National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett revealed that the U.S. government has spent $12 billion on the Iran war after just over two weeks of fighting.
“The latest number I was briefed on was 12,” Hassett told Face the Nation host Margaret Brennan when asked for a cost prediction.
The updated figure is only a slight increase from a previous estimate provided by the Pentagon on Tuesday. Then, officials estimated the war effort cost $11.3 billion for just the first six days of fighting.
Strikes have continued apace since that first week, including most recently the U.S. military’s bombing of Iran’s oil lifeline, Kharg Island. That strike operation saw the United States hit 90 Iranian military targets, while leaving its oil infrastructure untouched.
Now in its third week, an end date for the war is still unclear.
Israel, for its part, has declared it is prepared for at least three more weeks of fighting. President Donald Trump, meanwhile, declined to “declare victory” when speaking to reporters on Sunday night.
“I don’t want to do that. There’s no reason to. I think I just say, they’re decimated. If we left right now, it would take them 10 years or more to rebuild. But I’m still not declaring it over,” he said aboard Air Force One.
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With all the uncertainty about an off-ramp for the war, Hassett still signaled that the administration wouldn’t need to request more money.
“I think right now we’ve got what we need. Whether we have to go back to Congress for more is something that I think that Russ Vought and OMB will look into,” he said. “This is something that we’ve got the weapons that we’ve already got in place to do this, and so we are not necessarily going to need any kind of supplemental.”
