KOSOVO MILITARY OPERATIONS: COSTS AND CONGRESSIONAL ACTION ON FUNDING
CRS Report for Congress
Kosovo Military Operations:
Costs and Congressional Action on Funding
Stephen Daggett
Specialist in National Defense
Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade Division
Summary
On April 19, the White House sent Congress a request for emergency supplemental
funding of $6.05 billion to cover costs of U.S. military operations against Yugoslavia,
assistance to Kosovo refugees, and some expenses of military operations in Iraq. On
May 6, the House approved an emergency supplemental appropriations bill, H.R. 1664,
that provided $13 billion, about $7 billion more than requested. Subsequently, House
and Senate conferees on H.R. 1141, a bill to provide supplemental appropriations for
Central America disaster relief and other purposes, folded Kosovo-related funding into
that measure and approved the conference agreement on May 13. On May 18, the
House approved the conference agreement by a vote of 269-158, and on May 20, the
Senate approved the agreement by a vote of 64-36. The President signed the bill into
law (P.L. 106-31) on May 21. In all, the measure provides $14.9 billion in supplemental
funds and makes $2.0 billion in offsetting rescissions. Funds are provided for Kosovo,
Central America disaster assistance, aid to Jordan, farm relief, domestic disaster relief,
and other purposes. This report may be of interest to staff and Members in tracking
debate over funding for Kosovo-related operations. It will be updated as necessary to
include new information and to follow congressional action.
The Administration’s Kosovo-Related Request
The Administration’s April 19 request included $5,458.1 million for the Department
of Defense (DOD) and $591 million for the Department of State and other international
affairs accounts. The funds for DOD cover projected incremental costs (see below for a
discussion) of military operations against Yugoslavia through the end of the fiscal year on
September 30; some munitions, including funds to replenish stocks of conventionally-
armed cruise missiles and to accelerate production of the Joint Direct Attack Munition
(JDAM); refugee relief efforts; and some costs of operations in Iraq. The international
affairs funds are mainly for refugee relief. Subsequently, the Department of Health and
Human Services requested an additional $100 million to help resettle Kosovo refugees.
All of the funds were requested as “emergency appropriations,” so caps on defense and
Congressional Research Service ˜ The Library of Congress
non-defense discretionary spending and on total discretionary spending would be raised
by the amounts provided, avoiding a requirement to impose an across-the-board reduction
in spending. Table 1 provides details of the request and of congressional action.
Incremental Costs of Military Operations
Traditionally, costs of military operations are measured by calculating so-called
“incremental” expenses — i.e., costs over and above the normal expenses of day-to-day
military operations. For the current Allied Force air campaign, such expenses may include
hazardous duty pay and other additional pay and benefits for active duty personnel
involved in the operation; active duty pay, additional pay, and benefits for any additional
numbers of military reservists called into active service; increased fuel and equipment
maintenance costs due to a higher pace of operations; transportation of personnel,
equipment, and supplies to the area of operations; replenishment of munitions to the extent
necessary to maintain stockpiles at desired levels; and other expenses, such as the cost of
accelerating production and delivery of weapons and munitions found to be especially
valuable for the campaign.
Congressional Action
On April 29, the House Appropriations Committee approved H.R. 1664, a bill
providing $13 billion in emergency supplemental appropriations for Kosovo and other
activities. On May 6, the House approved the committee bill with two amendments — a
Pelosi amendment adding $67 million for aid to refugees and a Latham amendment adding
$105.6 million for farm loan support and making offsetting rescissions. On May 13, a
House-Senate conference committee reached agreement on H.R. 1141, a bill providing
$14.9 billion in supplemental appropriations and making $2.0 billion of offsetting
rescissions. The House approved the conference agreement on May 18 by a vote of 269-
158; the Senate approved the agreement on May 20 by a vote of 64-36; and the President
signed the bill into law (P.L. 106-31) on May 21.
As enacted, the bill combines two separate measures — (1) funding for Central
America disaster assistance and other purposes that the House and Senate had considered
in H.R. 1141/S. 544 and (2) funding for Kosovo-related military operations, refugee relief
activities, and military readiness that the House had addressed in H.R. 1664. For a full
discussion of H.R. 1141 and the parallel Senate bill, S. 544, see CRS Report RL30083,
Supplemental Appropriations for FY1999: Central America Disaster Aid, Middle East
Peace, and Other Initiatives, by Larry Nowels.
Major elements of the conference agreement include:
!$10.9 billion for defense-related programs, $5.5 billion more than requested and
$1.4 billion less than the House had provided in H.R. 1664. The congressional
additions include $2.25 billion in various military readiness accounts; $1.838 billion
for FY2000 pay and benefits increases; $475 million for military construction; $300
million (in the “Operational Rapid Response Account”) to support readiness of
forces elsewhere in the world that may have been affected by the Kosovo operation;
$250 million for munitions, $100 million for recruitment; and $200 million for the
Coast Guard.
