By Emelie Rutherford
The Obama administration released last Thursday night its request to Congress for $75.5 billion in supplemental-war funding, including $2.7 billion for mine-resistant vehicles, $9.8 billion for armored vehicles, $1.5 billion for countering explosive devices, and $600 million for F-22 jets.
The long-delayed supplemental spending bill has an overall pricetag of $83.4 billion, because additional funding for the State Department and other agencies is included. President Obama pled last Thursday for Congress’s speedy approval in a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
The supplemental would fund the United States’ new strategy against al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan, along with the process in Iraq leading up to a drawdown of troops there, through the end of fiscal year 2009 on Sept. 30
The measure request $600 million for four F-22 jets–the final ones Defense Secretary Robert Gates wants to buy from Lockheed Martin [LMT]–as part of $11.6 billion in funding for refurbishing or replacing equipment worn or damaged from use in Iraq and Afghanistan. The F-22s are intended to replace one Boeing [BA]-built F-15 and three Lockheed Martin-made F-16s lost in theater.
The procurement totals in the 99-page bill include:
– $2.7 billion for the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicle (MRAP) Fund, to fund the sustainment, transportation and upgrades of MRAPs in Iraq and AFghanistan, and to “also allow additional procurement should ongoing analysis of theater requirements warrant;”
– $1.5 billion for the Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Fund;
– $8.1 billion for Army tactical wheeled vehicles, including “High Mobility Multi-Purpose Wheeled Vehicles, Medium Tactical Vehicles, Heavy Tactical Vehicles, armored security vehicles, and tactical trailers; communications and electronic equipment, such as Joint Network Nodes, SINCGARS and high frequency radios, Information System Security Program, Combat Service Support SATCOM and its interface system (CAISI), WARLOCK systems, night vision devices, Air and Missile Defense Planning and Control Systems, Base Expeditionary Targeting Surveillance System-Combined and intelligence equipment; unmanned aerial systems; other combat support equipment, such as mine clearing vehicles and equipment, construction equipment, Chemical Biological Reconnaissance and Nuclear Soldier Protection; Tactical Bridging, and Rapid Equipping Soldier Support Equipment, which are critical to protecting U.S. and Coalition forces participating in military operations supporting the war effort;”
– $1.7 billion for Army weapons and tracked combat vehicles, including “Stryker vehicles and survivability enhancements, M1 Abrams Upgrades, M2 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicle upgrades, Improved Recovery Vehicle (M88A Hercules), and small arms such as the M240 Medium Machine Gun and Common Remotely Operated Weapons Station;”
– $1.6 billion for Marine Corps weapons and equipment, including “Add on Armor Protection Kits, High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles, Light Assault Vehicle upgrades, Repair and Test Equipment, Explosive Ordnance Disposal equipment, small arms, and other ancillary equipment. Funds provided will be used to reconstitute equipment destroyed, damaged, or worn out by combat operations, or to ensure that adequate equipment is available for next deploying units;”
– $1.8 billion for the Air Force to “procure security and tactical vehicles, communications and electronic equipment, such as radios and intelligence support equipment, and other combat support equipment, such as night vision devices;”
– $264.8 million for Navy tactical vehicles and “intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance, special purpose, supply, salvage, and communications equipment;”
– $2.4 billion for Air Force aircraft, including the four F-22s as well as “additional MQ-9 Reaper Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and various UAV modification/retrofit efforts” along with “aircraft modification efforts to improve communications and increase crew and aircraft safety and survivability, such as Single Line of Sight/Beyond Line of Sight for F-16 aircraft and Large Aircraft Infrared Countermeasures for C-130, C-17 and C-5 aircraft;”
– $762.6 million for Army aircraft, for reconstitution and to ensure equipment is available for training deploying units;
– $601 million for Navy aircraft, including “MH-60 and UH-1Y helicopters, as well as modifications to aircraft, such as the F/A-18 aircraft, CH-46 landing aids, and CH-53 Blue Force Tracking;”
– $767.1 million for Army missiles, including “Hellfire, TOW, Guided Multiple Launched Rockets, and Javelin missiles;”
– $99.5 million for Navy weapons, “such as Tactical Unmanned Aircraft Systems upgrades, Hellfire missiles and small arms;” and
– $57.4 million for Air Force Predator Hellfire missiles.
Congressional aides were briefed late last week on the supplemental by the White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB), which released the details Thursday night.
Obama wrote to Pelosi that the war-funding request, the first of his administration, is also the “last planned” supplemental for Iraq and Afghanistan operations.
“Since September 2001, the congress has passed 17 separate emergency funding bills totaling $822.1 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,” Obama said in the April 9 letter. “After (seven) years of war, the American people deserve and honest accounting of the cost of our involvement in our ongoing military operations.”
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs also told reporters last Thursday the White House intends for the supplemental request to be the final one for Iraq and Afghanistan.
“This will be the last time,” Gibbs said.
OMB announced in February the administration will request $130 billion in war funding for all of FY ’10 at the same time its submits its detailed $533.7 billion FY ’10 base defense budget request (Defense Daily, Feb. 27).
Still, Pentagon Comptroller Robert Hale at a March 18 congressional hearing said the Pentagon could seek a supplemental in FY ’10 if additional wartime needs arise (Defense Daily, March 19).
The House Appropriations Defense subcommittee (HAC-D) is expected to discuss the supplemental during an April 22 hearing, followed by an April 30 markup of the bill by House Appropriations Committee.
Gibbs reiterated Hale’s call for lawmakers to pass the supplemental by Memorial Day.