Intense combat in Iraq is chewing up military hardware and consuming money at an unexpectedly rapid rate — depleting military coffers, straining defense contractors and putting pressure on Bush administration officials to seek a major boost in war funding long before they had hoped.
Since Congress approved an $87 billion defense request last year, the administration has steadfastly maintained that military forces in Iraq will be sufficiently funded until early next year. President Bush's budget request for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1 included no money for Iraqi operations, and his budget director, Joshua B. Bolten, said no request would come until January at the earliest.
But military officials, defense contractors and members of Congress say that worsening U.S. military fortunes in Iraq have dramatically changed the equation and that more money will be needed soon. This comes as lawmakers, returning from their spring break, voice unease about the mounting violence in Iraq and what they say is the lack of a clearly enunciated strategy for victory.
The military already has identified unmet funding needs, including initiatives aimed at providing equipment and weapons for troops in Iraq. The Army has publicly identified nearly $6 billion in funding requests that did not make Bush's $402 billion defense budget for 2005, including $132 million for bolt-on vehicle armor; $879 million for combat helmets, silk-weight underwear, boots and other clothing; $21.5 million for M249 squad automatic weapons; and $27 million for ammunition magazines, night sights and ammo packs. Also unfunded: $956 million for repairing desert-damaged equipment and $102 million to replace equipment lost in combat.
The Marine Corps' unfunded budget requests include $40 million for body armor, lightweight helmets and other equipment for "Marines engaged in the global war on terrorism," Marine Corps documents state. The Marines are also seeking 1,800 squad automatic weapons and 5,400 M4 carbine rifles.
Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.), vice chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, charged that the president is playing political games by postponing further funding requests until after the election, to try to avoid reopening debate on the war's cost and future.
Weldon described the administration's current defense budget request as "outrageous" and "immoral" and said that at least $10 billion is needed for Iraqi operations over the next five months.
"There needs to be a supplemental, whether it's a presidential election year or not," he said. "The support of our troops has to be the number one priority of this country. . . . Somebody's got to get serious about this."
Rep. Chet Edwards (D-Tex.), who returned from Iraq on March 23, said senior Army officers and contractors told him "serious problems" will surface this summer if Congress does not approve more spending by June. Without the additional funding, food concession contracts will have to be renegotiated and operations and training bases in the United States will have to be cannibalized to finance operations in Iraq.
"If one American soldier in Iraq loses his life because Congress and the administration were afraid of the political consequences of another supplemental appropriations bill, shame on everyone who should be a part of that process," Edwards said.
Some lawmakers said that if the administration stands firm against supplemental military spending this year, Congress may act on its own this summer to increase spending. But without Bush's lead, lawmakers say, it will be difficult.
Pressed on the funding issue yesterday at a Senate hearing, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz conceded that higher-than-expected troop levels are draining some military accounts, but he said other accounts remain in surplus and can be tapped.
Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was more equivocal: "We know that we have additional costs that we have to find funding sources for," he said. "We thought before that the services were identifying shortfalls that we could bridge. . . . I think we just have to assure ourselves that's still true."
The strains are beginning to show. Last month, all four military services began spending money halfway through the fiscal year that they were not supposed to touch until July, a senior Republican Armed Services Committee aide said. The military has asked Congress eight times in the past few months for permission to shift $619 million to urgent combat needs from less-pressing programs, Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) said.
Scrambling to fill its needs, the Pentagon last week diverted 120 armored Humvees purchased by the Israel Defense Forces to Iraq. Yesterday, the Army announced a $110 million contract for still more armored Humvees.
But even that will not be enough, said Robert F. Mecredy, president of the defense group at Armor Holdings. As the two-front uprising in Iraq began taking its toll last month, the company's O'Gara-Hess & Eisenhardt Armoring Co. subsidiary cranked up its Ohio defense plant, turning out 214 heavily armored Humvees in March, revving up for 220 this month, even building its own bulletproof-glass operation to augment faltering suppliers.
But by September, Mecredy said, O'Gara's funding from the Army will be running out. Mecredy arrived in Washington yesterday for a week of intensive congressional lobbying. To keep Humvee production at the Army's requested rate, he said, Armor Holdings will need $354 million more by Oct. 1, the beginning of fiscal 2005.
The top officers of Army Materiel Command began a major resupply review at Fort McCoy, Wis., yesterday to determine how to maintain operations in Iraq under increasingly strained circumstances, said Gary Motsek, the command's deputy director for support operations. The Army has worked through a serious supply problem with body armor, he said. And by next month, the command believes, a lingering short-supply problem with the tanklike treads of Bradley Fighting Vehicles will have been resolved.
But that is putting a further strain on the budget. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. is now churning out 50,000 steel "shoes" for Bradley treads a month, and will be up to 70,000 by June, Motsek said.
'Have to be innovative'
And other problems are still being worked through. The backlog of rear rotor blades for Chinook transport helicopters has become serious, he said, with 24 Chinooks now grounded in Iraq. Pre-positioned military stockpiles in Kuwait are critically short.
"An alternative source of funding has to be identified," Motsek said. "We're going to have to be innovative, no doubt about it."
Bush administration officials have not wavered in their contention that money is actually plentiful. Dov S. Zakheim, who left his post as Pentagon comptroller last week, told reporters earlier this month that there may be a temporary spike in spending in the coming months but that costs would then steadily decline. By borrowing from military personnel, operations and maintenance accounts for the final half of 2005, the Pentagon may be able to bridge the gap, said Rep. John M. Spratt Jr. (S.C.), the ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee. But budget chicanery of that magnitude would be unprecedented, he added.
"Whether they can do that if the requirement is $50 [billion] or $60 billion remains to be seen," Spratt said. "It's no way to run a budget."