House OKs Military Spending Bill

The House approved a $417-billion military spending bill Tuesday that includes an initial $25 billion for U.S. operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, plus billions for major weapons systems.

The 403-17 vote underscored an election-year bipartisan consensus behind military spending that wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have accentuated.

If anything, Democrats think President Bush has requested too little for operations in the two countries in the year starting Oct. 1 and predict the $25 billion he requested for the latter months of this year will prove at least $50 billion too low.

In the Senate, a proposal was rejected that would have taken money from Bush’s proposed missile defense budget for use on such tasks as securing bomb materiel around the world that could fall into the hands of terrorists and policing America’s ports and borders. The 56-44 vote defeated an amendment to the Senate’s defense authorization bill that would have shifted $515 million from the $10.2-billion missile defense budget.

Although Bush wanted to decide exactly how his requested $25 billion for Iraq and Afghanistan would be spent, the House limited his unfettered control to $1 billion. The rest was assigned to 22 specific accounts, such as $674 million earmarked to provide armor for Humvee vehicles.

It also included the 3.5% military pay raise Bush requested.