Table 1: Supplemental Funding Requests and Congressional Action
(millions of dollars)
House Conf. Versus
RequestHR 1664HR 1141Request
Department of Defense/Defense-Related
Military Personnel (Southwest Asia)16.516.516.50.0
Overseas Contingency Operations Transfer Fund
Kosovo Military Operations3,300.93,300.93,300.90.0
Kosovo Refugee Operations335.0335.0335.00.0
Readiness and Munitions Contingency Reserve850.01,311.81,100.0+250.0
Munitions /a/697.913.613.6-684.3
Southwest Asia257.8257.8257.80.0
Subtotal, Overseas Contingency Operations 5,441.65,219.15,007.3-434.3
Procurement of Munitions— 684.3684.3+684.3
Operational Rapid Response Account— 400.0300.0+300.0
Spare Parts (Contingent)— 1,339.21,124.9+1,124.9
Depot Maintenance (Contingent)— 927.3742.5+742.5
Recruiting (Contingent)— 156.4100.0+100.0
Readiness Training (Contingent)— 307.3200.2+200.2
Base Operations (Contingent)— 351.5182.4+182.4
FY2000 Pay and Retirement (Contingent)— 1,838.41,838.4+1,838.4
Military Construction— 1,071.0475.0+475.0
Coast Guard— — 200.0+200.0
Total Department of Defense/Coast Guard5,458.112,311.010,871.5+5,413.4
International/Refugee Relief
Department of State
Security of Diplomatic and Consular Missions25.070.570.5+45.5
Migration and Refugee Assistance125.0195.0266.0+141.0
Emergency Refugee & Migration Assistance Fund95.095.0165.0+70.0
International Assistance Programs
Emergency Support Fund105.0105.0105.00.0
AID Assistance for Countries in the Region170.075.0120.0-50.0
AID International Disaster Assistance Fund71.0163.0163.0+92.0
P.L. 480 Food Aid— — 149.2+149.2
Refugee Resettlement (Dept. of HHS)100.0— 100.00.0
Total International/Refugee Relief691.0703.51,138.7+447.7
Total Defense & International/Refugee Relief6,149.113,014.512,010.2+5,861.1
Programs in H.R. 1141
Farm Aid152.4105.6573.9+421.5
Central America/Caribbean Disaster Assistance955.5NA 988.5+33.0
Aid to Jordan300.0NA 100.0-200.0
Domestic Disaster Relief (FEMA)372.0NA 900.0+528.0
Other Domestic Appropriations /c/57.1NA 305.2+248.1
Total from H.R. 11411,837.0NA 2,867.6+1,030.6
Total in Conference Agreement7,986.1NA 14,877.8+6,891.7
Offsetting Rescissions— -105.6-2,003.6-2,003.6
Sources: Office of Management and Budget; H.Rept. 106-125; House Appropriations Committee.
Notes: a. The House bill provides $684.3 million for munitions in the Procurement account, as shown below.
b. Contingent amounts are provided subject to identification of a specific requirement and designation as emergency
appropriations by the President.
c. Conference amount includes $230 million transferred from HUD to FEMA.
!$1.1 billion for international affairs and refugee relief costs related to Kosovo, $447
million more than was requested;
!$2.9 billion for programs that had been addressed in earlier congressional action on
H.R. 1141, $1.0 billion more than requested. The total includes $989 million for
aid to Central America and the Caribbean (including $215.9 million for the Defense
Department); $100 million for aid to Jordan, which equals the amount the
Administration had requested for FY1999 but does not include advance
appropriations for FY2000 and FY2001; $900 million for domestic disaster relief,
mainly to respond to tornado damage; $574 million for aid to farmers; and $305
million for a variety of other programs, including $230 million transferred from
HUD to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for disaster relief.
Most of these amounts are offset.
!$2.0 billion of offsetting rescissions. The conference agreement does not include
a Senate provision that would have offset all of the amounts in H.R. 1141/S. 544
in outlays as well as in budget authority by making across-the-board cuts in non-
defense programs in last fall’s $21 billion supplemental bill. Nor does the
agreement include a controversial House provision making cuts in “callable capital”
for international lending institutions. Most of the rescissions appear to have little
or no outlays, including $1.25 billion in excess balances in the Food Stamp program
and $350 million in unspent balances of Section 8 Housing Program funds.
The conference agreement does not include funding for loan guarantees for steel
companies hurt by increased imports or for oil and gas companies, nor does it include a
provision reducing interest payments by Midwest utility companies on amounts that they
are required to repay to consumers — such provisions were matters of controversy in the
conference. The agreement does, however, include a measure to prevent the Federal
government from claiming a share of state court settlements with tobacco companies.
Conferees did not include a controversial policy rider to delay implementation of
restrictions on commercial fishing in Alaska’s Glacier Bay but did include some other
environmental provisions. The agreement also lifts a provision in last year’s omnibus
appropriations bill (P.L. 105-277) that had prevented obligation of funds in the FY1999
Commerce-Justice-State appropriations bill after June 15. And the agreement includes a
House-passed provision requiring the President to seek burdensharing contributions from
allies to offset U.S. costs in Kosovo.
