STEVENSVILLE -- America's occupation of Iraq costs about $10 million an hour.

That figure doesn't include the future costs Americans will pay for the war, things like the ongoing costs of health care and disability benefits for veterans injured in the fighting. Certainly, no economic equation factors in the physical and psychological costs of those injuries.

No equation produces an answer to the question of how long it will take for the United States to rebuild what once was a positive reputation in the world.

And no formula can assess the damage done to the American psyche by seeing its own military torture war prisoners in methods this country decried when they were used on American prisoners in other wars.

''If someone needed more reasons than those for us to get out of Iraq, we have them, but that seems like more than enough,'' former South Dakota Sen. George McGovern said last week during an interview at his home south of Stevensville. ''It's a disaster of the highest order for our country.''

Because he loves his country -- ''I will go to my grave believing that this is the greatest country in the world'' -- McGovern has co-authored the book ''Out of Iraq,'' with Middle East scholar William Polk.

In addition to a thorough history of Iraq and its feuding tribal factions, the book offers a comprehensive, 24-point plan for an American withdrawal from the country by July 2007.

''It's a plan that's good for America and better for Iraq,'' McGovern said. ''It obligates us to help rebuild Iraq, but it's far, far cheaper for us to do that than continue the occupation, which has turned us into a country whose government is barely respected anywhere in the world.''

The book is short, plainspoken and to the point. Polk's Middle East expertise shines through, and McGovern's vision of what has made America a great country is evident throughout.

To McGovern, those American hallmarks -- idealism, democracy, tolerance, decency -- have all been threatened by the war in Iraq and the subsequent occupation.

''We've about given away the farm on the ideals that made this country special,'' the former Democratic presidential candidate said. ''We used to stand for something. Now we torture prisoners. We tap our own citizens' phones. The president tells us he'll abide by the laws passed by Congress only if they suit his needs. We're in trouble, but I do think there's a way out.''

Benjamin Franklin once said, ''There never was a good war.'' But Iraq, McGovern said, is even worse, because it has disintegrated into a guerilla war. Such wars, McGovern and Polk argue, are unwinnable at best, crippling for generations or even centuries at worst.

''Among wars, guerilla wars are the worst; at best they are unwinnable, lasting as in Ireland for centuries and in Algeria for a century and a half,'' the authors write. ''Aware of this history, the American neoconservative advisors to our government plan for (and indeed advocate) perpetual war. If they get their wish, then the final lesson of Iraq will emerge from the 'fog of war.' It is that insurgency and counterinsurgency brutalize whole societies, even those of the victors.''

''Out of Iraq'' is rich with hideous examples that McGovern and Polk pin not on the soldiers who committed the atrocities, but on those who led them into war.

Americans are familiar with the disturbing events at the Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo prisons, but McGovern and Polk point to the less-discussed, but no less disturbing, acts of violence that occur routinely.

''Indeed, the events that have occurred outside prisons are the most disturbing of all, because they involved what might be termed 'casual' disregard for other human beings and are done by 'normal' young men and women who are not interrogators or jailers,'' the authors write.

A few of the examples: Soldiers who kept glass Coke bottles in their Humvees to smash over the heads of Iraqi civilians. An Army sergeant who lashed a group of children with an antenna from a Humvee. A Marine corporal who kicked a 6-year-old child in the chest.

Young Americans, the authors note, are no more ''vicious or cruel than any other people.'' But taking them from a country where laws are enforced and putting them in a place with everything is different and where their very presence is resented is a ''recipe to bring out the worst in them.''

''The history of guerilla warfare demonstrates this dehumanizing tendency among people of all religions and cultures,'' Polk and McGovern write. ''It also demonstrates that the longer these conditions persist, the greater the destruction to the values of the young men and women who are so placed. Ultimately, a whole generation can lose its civic moorings.''

Regarding torture in the prisons, the authors note with horror the actions of guards, but they place the responsibility on those soldiers' leaders, almost none of whom have been held responsible in criminal cases.

Those acts of torture -- and the tacit approval of it by the failure to hold leaders responsible -- has badly damaged America's reputation in the world, McGovern said.

''The effect on the image of America cannot as yet be documented, but no one believes it to be less than disastrous,'' they write. ''Iraqis and other Asians and Africans remark that torture puts America in the league with Saddam Hussein's tyranny.''

This time, George McGovern is hardly alone. Back in 1972, when he ran for president against Richard Nixon, McGovern stood for one principle above all else -- the war in Vietnam was a disaster and the country needed to withdraw.

''It's dangerous in American politics to be right too soon,'' McGovern said wryly. ''You are essentially punished for seeing the truth too early.''

McGovern isn't early this time, and he isn't alone. Polls overwhelmingly show Americans troubled and uneasy about the war, in disbelief over the administration's reasoning for it and utterly unsure whether a plan exists to get out of it.

Like McGovern and Polk, the New York Times editorial page last week presented a plan for withdrawal.

''No matter what President Bush says, the question is not whether America can win in Iraq,'' the paper opined. ''The only question is whether the United States can extricate itself without leaving behind an unending civil war that will spread more chaos and suffering throughout the Middle East, while spawning terrorism across the globe.''

