D.O.D.: Iraq Budget “Wrong” from the Start

In its new bud­get for fis­cal year 2008, the Pentagon says it’ll par­cel out about $142 bil­lion to pay for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But the Defense Department doesn’t really believe in its own fig­ures, appar­ently. The num­ber was was cal­cu­lated before the new 35,00–48,000 troop “surge” plan was put in place, Pentagon comp­trol­ler Tina Jonas said in a news con­fer­ence. So $142 bil­lion is just a “best esti­mate.“
“We know it will be wrong,” she added. “Conditions will change, and we’ll have to adjust at that point.“
The num­ber is also $28 bil­lion dol­lars less than the $170 bil­lion being spent on Iraq and Afghanistan this year. Does that mean there’s some sort of secret plan to start bring­ing troops home? Hell, no. “White House spokesman Tony Fratto said that fact shouldn’t be inter­preted as an indi­ca­tion of likely reduc­tion in U.S. troops in Iraq,” accord­ing to the AP.
There was another item of note from the Pentagon news con­fer­ence intro­duc­ing the new bud­get. Vice Admiral Stephen Stanley, Director for Force Structure, Resources, and Assessment for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, listed a num­ber of major “risks” to the health of the American armed forces. One of the biggest was increased wear and tear that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were putting on mil­i­tary gear. Another was the increased “oper­a­tional tempo” from those wars, which were grind­ing down our troops. In other words, the wars them­selves are a threat to the American mil­i­tary. Interesting to hear that, in a Pentagon briefing.

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