The Defense Department "is a little bit more than half the discretionary budget," said Todd Harrison, a senior fellow at the nonpartisan Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. "That, combined with two wars that have been going on for years now—I'd say it's a politically challenging environment for defense spending."
The Obama administration said "overseas contingency operations" in Iraq would require just $11 billion in fiscal 2012, while the Afghanistan war would cost $107 billion.