Overnight Defense: Hawks warn GOP leaders on Pentagon spending

by Rebecca Kheel - 10/19/15 6:22 PM ET

THE TOPLINE: Over one-hundred Republican lawmakers wrote a letter Monday saying they would not vote for any spending measure that leaves less than $561 billion for the Defense Department’s base budget as requested by the Obama administration.

The letter signed by 101 lawmakers also warns the Republican leadership against extending the current short-term funding measure — known as a continuing resolution — for the full year, which would fund the Pentagon for the full fiscal 2016 year at 2015 levels.

{mosads}The letter was spearheaded by Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio), chairman of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces.

The letter, addressed to House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) puts a wrinkle in Republican plans to maintain defense spending caps and fund the Pentagon’s base budget at $523 billion while adding $89 billion to a separate war fund.

Republicans and the White House are at a budget impasse, with the White House insisting that Congress lift the budget caps put into place in 2011, and Republican fiscal hawks demanding that they be left in place.

A compromise was drawn between Republican defense hawks and fiscal hawks to leave the base budget at $523 billion, but add the extra war funding to meet the administration’s request of $612 billion overall.

The president’s budget requests $561 billion in base funding, but would add $51 billion for war funding. The president has vowed to veto any spending bill that leaves the spending caps in place.

US TROOPS RAM AFGHAN HOSPITAL GATE: The Pentagon admitted Monday that investigators deliberately crashed through a closed gate last week at the Doctors Without Borders hospital compound in Afghanistan where a U.S. airstrike killed at least 22 people.

The admission came the same da y Afghanistan’s acting defense minister told The Associated Press the hospital was used as a base by militants and had a Taliban flag hoisted on the walls around the compound.

Doctors Without Borders officials have repeatedly denied Taliban fighters were using the hospital. The group has said it treated wounded Taliban fighters in line with its policy to treat everyone but that no weapons were allowed in the hospital.

Navy Capt. Jeff Davis told reporters that an Afghan armored vehicle carrying U.S. personnel drove through the gate during a visit to determine the compound’s structural integrity.

Davis said the car didn’t stop to open the gate because investigators came under fire during a previous visit to the hospital after the bombing.

Those in the car also mistakenly believed Doctors Without Borders personnel were not there.

Davis also said that he expects a report on the casualties of the bombing to be released by midweek. That report will only look at whether there were civilian casualties and whether the causalities were caused by the airstrike.

A more detailed preliminary investigation on the airstrike to determine who is at fault is due in a couple weeks, Davis said.

Doctors Without Borders has called for an independent investigation by the International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission into the bombing.

The commission has said it would conduct the investigation but needs the consent of both the United States and Afghanistan.

Masoom Stanekzai, Afghanistan’s acting defense minister, told the AP his government would not support the commission’s investigation since three investigations are already underway.

Pentagon, NATO and Afghan officials are investigating the bombing.

US, ISRAEL RESUME TALKS ON DEFENSE AID: The U.S. and Israel announced Sunday they are resuming talks on an extension of military aid.

The announcement came the same day the Iran nuclear deal took effect and during a visit to Israel from Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford.

The meeting signaled both countries’ attempts to smooth frayed relations over the Iran nuclear deal, which the U.S. took the lead on negotiating and Israel strongly opposed.

Dunford assured Israeli leaders he was “committed” to U.S. and Israeli cooperation to meet the nation’s security challenges.

The two countries are looking to agree on a 10-year military aid package, worth $3 billion a year, to extend current U.S. grants to Israel, which are due to expire in 2017, according to The Nation.

Prime Minister Netanyahu froze talks during international negotiations of the Iran nuclear deal.

Before the suspension in talks, the two sides were close to a new package of grants worth up to $3.7 billion a year — and likely more in the coming years — in a bid to counter increased Iranian revenue due to sanctions relief granted under the deal.

MCCONNELL, GOP VISIT AFGHANISTAN AMID STRATEGY SHIFT: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and congressional Republicans met with top U.S. military leaders in Afghanistan last week.

McConnell, as well as Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) and Rep. Andy Barr (R-Ky.), were in Afghanistan when President Obama announced that he would keep 9,800 troops in the country through most of 2016 before drawing down to 5,500.

The Republican leader offered mixed praise for the president’s decision, which was a significant shift from the approximately 1,000 troops Obama had planned to keep in Afghanistan after 2016.

“I will give the president credit for finally getting to the right place on Afghanistan,” McConnell told the Lexington Herald-Leader, but he added that it came after “three agonizing years” of trying to drawdown U.S. troop levels.

The Republican leader also said that in Afghanistan “everybody’s in favor of what the president announced.”

McConnell’s office said Monday that in addition to visiting Afghanistan — where they met with officials including Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and Gen. John Campbell, who is the top U.S. commander in the country — the Republican lawmakers also went to Iraq, Israel and Jordan.

While in Israel they met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:

— Boehner to sign defense bill, sparking showdown with Obama

— Graham: Obama ‘just made up a number’ on Afghan troop levels

— Senior al Qaeda leader killed by airstrike

— VA official in charge of backlog resigns

— Navy won’t have aircraft carrier in Persian Gulf as Iran deal takes effect

Please send tips and comments to Kristina Wong, kwong@digital-release.thehill.com, and Rebecca Kheel, rkheel@digital-release.thehill.com