Bush to request Iraq funds through emergency bills

Washington, Feb 2: President George W Bush next week will seek emergency funds to pay for operations in Iraq and try to fend off critics who say he is using a ''shadow budget'' to pay for the unpopular war.

Bush will submit two emergency spending proposals for the Iraq war on Monday when he unveils his annual budget, an administration official said today on condition of anonymity.

The first of those supplemental bills, for 2007, is expected by many on Capitol Hill to top 100 billion dollars, making it the biggest such request yet for Iraq. The second would cover fiscal year 2008.

Meanwhile, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that Bush's planned troop buildup could cost at least double what the administration initially estimated and involve more than twice the number of troops.

The price tag could reach about 13 billion dollars for a four-month mission, the non-partisan CBO said. The approximately 20,000 combat soldiers Bush said he is going to deploy to Iraq might have to be augmented by 28,000 support troops, it said.

In January, the Bush administration estimated a cost of 5.6 billion dollars to dispatch 21,500 troops.

The administration official said details of both emergency spending proposals would be provided in the budget book that lays out the overall budget for 2008.

It also will include a forecast for war-spending in fiscal 2009 but not beyond that. ''That's about as far out as you can realistically project,'' the administration official said.

Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers have criticized Bush for using emergency bills to fund the Iraq war and have demanded that he include the costs in his regular budget.

In a letter sent to Bush in December, three lawmakers said that the use of emergency bills had created an ''ever-expanding shadow budget'' that was obscuring Congress's oversight process and skewing budget deficit projections.

It was signed by Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, a North Dakota Democrat, House of Representatives Budget Committee Chairman John Spratt of South Carolina, and New Hampshire Republican Sen. Judd Gregg.

Lawmakers also contend that Bush is required by law to incorporate the war costs into the regular budget based on an amendment passed last June. The administration has said it does not view that language as binding because submitting the budget is the president's role, not Congress's.

Administration officials say they do not object to greater transparency but are using emergency bills to avoid having the costs viewed as part of the Pentagon's permanent budget. If such costs were incorporated into the main Pentagon budget, it would be politically difficult to scale them back when it is time to do so.

But the Bush administration hopes that plenty of details on the spending plans will satisfy Congress's demands.

''We're going to try to be much more transparent on the costs of the war,'' said the White House spokesman Tony Snow.

Reuters