Breaking News | Forum | UK News | USA News | World News | Political News | Sci-Tech News | War & Terrorism News | Sports News | Multimedia | Set Homepage

Saturday, December 15th, 2007

The US Senate has approved $696 billion (£345 billion) in increased military spending, including boosted funds for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The bill has passed through both houses of Congress and is expected to be signed by US president George Bush soon.

Increased funding for the Iraq war was put into doubt after Democrats, who favour a pull-out from the country, took control of both legislative houses in midterm elections last year. The party had attempted to tie increased funding for the war to a date for a full withdrawal from operations.

Previous attempts by the party to pass laws containing the condition have failed and the only bill which contained the clause was vetoed by Mr Bush earlier this year.

In addition to $189 billion (£94 billion) in funds for operations in the Middle East, the present bill will increase the pay of servicemen by 3.5 per cent and also sets aside funds for the medical care of veterans.

However, the bill places obstacles in the way of the Bush administration’s plan for setting up a missile defence shield in Europe. The White House hopes to set up interceptor systems in the Czech Republic and Poland to protect the US from missiles launched by rogue states.

The legislation requires the parliaments of the two European countries to give the go-ahead for the proposal and for the defence department to brief Congress about the programme before the release of funds.

Under the US political system, the president must ask Congress to appropriate funds to programmes it wishes to implement.

© Adfero Ltd

See More:Iraq 

Have Your Say: US increases Iraq war funds
Please note, only selected comments will be published.

Or discuss this report in our new forums

RSS TrackBack URL

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 15th, 2007 at 2:08 pm and is filed under War & Terrorism News . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Loading ...

ADVERTISEMENTS

SITE MAPS

7/7 Afghanistan Alternative Energy Art BBC Big Brother Bilderberg Biometrics Bush CIA Climate Change Cover Up Cults Culture Database State David Hicks David Ray Griffin Democrats Demos Drugs Education EU False Flag FBI Fraud Free Speech Freemasons G8 Globalization Guantanamo Health News History ID Cards Internet Iran Iraq Israel Law Marches MI5 MI6 Microsoft Military MoD Money Music NASA Neocons NSA Oil Pakistan Podcast Police State Propaganda RFID RINF Rumsfeld Science Secrecy Security Slavery Space Sports Spying Stephen Lendman Technology Terrorism Tony Blair Torture TV UK News UN USA News Video Voting Warfare White House Wolfowitz World News Yahoo
2003 - 2005 Archives | 2005 - 2007 Archives | 2007 - 2008 Archives | Current Archives | Past Version