Dr. John Collins, a retired Army colonel and former chief researcher for the Library of Congress, said ... every military commander since Sun Tzu, the ancient Chinese strategist, has hated urban warfare.

"Military casualties normally soar on both sides; innocent civilians lose lives and suffer severe privation; reconstruction costs skyrocket," Collins said...

--Philadelphia Inquirer

Skyrocketing reconstruction costs? You say that like it's a bad thing:

The first contracts for rebuilding post-war Iraq have been awarded, and Vice President Dick Cheney's old employer, Halliburton Co., says it is one of the early winners....

--CNNmoney

And please note the terms of these contracts:

Confidential contract documents indicate that companies will be paid under an arrangement known as "cost plus fixed fee." Once the cost of a project is established, the contractor is entitled to recover those costs plus a fee that is a fixed percentage of those costs. That percentage is generally 8 to 10 percent, although the security precautions required under the Iraq contracts might justify a higher fee in some cases, construction industry analysts said.

--from an article on Iraqi reconstruction in Sunday's New York Times

So the higher the cost, the larger the profit (the "plus") in raw dollars.