Pentagon seeks $120B in war funds

[Joanne98]

Source: Politico

The Pentagon is expected to seek in the range of $120 billion for overseas war costs next year, a significant drop from 2011 but still a stubborn strain on deficit-reduction efforts.

The new request was discussed Thursday at a closed-door briefing for top lawmakers with Defense Secretary Robert Gates and confirmed to POLITICO by an administration official.


For the current fiscal year, the Obama administration has assumed about $159 billion in costs for military operations, chiefly in Afghanistan and Iraq. The new estimates now appear to reflect the double impact of pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq and also getting a better handle on stepped-up operations in Afghanistan.

Nonetheless it is a very different picture than President Barack Obama had once hoped for as a candidate backed by anti-war forces in his party. In contrast with the Bush-era budgets, Obama has made a point of including some place-holder for war costs in his spending plans, but these have proven more of a gesture than any accurate forecast of the dollars needed.




Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0111/47206.html

[no_hypocrisy]

1. Trade you war funding for tax cuts

[Roland99]

4. I'd rather trade war funding for Single Payer/Medicare for all!

[katty]

2. every penny they are "Given" they lose in the billions, spend

like addicted gamblers on bullshit projects, throw money at faux wars that can never be won....and on and on...

[Hubert Flottz]

3. Get in the back of the line Mr. ChickenHawk.

Wall Street CEOs get the first check...then the banksters...

[Bigmack]

5. Try and look at this from the perspective...

of somebody from another country... or planet.

They want how much?... for a decade-old war that has cost $367 B so far.. to say nothing of 1500 US lives, 9,000 more wounded, and untold deaths among the Afghans?

For a war that has no tangible goals or even a definition of "victory"?

Anybody from another country or planet would respond to such a request...

"Are you out of your fucking mind?"

[sarcasmo]

6. Total war budget including Pentagon, CIA all our bases and all our wars.

Does anyone have an idea of the yearly average for the World Police?

[Bigmack]

7. No guess... around $1 Trillion. We can't afford it. nt

[FlyByNight]

8. The rest of us will get "austerity"

The money is needed here. For us - NOT Wall St.