Blitz Bureau
NEW DELHI: The US military campaign against Iran has cost approximately $37.5 billion so far. At a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on July 21, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth offered the Iran war cost estimate, as lawmakers consider an $86.7 billion supplemental spending request from President Donald Trump.
The requested supplemental covers funding for a range of government programs, including $67.1 billion for the Department of War. Hegseth called on the Congress to pass the supplemental request to sustain recent US military operations, like the one in the Middle East. “We face critical shortfalls that threaten our ability to also simply pay our service members, rapidly replenish equipment and munitions, and sustain vital operations without disruption,” he said.
“This supplemental request serves two purposes: sustain our military readiness to meet this year’s new demands, and accelerate critical capabilities to replace and augment those we have used in contingencies.”
The Pentagon has offered periodic costs of the running estimates of the recent military campaign in the Middle East, which began when US and Israeli forces commenced strikes on Iran on February 28. Their last public estimate for the cost of the conflict was about $29 billion.
Much of the fighting occurred before Washington and Tehran entered a ceasefire on April 8, but there have been periodic exchanges of fire in the months since.
Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers have complained since the US and Israel began bombing Iran on February 28 that Trump and his team have not kept them informed about the conflict or his plans. “The President is threatening escalation and war crimes, and suggesting this could be another forever war,” Senator Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, said at the hearing. Trump has repeatedly issued severe threats against Iran, including against civilian infrastructure, which critics say would be a war crime.
