War Costs Soar by a Third; Total Could Top $1.4 Trillion

By Noah Shachtman

It’s not just the troops that are surging.  War costs are up for American operations in Iraq and Afghanistan* – way up, more than a third higher than last year.  In the first half of this fiscal year, the Defense Department’s “average monthly obligations for contracts and pay is running about $12 billion per month, well above the $8.7 billion in FY2006,” says a new report, obtained by DANGER ROOM, from the non-partisan Congressional Research Service.

Additional war costs for the next  10 years could total about $472 billion if troop levels fall to 30,000 by 2010, or $919 billion if troop levels fall to 70,000 by about 2013.  If these estimates are added to already appropriated amounts, total funding about $980 billion to $1.4 trillion by 2017.

Meanwhile, Inside Defense reports that “top Pentagon budget and program officials have directed the military services to prepare spending proposals to finance Iraq and Afghanistan operations… through fiscal year 2009, which will span the last days of the Bush administration and the early months of the next administration.”

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