Obama Plans $42 Billion Cut in Iraq and Afghanistan War Costs

[sabra]

Source: Bloomberg

The Obama administration’s plan to reduce the number of U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan will cut the Pentagon’s war budget by $42 billion -- a 26 percent decrease from this year’s level, according to government officials.

The proposed $117 billion for fiscal year 2012, which begins Oct. 1, would be the lowest expenditure for the wars since fiscal 2005.

The war-spending request will accompany a $553 billion defense base budget for fiscal 2012 that is expected to go to Congress the week of Feb. 14, the officials said. That compares with the $525 billion stopgap defense measure Congress passed last month, said Congressional Research Service analyst Stephen Daggett.

The drop from the Pentagon’s fiscal 2011 war-spending request of $159 billion reflects President Barack Obama’s plan to reduce troop levels in the war zones and stricter White House rules on what costs can be included in the war budget, said the officials, who asked that their names not be used because the budget has not been formally released.

Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-01-20/pentagon-fiscal-2012-war-request-to-be-lowest-since-fiscal-2005.html

[Broderick]

1. We need to be out of there

We still have folks dying. It's time.

[Robb]

2. Excellent news.

[Kolesar]

5. Indeed! ...eom

[Hell Hath No Fury]

3. So it's going to pre-surge levels.

More good money after bad, IMO.

[TheWraith]

10. Uh, we're FAR below any previous levels.

Remember that we're down to under 50k troops there, and those are leaving soon.

[OregonBlue]

4. It's a good start.

[bahrbearian]

6. Think how much it would be if we got out of there.

[Lucky Luciano]

7. Can't wait to see the phony deficit hawks push back on this. nt

[RC]

8. I saw the OP's subject ling and thought that

the troops would have to start doing their own laundry.

[bossy22]

9. now this is a smart defense cut

the OCO budget needs to be reduced and end these wars. We should focus more on replacing aging strategic and large equipment instead of operation useless dirt

[defendandprotect]

15. Bush doubled the MIC budget ... about $350 BILLION increase ...

we're getting back $42 billion -- Abu Graib is still open -- and we're

still occupying Afghanistan and Iraq -- wars of aggression based on lies?

PLUS, we're still building that $750 million+ US Embassy!! The second one!!

????????????

[bossy22]

17. except stupidly spent the money

im not claiming that the pentagon should claim poverty but many of our large weapon systmes are becoming old and needing replacement- navy ships, fighters, long range bombers, ISR equipment, helicopters etc....rumsfeld spent the money on these super weapons that wound up being too expensive to actually field. The U.S. needs to start shopping for OTS (off the shelf) options to replace the military. Such good calls as restarting the DDG-51 and designing an improved version to replace our cruisers will save us money, so is the decision to increase virginia sub production to 2 a year.

also i wouldnt lump both afganistan and iraq in the same category. Afganistan in my mind started out as a just war. the world was behind us and we went in for the right reasons. Iraq was based on straight out lies.

[defendandprotect]

18. Wait ... who were the enemy when Bush took office? Power and Rice ON VICEO....

are ssen talking about how we had no enemies in the world and how if we

wanted to go to war "we'd have to invent some"-!!

The fake Cold War was over - the USSR was gone -- what happened to the peace dividend?

All of that crap should be folded up and sunk somewhere or put in a museum -- no one

wants war except elites.

Rumsfeld also couldn't account for $2.3 TRILLION the Pentagon still can't find!!

PLUS, notions of privatizing the military have also bankrupted them and us.

We can save an immediate 28% by MERGING THE SERVICES ... something every other nation has done!

We need a liberal Congress and President who would cut up that Pentagon credit card --

and put most of the corrupt/criminal contractors in jail!


also i wouldnt lump both afganistan and iraq in the same category. Afganistan in my mind started out as a just war. the world was behind us and we went in for the right reasons. Iraq was based on straight out lies.

Afghanistan certainly was NOT in any sense a just war -- since when do you attack an entire

nation because some of the people are suspected criminals? Should we have bombed Australians

because of Assange? Or maybe we should have nuked Mississippi for their KKK members?

Afghanistan offered to turn over Bin Laden, as I recall, and W refused. Afghanistan is as

much fakery and lies as Iraq.

Plus that, Obama has gone even further than W in many ways re claiming a right to indefinitely

detain prisoners and the a right to assassinate! Eye opening, indeed! :nuke:

[SoapBox]

11. I would love to cut off some "feed" from the Pentagon "pig"...Bet the WarHawks will SQUAWK!

...the Haters, Killers and MilitaryNutJobs will screeeeech!

[rocktivity]

12. How - by brining the troops home?

:bounce:
rocktivity

[bossy22]

13. actually yes

mostly by bringing troops home- also by limiting what can be funded within the OCO budget (the "war budget")

hopefully by 2014 we can get down to an OCO of no more than 50 billion. The base budget is a whole different story. i am actually a fan of Gates's current plan to keep defense spending flat until abou 2016 and then increase it by 3% per year after that. I believe that is fair because the overall defense budget (which includes war funding) would be reduced close to 20% from their highs and then increased by no more than our average yearly economic growth

[defendandprotect]

14. Cuts? We need to get the hell out of Afghanistan and Iraq and stop building new military bases...

and Taj Mahal type US Embassies costing $750 million++

These wars are bankrupting the Treasury -- and Dems have been refunding

these Bush wars for 5 years now -- and Obama has been president for more

than two years -- whose wars are they now?

PLUS, these wars are illegal and immoral wars of aggression -- based on lies.

[valerief]

16. I wonder who really gets most of the money. nt