Robert Hale: Pentagon Stops War Budget Shift

The Defense Department has stopped moving funds from its overseas contingency operations budget covering the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq to its base budget.

Robert Hale, Pentagon comptroller, told Defense News the department stopped the shifts because of uncertainties such as sequestration cuts surrounding the budget.

Hale said the Pentagon included $88.5 billion in OCO funds for its fiscal year 2014 budget request but has not sent Congress its proposed OCO funding.

The Pentagon is set to receive about $81 billion and would incur a $7 billion fiscal year 2013 cut after the sequester, according to the report.

Hale told Defense News the department plans to keep requesting OCO funds that would go to post-2014 force levels and for repairing equipment.

Since 2010, OCO funds have declined from $162 billion to $115 billion in fiscal 2012, Marcus Weisgerber reports.

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