State takes over Pakistan funding in new budget request
The State Department was awarded a big slice of the foreign military assistance pie in the President’s new fiscal 2011 budget request, $1.2 billion for Pakistani military training that was previously in the hands of the Pentagon. The Cable has reported extensively on the turf wars between State and Defense over authorities for a range ...
The State Department was awarded a big slice of the foreign military assistance pie in the President’s new fiscal 2011 budget request, $1.2 billion for Pakistani military training that was previously in the hands of the Pentagon.
The Cable has reported extensively on the turf wars between State and Defense over authorities for a range of foreign assistance funding, money that should logically go through State but has been controlled by the Pentagon for a variety of reasons. The movement of the Pakistani Counterinsurgency Capability Funding from DOD to State represents a test of the State Department’s ability to manage these types of new, large scale foreign military assistance programs.
Some senior lawmakers have wanted the PCCF money to be given to State for a while. Appropriators wanted to make the change in the fiscal 2009 supplemental bill, but relented after Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton both testified that State wasn’t ready to take on the mission at that time.
"I know there’s been some concern here on the Hill about whether this money ought to be in the State Department or it ought to be in the Defense Department," Defense Secretary Robert Gates told the Senate Appropriations Committee last April, "Part of the problem is authorities and capacity in the State Department to be able to apply this money with the agility Secretary Clinton was talking about."
PCCF received $400 million in the first tranche of fiscal 2009 war funding. House Foreign Affairs chairman Howard Berman had directed in his bill that the money should go to State but he eventually relented after the administration made it clear that this wasn’t wise.
This money is separate from the Kerry-Lugar Pakistan aid bill, which authorized $1.5 billion in varied assistance to Pakistan over 5 years.
As we reported earlier, the State Department did not receive the so-called "1206" money, which is also called "Global Train and Equip," but sources said that if State does well with the PCCF fund, 1206 will be back on the table for fiscal 2012.
As for the "1207" funds, that did transfer over to State. That $100 million will now be called the Complex Crises Fund, which is meant "to prevent or respond to emerging or unforeseen crises that address reconstruction, security, or stabilization needs."
Josh Rogin covers national security and foreign policy and writes the daily Web column The Cable. His column appears bi-weekly in the print edition of The Washington Post. He can be reached for comments or tips at josh.rogin@foreignpolicy.com.
Previously, Josh covered defense and foreign policy as a staff writer for Congressional Quarterly, writing extensively on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, U.S.-Asia relations, defense budgeting and appropriations, and the defense lobbying and contracting industries. Prior to that, he covered military modernization, cyber warfare, space, and missile defense for Federal Computer Week Magazine. He has also served as Pentagon Staff Reporter for the Asahi Shimbun, Japan's leading daily newspaper, in its Washington, D.C., bureau, where he reported on U.S.-Japan relations, Chinese military modernization, the North Korean nuclear crisis, and more.
A graduate of George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, Josh lived in Yokohama, Japan, and studied at Tokyo's Sophia University. He speaks conversational Japanese and has reported from the region. He has also worked at the House International Relations Committee, the Embassy of Japan, and the Brookings Institution.
Josh's reporting has been featured on CNN, MSNBC, C-Span, CBS, ABC, NPR, WTOP, and several other outlets. He was a 2008-2009 National Press Foundation's Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellow, 2009 military reporting fellow with the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism and the 2011 recipient of the InterAction Award for Excellence in International Reporting. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C. Twitter: @joshrogin
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