — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 29
• XREF: connects to: Independent estimates of overseas base costs exceed official figures tenfold; Overseas bases cost more to run than domestic ones despite host-nation support; Official overseas base costs for 2012 totaled 22.7 billion dollars — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 604 (+10 more)

Broader Connections

• Overseas bases reveal America’s permanent war footing and militarized economy #expands (0.55)
• Stationing a soldier abroad costs each taxpayer $10,000–$40,000 more annually #corroborates (0.50) — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 28