''It's becoming a pretty broadly held opinion, and it's not just peaceniks and Democrats that are saying what we're saying,'' McGovern said. ''Our book quotes generals, military commanders and historians. Six out of 10 Americans think the war is a mistake.''

The book draws on numerous statements from military experts regarding the ''disaster that this war has become,'' and makes clear that even President Bush's father, former President George H.W. Bush realized that invading Iraq was a mistake.

''Had we gone the invasion route, the United States could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land,'' the former president said of not invading Iraq during the Gulf War of 1991.

Even the president himself has begun to acknowledge that the war is going badly, although he continues to argue that victory in Iraq is central to American security. In fact, the White House has now banned future use of the administration's former catchphrase for the war campaign, ''Stay the course.'' Instead, the president on Wednesday used the phrase, ''Until the job is done.''

''They've made the mess, and they have no plan whatsoever to get us out of it,'' McGovern said.

McGovern and Polk have a plan, a plan to exit in ''an orderly way, on a reasonable schedule, and in a manner that prevents further damage to American interests.''

Even that, McGovern said, will not prevent inevitable damage in Iraq. That damage, however, will result whenever U.S. forces leave.

''A nation afflicted with a failing and costly policy is not well served by those who call for more of the same,'' the authors write.

As part of the withdrawal, America should help fund and create an effective national police force, plus help establish an international force that would help police the country until the national force takes shape.

Other parts of McGovern's withdrawal plan include:

- Release all prisoners of war and close all detention centers.

- Assist with a national reconstruction corps.

- Withdraw from the Green Zone and turn it over to the Iraqi government.

- Remove all private security firms by stopping payments to them.

- Help rebuild the country, but let Iraqis do the work with American financial assistance.

- Make financial reparations to Iraqis for the loss of life and property damage.

- America should not object to Iraq voiding all contracts for oil exploration, development and marketing. The goal is to have those contracts open to free bidding.

- Assist with food, farming and health programs conducted under guidance by the United Nations.

Assuming even the highest costs for their proposals, Polk and McGovern estimate withdrawal would save $400 billion to $500 billion over the next two years.

That money is important -- particularly to American taxpayers -- but still not the most important aspects of withdrawal, the former senator said.

''Much more important but of incalculable value are the savings to be measured in what otherwise are likely to be large numbers of shattered bodies and lost lives,'' the authors write. ''Even if our estimates are unduly optimistic and the actual costs turn out to be far higher, we believe that implementing our plan for withdrawal would be perhaps the best investment ever made by our country.''

Just as important as what America would do for Iraq before leaving is what the country should and must do for its own soldiers, McGovern said.

''This nation owes a debt of comprehensive benefits to the young men and women called to military service in Iraq,'' they write. ''The veterans of the war in Iraq especially need and deserve comprehensive rehabilitation - physically, mentally, educationally and economically, including the highly successful offerings of the World War II G.I. Bill of Rights.''

If America doesn't withdraw soon and in an orderly fashion, the authors believe, the country will eventually pull out under pressure and in haste. And that will translate to ''defeat.''

''Just as this sort of defeat has been put to nefarious use by political demagogues in the past, both in America and elsewhere, it will likely poison American politics further,'' they write. ''More important, it would leave behind an angry, dispirited Iraqi society and a vengeful, empowered mass of recruits for terrorist actions against the United States, both in Iraq and throughout the world.''

McGovern was known in 1972 as a candidate of peace, but he was a warrior in World War II. He was a bomber pilot whose planes were shot up repeatedly, and he has been awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.

He wholeheartedly believes he knows the difference between the right and wrong wars.

''I think some wars have to be fought, absolutely have to be fought,'' he said. ''But not this war. This war is a disaster in every possible way. It's gotten us nothing. It's made the world a more dangerous place. It's made us a laughingstock. It's cost us our sons and daughters. It's cost Iraq everything.''

Nothing, he said, is worse than the loss of life, but there's a loss attributable to the war that bothers the historian in McGovern almost as much - the diminishment of American idealism.

''We are a great country, but we are not being led by great Americans,'' he said. ''Our leaders have let us down in nearly every way, in both parties. We have to reclaim our greatness, and I fear it will take us a very, very long time. But we can do it.''

What we have to do, he said, is stand up and be heard. We must practice the political faith of the founding fathers, of presidents like Franklin Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln and Dwight Eisenhower.

The political leaders of the day have abdicated that faith, he said, taking up instead the mantle of money and political advantage.

''We're coming to a point again where the people will have to lead because the leaders are lost,'' he said. ''For all the talk about the Constitution you hear from the Bush administration, they don't really seem to believe in it anymore. They've essentially thrown away the Bill of Rights.''

And so McGovern is standing up, just as he did three decades ago, when he saw his country similarly adrift. In doing so, he follows proudly in the footsteps of a man from the Republican Party, Gen. Dwight Eisenhower.

''Here in America we are descended in blood and in spirit from revolutionists and rebels - men and women who dare to dissent from accepted doctrine,'' Eisenhower said in 1953, at the height of the Cold War. ''As their heirs, may we never confuse honest dissent with disloyal subversion.''