Defense Budget: Fiscal Year 2018 Obligations of Operation and Maintenance Funding for Overseas Contingency Operations

According to the Department of Defense (DOD), since September 2001, Congress has appropriated approximately $1.8 trillion to DOD for Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO),primarily in Iraq and Afghanistan.1 Since fiscal year 2010, DOD has submitted separate requests for both base and OCO funding as part of its annual budget request to Congress.2Congress separately appropriates amounts for both base and OCO activities into the same appropriation accounts, such as Operation and Maintenance (O and M) accounts or the Afghanistan Security Forces Fund account, and directs how funds are to be spent by designating specific amounts at the activity level in conference reports or in explanatory statements accompanying annual appropriations acts. In enclosure I, we include the status of our prior recommendations from recent reports related to DODs use of OCO funds.