In addition to the debate over how to fund the war there remains the question of just what a troop buildup of the kinds proposed will cost. As theLA Times noted Monday, the Obama administration and the Pentagon have produced significantly different price tags for how much it will cost to add troops to Afghanistan. The Pentagon has previously released estimates saying that the cost would be $500,000 per year for each service member, putting the total price tag for an increase of 40,000 troops -- which is what Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal has requested -- at an additional $20 billion a year.
The White House, meanwhile, has recently put the figure at twice that much -- a cost of $1 million per new solider. Interestingly, as the L.A. Times notes, an estimate from a Pentagon comptroller earlier this month, produced a number much closer to the Office of Management and Budget's estimate than that of the Pentagon.
A helpful explanation of how the numbers were arrived at, via the LA Times:
White House officials included in their estimate everything they consider necessary to wage war, including troop housing and equipment.[...]The Pentagon arrived at its much lower estimate by dividing its war funding request by the number of troops throughout the region: 68,000 in Afghanistan and up to 95,000 in supporting roles elsewhere, such as on nearby ships or in surrounding countries.
The Pentagon cost includes higher combat wages, extra aircraft hours and other operations and maintenance costs, but omits such items as new weapons purchases -- one-time costs that vary by year -- and support equipment like spy satellites and anti-roadside-bomb technology.
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