America’s war machine, the Pentagon is expected to move the U.S Congress for additional funding on an urgent basis that will be used to supplement the current funds and wage a prolonged campaign in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff stated that the war efforts in these two theaters require additional funds, that would be on top the $130 billion funding that the Congress approved for the Pentagon in the month of October this year. Although the exact amount that is going to be requested from the Congress hasn’t been disclosed, yet some experts believe the budget could easily reach upto $50 billion.

The current $50 billion budget figure is just an estimate and the actual figure will be determined, once President Obama confirms how many more troops are to be deployed to Afghanistan. The highest ranking NATO commander in-charge of the Afghanistan operations, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, has already submitted a request for an additional 40,000 U.S troops. If his request is met, the total number of U.S troops on Afghan soil will reach a staggering 108,000 soldiers.

According to Tommy Vietor (Spokesman, White House),

“The president’s budget provides a full-year funding for anticipated costs in Iraq and Afghanistan, and he has made clear his intent to fund these wars through the normal budgeting process. No decisions have been made about additional costs related to new resource requests from the Department of Defense.”

However, according to Pentagon’s financial gurus, the military headquarters will most definitely need more than $130 billion regardless of reinforcements and that, the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan won’t be able to meet their expected standards if the military funding isn’t increased.

Via New York Times.