The
White
House has asked Congress for an additional $5.6 billion in oversees
contingency operations funds, of which $5 billion will go to the Defense
Department and the rest will go to the State Department, to cover the mounting
costs of the anti-ISIS campaign. That brings the Defense Department's total Fiscal 2015 OCO request to $63.6 billion. Of the $5 billion, $3.4 billion would
support military actions under Operation Inherent Resolve, Defense Secretary
Chuck Hagel told members of the House Armed Services Committee on Thursday.
Another $1.6 billion would go to the “new Iraqi train-and-equip fund, devoted to
helping reconstitute Iraq’s security forces,” said Hagel. “This fund will be
critical for enabling Iraqi security forces, including Kurdish and tribal
forces, to go on the offense in 2015. And, it will require the Iraqi government
and coalition members to make significant contributions as well.” About $1
billion of that fund will “be available initially” while the remaining $600
million “would not be released until the government of Iraq and coalition
partners have provided at least $600 million of their own contributions,
because the Iraqi government must invest in its own security and its own
future,” said Hagel.