Big hike in budget for Bush war

[Neo]

February 06, 2007
Big hike in budget for Bush war

By Anwar Iqbal

WASHINGTON, Feb 5: US President George W. Bush sought a record $784 billion for national defence on Monday as part of the annual and supplemental budget requests he sent to Congress.

In his $2.9 trillion budget requests for fiscal year 2008, Mr Bush is seeking $481.4 billion for the Department of Defence, which shows a 62 per cent boost in defence spending since he took office in 2001 and a 10 per cent increase over this year’s spending.

The Bush administration is seeking $235 billion more for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for fiscal year 2008, which begins on Oct. 1.

Most of these funds will be spent on Iraq but President Bush warned that even more funds may be needed for this increasingly unpopular war.

“As commander in chief, my highest priority is the security of our nation”, Mr Bush said in a budget message to Congress. “The budget will support a new strategy in Iraq that demands more from Iraq’s elected government, and gives American forces in Iraq the reinforcements they need to complete the mission”.

The $784 billion proposed defence budget is the total of four separate requests covering three fiscal years — a base budget for 2008, supplemental budgets for 2007 and 2008, and a partial supplemental budget for 2009, said the House Budget Committee Chairman John Spratt, a Democrat from South Carolina.

“That is a huge sum of money for one budget cycle". Mr Spratt says. "The president calls for us to rein in spending and then calls for a $784 billion increase in spending.”

The Democrats, who now control both chambers of the US Congress, warned that they will not give a blanket approval for the administration’s defence requests as the previous Republican-controlled Congress did.

Mr Spratt told reporters that even some Republicans are no longer “willing to rally around” President Bush’s budget proposals.

Steven Kosiak, a defence analyst with the Centre for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment in Washington, told reporters that the $784 billion budget request for national defence was comparable with what American spent on “previous big wars like Vietnam and Korea, and might very well surpass those”.

While sending his requests for 2008, Mr Bush bowed partly to congressional pressure to include more comprehensive war costs in the budget plan.

Under a Republican-controlled Congress, the administration refused to include most war-related costs in its budget submissions, saying they were difficult to estimate and instead sought funding through a series of supplemental appropriations.

President Bush also sent to Congress a request for additional funding to continue his global war on terror, including funds needed to address extraordinary emergency requirements.

These include:

Providing resources for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan:

— $43.4 billion for 2007 and $74 billion for 2008 for ongoing military and intelligence requirements

— $10.4 billion for 2007 and $15.2 billion for 2008 to provide greater protection to US military forces including countering improvised explosive devices

— $1.5 billion for 2007 and $2.7 billion in 2008 to support coalition partners and the Commander’s Emergency Response Programme

US diplomatic presence in Iraq and Afghanistan:

— $877 million in 2007 and $1.9 billion in 2008 for security and operating costs to support US embassy operations and diplomatic activity in Iraq and Afghanistan

Strengthening Iraqi self-reliance:

— $5.6 billion to deploy reinforcement of more than 20,000 additional soldiers and Marines to Iraq, including 4,000 Marines for the restive Anbar province

— $3.8 billion in 2007 and $2 billion in 2008 for training Iraqi security forces

— $2.3 billion in 2007 and $966 million in 2008 in foreign assistance to Iraq

Classified activities:

— $3.6 billion in 2007 and $5.9 billion in 2008 for classified military and intelligence activities

— $176 million in 2007 and $147 million in 2008 for FBI and other US agencies for their anti-terrorism efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan

Stabilising Afghanistan against the insurgency:

— Security Forces: $5.9 billion in 2007 and $2.7 billion in 2008 for expedited training of the Afghan security forces

— $698 million in 2007 and $339 million in 2008 for reconstruction efforts

Preventing weapons of mass destruction from falling into the hands of terrorists:

— $63 million in 2007 and $50 million in 2008 to accelerate US efforts to secure vulnerable nuclear and radioactive material overseas from diversion or theft by terrorists or states of concern

Strengthening Lebanon:

— $770 million in 2007, including $300 million in economic assistance, $286 million in security assistance and $184 million to support the United Nations Peacekeeping Force

Winning the war of ideas:

— $50 million in 2007 to increase outreach to the Muslim audiences with additional television programming, expanded education and cultural exchanges, and enhanced public diplomacy programs

— Sudan: $362 million in 2007 for emergency humanitarian assistance, emergency food aid, and peacekeeping needs in Darfur and Southern Sudan

— Somalia: $40 million for peacekeeping operations and $20 million for stabilising the humanitarian and security situation in Somalia

— Kosovo: $279 million in 2007 for a one-time assistance package to promote stability and economic growth.

http://www.dawn.com/2007/02/06/top11.htm