Report: Congress weary of Iraq war cost

WASHINGTON, Feb. 21 (UPI) -- U.S. President George Bush's sixth request to Congress for funding the war in Iraq and Afghanistan is encountering grumbling from lawmakers.

Bush's emergency spending request, sent to Capitol Hill last week, includes $72.4 billion for the global war on terror, the total cost of which is approaching $400 billion.

Congress won't take up the request until early next month, but the Christian Science Monitor said there is already some "chafing" among lawmakers.

Rep. Bill Young, R-Fla., chairman of the House Defense subcommittee, worries that war costs are starving procurement of weapons systems, such as the DDX Destroyer and the F-22 Tactical Fighter Aircraft, which were cut by $5.3 billion in the president's 2007 budget.

In other hearings last week, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle questioned administration officials on why, despite spending more than $20 billion on rebuilding Iraq's infrastructure, services were still below pre-war levels.