A sailor handles munitions on the flight deck of the USS George Washington in the Arabian Sea, on September 13, 2026.
| Photo Credit: Reuters
The U.S. war against Iran has cost the Department of Defence more than $38 billion through August 1, and will continue costing up to $3 billion a month or more depending on the intensity of the conflict, according to an assessment released on Tuesday (September 15, 2026) by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
CBO said the war is expected to contribute to inflation into the first quarter of 2027, making inflation roughly 0.5 percentage points higher than they had previously estimated. That’s driven largely by the reduction of oil and natural gas shipments through the Strait of Hormuz and disruptions to shipping through the Red Sea.
The estimate, prepared in response to a request for information from the top Democrat on the House Budget committee, Rep. Brendan Boyle, largely aligns with a previous estimate from Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, who pinned the costs at $37.5 billion, according to his Senate testimony.
The estimates come largely from replacing munitions and equipment lost in battle, the CBO said, and do not include costs related to U.S. military personnel killed or injured in the conflict or longer term veterans’ healthcare and disability compensation.
Mr. Boyle said that beyond with the war’s human toll, “this nonpartisan CBO report makes clear that the war has also cost American taxpayers tens of billions of dollars and counting, while continuing to drive up costs.”
“Donald Trump and Republicans have spent years telling Americans that we cannot afford to help families here at home,” Mr. Boyle said in a statement, “but apparently they can find tens of billions of dollars, and potentially much more, for a reckless war that is leaving Americans to pay the price.”
The findings come as voters eye the war and high prices heading toward the midterm elections that will determine control of Congress, where Republicans now hold majority power in the House and Senate.
The war, which started Feb 28, is now in its seventh month, with no signs of a quick end to the on-off conflict.
The White House made a request for $87.6 billion in supplemental funding in June, largely for the war effort, but Congress has not approved it. CBO said the portion of that request that appears to be directly related to the conflict, $42.3 billion, is about 10 per cent larger than CBO’s estimate of DoD’s costs.
The Defence Department declined to respond to CBO’s request for information for its report, which was a break from norms. The budget office said it relied on government databases and public reports, and as a result, its estimates “are subject to considerable uncertainty”.
A Pentagon inspector general report Monday said the war has resulted in “strategic inventory shortfalls”.
Published – September 16, 2026 02:45 am IST
