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| Defense Secretary Robert Gates pauses during a news conference at the Pentagon on Nov. 15. Haraz N. Ghanbari |
Pentagon is left scrambling to pay for war
Secretary Robert Gates says Congress's failure to fund war operations means furloughs at US bases are likely.
from the November 19, 2007 edition
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"The high degree of uncertainty on funding for the war is immensely complicating this task and will have many real consequences for this department and for our men and women in uniform," he said.
Unlike during last year's budget showdown with Congress over war funding, the Pentagon this time has little wiggle room for moving money around, said Gates. The Pentagon currently can move only about $3.7 billion into accounts for war operations – roughly the equivalent of one week's worth of war funding.
That's largely true, says Rep. Joe Sestak (D) of Pennsylvania, a former Navy admiral who worked on the Pentagon's Joint Staff before retiring and running for Congress. "Money is only so fungible among various accounts," he says. "Congress makes it that way."
Representative Sestak voted in favor of the ultimately unsuccessful proposal to fund war operations at $50 billion as long as troops start leaving soon. But he says he doesn't want Congress to micromanage the war via its purse strings and says the better option for Democratic lawmakers is to put such goal-post language in an authorization bill instead of insisting that it be part of an appropriations bill. The distinction would give Pentagon planners a date to work toward, without directly affecting their ability to spend the money Congress appropriates for war operations.
"It makes Congress a less blunt instrument," Sestak says.
Only when lawmakers end their rancor over the war can the two parties come to an agreement about how to proceed, he says. "I don't think we sit down enough with the other side to work things out."
This is not the first time the Pentagon has threatened severe consequences for delayed or insufficient war funding. Earlier this year during budget negotiations for fiscal 2007, the Defense Department said it would have to curtail critical predeployment training for troops and other procurement programs if Congress didn't provide enough money for the war. But the situation was different then, because the Pentagon already had what's called "bridge supplemental" funding that allowed it more flexibility to get through budgetary dry spells. This year, no such supplemental funding exists – hence the Pentagon's threat to begin shutting down US bases.
Ultimately, gridlock over war funding may not end until after the '08 election, says think tank analyst Mr. Thompson.
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