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Pres Bush is asking for another $46 billion for Iraq, Afghanistan, and other “national security” projects.
”We must provide our troops with the help and support they need to get the job done,” Bush said.
The figure brings to $196.4 billion the total requested by the administration for operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere for the budget year that started Oct. 1. It includes $189.3 billion for the Defense Department, $6.9 billion for the State Department and $200 million for other agencies.
Where has all this money been going so far? Well, we know the State Dept. has recently thrown another $92 million to the Dogs of War… erm… Blackwater. A group that continues to sit in hot water with increasing claims of unnecessary violence and hostility being shown by it’s employees.
On top of that, the military itself has been critized heavily for throwing money into projects that have no practical application in today’s combat environment, and not only do not benefit our troops- but might possibly endanger them. The biggest offender? The V-22 Osprey. A tilt-rotor troop carrier TIME referred to as the “Flying Shame”, and that carries the distinction of being so wrought with difficulties, set-backs, compromises, and failures that even VP Cheney wanted to take funding away from the development program.
(T)he aircraft that flies like an airplane but takes off and lands like a chopper is about to make its combat debut in Iraq. It has been a long, strange trip: the V-22 has been 25 years in development, more than twice as long as the Apollo program that put men on the moon. V-22 crashes have claimed the lives of 30 men — 10 times the lunar program’s toll — all before the plane has seen combat. The Pentagon has put $20 billion into the Osprey and expects to spend an additional $35 billion before the program is finished. In exchange, the Marines, Navy and Air Force will get 458 aircraft, averaging $119 million per copy.
So where does the money not seem to be going?
(A) Pentagon task force recently concluded that the number of mental-health professionals available to vets is “woefully inadequate,” and the average wait time for disability claims is six months. Linda Bilmes, a policy analyst at Harvard who will testify before Congress this week, calculates that over the next decade, the disability costs for vets will be at least $60 billion—more than six times the administration’s official projections. The numbers coming out of government budget offices, she says, “are significantly underestimating the reality.” All this has angered some vets and their families. “I would love to have the president live my life for one week to see how difficult it is,” says Annette McLeod, wife of Army specialist Wendell McLeod, who is suffering from PTSD after serving in Iraq. “How do you fund a war but not fund the casualties?”
That question, for now, goes unanswered.
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