Pentagon Wants $200B for War

The Pentagon has drafted a funding request exceeding $200 billion for operations against Iran, setting up a clash with Congress over the scale and direction of the war, according to administration officials. The proposal, sent to the White House, would go well beyond paying for the air campaign to date and is aimed largely at ramping up production of precision weapons used by US and Israeli forces over the past three weeks, the Washington Post reports. The supplemental budget would be on top of President Trump's push for the next defense budget to total $1.5 trillion.

White House officials have not decided how much to formally seek from Congress, and some doubt lawmakers would approve such a package, one senior administration official said. The Pentagon has circulated multiple versions of a supplemental request as the costs of the Iran attacks have mounted, surpassing $11 billion in the first week alone, according to officials. There could be other complications, per the Post. Former Pentagon budget official Elaine McCusker, now at the American Enterprise Institute, cautioned that industry limits on labor, facilities, and materials will constrain how fast production can rise. "Just throwing lots of money into the industrial base doesn't necessarily get you things sooner," she said.