Key Issues
The emergency supplemental appropriations bill for Kosovo raised a number of
issues, including (1) whether to provide additional funds for defense readiness as
emergency supplemental funding; (2) whether to impose offsetting rescissions for some
or all of the supplemental amounts; (3) how to resolve outstanding issues on H.R. 1141;
(4) burdensharing; and (5) whether to use the supplemental appropriations bill as a vehicle
to limit the use of ground troops.
Additional Funds for Defense Readiness. When the Administration submitted
its funding request for Kosovo, some defense advocates in Congress complained that the
amount was much too small. The crisis, they said, shows that forces are overburdened in
general and that emergency funding is required to correct readiness shortfalls. Some
legislators proposed adding as much as $20-25 billion to the Administration request to
improve military readiness in general.
This prospect prompted considerable opposition. House Minority Leader Richard
Gephardt and Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle said that a Kosovo supplemental is
not the proper vehicle for an increase in defense spending. In effect, to use an emergency
supplemental bill to add funds for defense readiness would be a means of bypassing limits
on total discretionary spending established in the 1997 budget agreement — caps that
Republicans insisted on maintaining in the recently-approved FY2000 budget resolution.
As approved by Congress, the conference agreement adds $5.4 in unrequested
defense funds, including $1.8 billion for military pay and benefits increases in FY2000,
$2.25 billion for military readiness accounts (all made available for obligation through the
end of FY2000), and $475 million for military construction. Such funds would not
normally be counted as incremental costs of an operation. Funding for military pay and
benefits in FY2000 in particular appears to be a means of easing constraints on the
FY2000 budget. The bill does not, however, add nearly as much as some had proposed.
In a key test of House sentiment on additional funds for the Defense Department, the
House rejected an amendment to H.R. 1664 by Rep. Obey that would have cut about $3
billion from the amount added. The conference agreement trims the House additions by
about $1.4 billion.
Offsetting Rescissions. A closely related issue concerns whether Congress should
impose offsetting rescissions for some or all of any supplemental amounts provided for
Kosovo. Whether to offset supplemental funds in general, and defense supplemental funds
in particular, has been an issue since caps on discretionary spending were first established
by the 1990 Budget Enforcement Act. This year, the issue has been particularly1
contentious, in part because of a backlash against last year’s supplemental appropriations
bill (part of P.L. 105-277), which provided $21 billion of emergency funding without
offsets, and in part because any extra spending will reduce the Social Security-related part
of the budget surplus.
In earlier action on H.R. 1141 and S. 544, the parallel Senate bill, the issue of
offsets was especially controversial. The House-passed bill made offsets in budget
authority, but not in outlays, for all of the non-defense amounts provided, but the House
rejected an amendment by Rep. Todd Tiahrt to offset the defense amounts as well. The
Senate, in contrast, offset all of the amounts, in outlays as well as in budget authority, by
making an across-the-board cut in non-defense funds in last year’s supplemental. There
was considerably less opposition to providing non-offset, emergency funds for the Kosovo
supplemental. In floor action on H.R. 1664 on May 6, the House rejected by a vote of
101-322 a Coburn amendment to offset all of the funds in the bill. The conference
agreement on H.R. 1141 provides all of the Kosovo-related funds as emergency
appropriations without offsets.
For a detailed discussion of the debate over emergency supplemental funding for defense1
programs between 1993 and 1998, see Stephen Daggett, “Emergency Appropriations for the
Department of Defense,” CRS General Distribution Memo, August 18, 1998.
Issues in H.R. 1141. The Senate bill provided substantially more money than the
House bill and included some contentious policy riders, including a provision prohibiting
the federal government from claiming a share of the multi-state settlement with tobacco
companies and several environmental riders. Offsets, however, appeared to be the most
difficult issue to resolve. The White House threatened to veto either version of the bill
because it objected to particular offsets. Conferees included some of the policy riders, but
did not insist on the most contentious offsets.
Burdensharing. Several Members of Congress have complained that the United
States is bearing a disproportionately large share of the costs of Kosovo-related
operations. Accurate estimates of allied costs are not available, but rough data on the U.S.
share of the military effort and relief operations have been provided. On April 21, Joint
Chiefs Chairman General Henry Shelton told the House Appropriations Committee that
U.S. forces have flown about 65% of the aircraft sorties, including combat and support
operations, in Operation Allied Force. On April 27, OMB Director Jacob Lew said that
the United States is providing about 25% of refugee and migration assistance. The
conference agreement includes a provision, as passed by the House, that directs the
President to seek more equitable burdensharing and requires a report on the issue by
September 30.
Restrictions on the Use of Ground Troops. In the House Appropriations
Committee markup of H.R. 1664, Rep. Istook offered an amendment barring the use of
funds for U.S. ground troops in Kosovo. Other members of the Committee urged its
withdrawal, saying that such a provision would lead to a veto by the President. The
measure did not receive sufficient support to be brought to a roll call vote. In House floor
action on the bill, Rep. Istook offered a similar proposal that was rejected by a vote of