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Bush Asks Congress For $46 Billion More In War Funding
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VIDEO | President Bush asked Congress on Monday for another $46 billion to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and finance other national security needs.
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Most Americans oppose funding Bush's full war request, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll last month. Just a quarter of those surveyed supported the president's full spending plan, as it was then projected, and seven in 10 wanted it reduced. About 46 percent wanted it cut sharply or altogether.
The $45.9 billion Bush asked for yesterday comes on top of $150.5 billion already requested for the 2008 fiscal year that started Oct. 1. If passed, it would put the total cost of Iraq, Afghanistan and counterterrorism operations at $806 billion, more than any single U.S. conflict since World War II. A study by the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments last month said that in today's dollars the Persian Gulf war of 1991 cost $88 billion, the Korean War cost $456 billion and Vietnam cost $518 billion.
"We're clearly not at the end of this," said Steven M. Kosiak, the study's author. "This is going to be going on at least through this administration," he added, and "the war costs are likely to be with us even if we do pull out of Iraq soon."
A Congressional Research Service report in July estimated that the total cost of Iraq, Afghanistan and other operations over the next 10 years could reach $1.45 trillion, even assuming the number of U.S. troops in Iraq is cut in half by 2013.
The difference is that national defense today represents a smaller burden on the U.S. economy, roughly 4.2 percent of gross domestic product this year, compared with 9.4 percent at the peak of Vietnam and 14.2 percent at the peak of the Korean War, Kosiak's report said.
Bush's spending request yesterday included $42.3 billion more for the Pentagon and $3.6 billion for the State Department. It would pay for day-to-day costs of the wars, including everything from bullets to body armor, as well as for training of Iraqi troops, embassy programs and intelligence operations. It also would pay for treatment of injured soldiers, equipment repairs and relief for Iraqi refugees.
The administration also tucked in money for priorities not directly related to Iraq or Afghanistan, such as funds for the Palestinian Authority, U.N. peacekeeping in Darfur, emergency food aid for Africa, counternarcotics aid for Mexico and Central America and heavy fuel oil for North Korea as part of a deal to dismantle its nuclear programs.
