Armed Services members in the dark on details of war costs

John M. Donnelly, CQ-Roll Call on Mar 13, 2026

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

WASHINGTON — The House and Senate Armed Services panels have yet to be briefed on the costs of the Iran war, members and aides said Thursday.

This week, Pentagon officials gave the Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee an estimate of $11.3 billion for the war’s first week, a figure first reported Wednesday by The New York Times.

The Senate Armed Services Committee held a classified briefing on the overall war effort on Tuesday with Pentagon officials and top officers.

But neither the House nor Senate Armed Services panels, which authorize nearly $1 trillion in annual defense spending and set national security policies in law, have yet received a briefing focused on the details of the war’s costs. The war entered its 13th day on Thursday and how long it will continue remains unclear.

Such a briefing on costs could give Armed Services members and staff an opportunity to probe what the Pentagon is including — or perhaps not including — in cost estimates that are fast becoming an outsize piece of the federal fiscal picture.

To Democrats, the lack of briefings for the Armed Services panels reflects a dearth of strong congressional oversight of the Iran war under GOP majorities in both chambers and, they say, a lack of Pentagon cooperation with Congress during President Donald Trump’s second term.

Rep. Adam Smith of Washington, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, said on MS NOW on Wednesday that the House panel has yet to obtain cost estimates from the Pentagon on the Iran war or, for that matter, on the military operations conducted in the Caribbean starting last September.

“The Trump administration is not transparent,” Smith said. “They do not share the information with Congress that they’re supposed to share.”

Smith said that if Democrats control the House in the next Congress, the Armed Services Committee would use “subpoena power” to obtain information they believe they need.

‘Thorough oversight’ promised

The Senate Armed Services Committee, meanwhile, like its House counterpart, has also not received detailed cost information from the Pentagon.

Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., the Armed Services Committee chairman, told reporters Thursday that the Senate committee’s request for a cost estimate has been sent to the Pentagon.

“The question is being asked,” Wicker said. He promised the Senate Armed Services Committee would deliver “thorough oversight” of the war.

But the Senate Armed Services Committee’s ranking member, Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., sent a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Tuesday requesting war cost estimates.

Reed wrote that he has seen “press reports” with “various cost estimates for these operations, but the Department has not yet told Congress. The American people deserve to know what this war is costing in blood and treasure.”

Reed asked Hegseth to report back on how much has been spent to date and what the daily costs are, as well as the “costs to readiness” and the price of replenishing munitions and lost aircraft.

He also asked Hegseth when a war supplemental funding request is coming to Congress.

Wicker has said he does not expect to see a supplemental request before April.

‘An underestimate’

The lack of information from the Pentagon on the war is not sitting well with Democrats. A group of them is pushing Republicans to hold public hearings focused on the war.

The Democrats are calling for both Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio to testify in an open session and answer questions about not just costs but other implications of the conflict.

Hegseth, Rubio and other top administration officials held classified briefings for all lawmakers on March 3.

Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., has said classified briefings, while useful in conveying information that needs to be kept secret, also effectively muzzle lawmakers from talking openly about important public issues.

But the Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee is the only panel known to have gotten information behind closed doors that is focused on the Pentagon’s cost estimates.

A spokesperson for the House Appropriations Committee did not immediately reply to a question about whether the Pentagon has briefed House appropriators on war costs.

Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware, the top Democrat on the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, complained Thursday about the quality of the widely reported $11.3 billion estimate for the war’s first week.

Coons said it was “an underestimate” of the war’s full cost to the Pentagon, let alone to the wider world economy.

‘Shockingly arrogant’

Even private briefings for the Armed Services Committees have not happened, aides said Thursday.

On the Senate Armed Services Committee, Democrats are unhappy about what they call being left in the dark about the war, which has spread throughout the Middle East, cost hundreds of lives and roiled the global economy.

“We should be briefed on the cost of the war and so many other factors,” said Sen. Mazie K. Hirono, D-Hawaii, a member of the committee.

Those questions, Hirono said, touch on everything from the war’s impact on the U.S. Transportation Command, which oversees logistics operations, to its effect on U.S. munitions stockpiles.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., also a member of the Armed Services Committee, said the committee should be briefed not just on the new war costs but also how the money allocated for defense so far has been spent. That includes $1 trillion appropriated for national defense in fiscal 2026 in regular appropriations and reconciliation funds.

“It is shockingly arrogant for the secretary of war to think he can send a note over to the Senate telling us how much money he expects to get without any accountability for how much he has already spent and what his plans are for the additional money he’s asking for,” Warren said in a brief interview Thursday.