Pentagon Warns of Training Cuts as Iran War Costs Hit $29 Billion

The Pentagon's top leaders are sounding the alarm: the nearly $30 billion cost of the war in Iran is draining funds for other critical military needs, with operational readiness potentially suffering as early as July.

Pentagon leaders are warning Congress they may need to curtail training and operations starting this summer, as the war in Iran has already cost the Defense Department approximately $29 billion, forcing the military to divert funds from its annual budget.

“I will have to start making decisions to change training, operations, certification events, those type of things we do to generate our force in the July time frame,” Adm. Daryl Caudle, the chief of naval operations, told members of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee this week.

The $29 billion cost, an increase of about $4 billion in less than two weeks, covers operational expenses and munitions but does not include damage to U.S. facilities. The funding crunch is exacerbated by costs from troop deployments on the U.S. southern border, with the Army facing a shortfall between $2 billion and $6 billion, an Army official said.

Without a supplemental spending bill from Congress, the military faces a readiness crisis, potentially grounding pilots and canceling training rotations. The delay in submitting a formal request, however, turns any potential vote into a politically charged referendum on the war itself ahead of midterm elections, creating significant fiscal uncertainty and geopolitical risk.

Families Feel the Strain

While the Pentagon juggles its budget, military families are feeling the immediate financial strain. The war has contributed to domestic inflation, with gas prices rising over $1.50 a gallon and grocery costs increasing, hitting service members’ families particularly hard. A survey by the Military Families Advisory Network before the conflict found one in four active duty families struggled with food insecurity, a number that has “significantly increased,” according to Shannon Razsadin, the group’s executive director.

Support services that were common during previous conflicts have not been as visible this time. “People really were not seeing this [war in Iran] coming and so in a lot of cases some of those programs that were in place during the global war on terror, they haven’t been activated in a while,” Razsadin said. This has left many families to fend for themselves, patching together childcare and dealing with rising costs without an adequate support system. Only 31% of military families surveyed by Blue Star Families said they are getting the support they need.

A Political Standoff

Lawmakers from both parties have urged the Defense Department to submit an emergency supplemental spending request to address the shortfall, but the Pentagon has yet to act. “We have to start with getting that number from the Pentagon and it needs to be here now,” Rep. Rob Wittman (R., Va.), vice chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said Thursday.

The White House has not forwarded a reported $200 billion supplemental request to Congress, and the delay is creating a standoff. The Army has already instructed commanders to make “tough and sound resource decisions” for the remainder of the fiscal year. The situation is compounded by nearly $2 billion in unpaid reimbursements from the Department of Homeland Security for border deployments, according to Sen. Jack Reed (D., R.I.). The inaction risks a repeat of readiness declines seen during past budget cuts, a scenario top military leaders are desperate to avoid.

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