WASHINGTON, Sept 22 (AFP) - With an intensifying insurgency in Iraq, the Pentagon is drawing on a 25-billion-dollar emergency fund to cover the costs of US military operations there, a Pentagon spokeswoman said Wednesday.
About 2.2 billion dollars from the fund has been used in the past month to meet rising fuel prices and to buy protective gear for the force, including body armor, armored Humvees and aircraft survivability equipment, said Lieutenant Colonel Rose-Ann Lynch.
"The department is executing these funds just as Congress expects us to," she told AFP.
President George W. Bush's administration had said it would not need the emergency funds for Iraq this fiscal year, but Congress went ahead and passed legislation anyway creating the 25-billion-dollar emergency fund and making it available immediately.
The cost of the war in Iraq through June averaged 4.4 billion dollars a month, according to Pentagon figures. In Afghanistan, the United States has spent another 775 million dollars a month on average this fiscal year through June.
But the pace of military operations has stepped up since June in the face of rising attacks as both countries head into violently contested elections. In April, the last time insurgent violence spiked in Iraq, war costs surged to 5.2 billion dollars.
In addition, plans for another major rotation of US forces in Iraq this year at a time of soaring fuel prices will add to the bill.
Lynch said the 25-billion-dollar emergency fund will cover war costs until Congress approves additional funding for Iraq and Afghanistan.
That is on top of a 416-billion-dollar defense budget for fiscal 2005.