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The United States is spending nearly US$4 billion a month in Iraq, a "burn rate" that is likely to continue far longer than the Bush administration intended due to ongoing attacks on US forces, the Washington Post reported Thursday.
Pentagon officials have avoided divulging the size of the force they anticipated for Iraqi occupation and reconstruction, but a Pentagon report sent to US Congress last week conceded that demobilization has not been as rapid as planned.
US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told the US Senate Armed Services Committee Wednesday that the monthly cost of operations in Iraq is roughly US$3.9 billion.
The military has already had to shift about US$3.6 billion from an Iraq contingency fund and other military accounts to cover unanticipated costs, according to the report.
And the current force in Iraq -- about 150,000 troops -- will likely remain in the region into the next fiscal year, which begins in October, the report said. Before the war, US Defense Department officials hinted that the peacekeeping force would be 40,000 to 60,000 troops.
The US$3.9 billion monthly spending rate is nearly double the rate anticipated for longer-term peacekeeping operations, a US House Appropriations Committee aide said.
(Xinhua News Agency July 11, 2003)
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