Diplomatic and Embassy Security Funding Before and After the Benghazi Attacks

Summary

Congressional investigations into the September 11, 2012, attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya, have focused on a number of issues, including the extent to which overall funding levels may have played a role in the security measures in place at that U.S. facility. While several factors may have been involved in the Benghazi situation, this report focuses only on funding for security of U.S. diplomatic personnel and facilities abroad, hereinafter referred to in this report as diplomatic/embassy security. (For other CRS reports on the Benghazi attacks and a list of CRS experts, go to CRS.gov and search “Benghazi.”)

The report of the Accountability Review Board for Benghazi (ARB) report highlighted the funding complexities at the Department of State:

For many years the State Department has been engaged in a struggle to obtain the resources necessary to carry out its work, with varying degrees of success. This has brought about a deep sense of the importance of husbanding resources to meet the highest priorities, laudable in the extreme in any government department. But it has also had the effect of conditioning a few State Department managers to favor restricting the use of resources as a general orientation. Experienced leadership, close coordination and agility, timely informed decision making, and adequate funding and personnel resources are essential.... One overall conclusion in this [ARB] report is that Congress must do its part to meet this challenge and provide necessary resources to the State Department to address security risks and meet mission imperatives. (Department of State, Accountability Review Board for Benghazi Attack of September 2012, December 19, 2012, p. 3. Available at http://www.state.gov/documents/organization.202446.pdf.)

Other post-Benghazi reports have pointed out how security funding for overseas staff and posts depends on the designation of the facility as office space, warehouse, or residence, and whether a facility is considered by State Department officials as permanent, temporary, or interim. Even the definition of each of those designations may differ within the Department of State. Further, some reports suggest that the inability to get more funds to improve security—whether because Congress does not appropriate enough, delays passing budgets, or because the Department of State is unwilling or unable to fully fund resource requests from its overseas posts—may contribute to an attitude by officials in the field that a combination of elevated threat and restricted resources to meet that threat should not be questioned. In that case, security officers requesting more funds simply may give up.

This report presents a history and analysis of the requested and actual funding for diplomatic/embassy security since FY2008—what actually became available for the Department of State to spend after rescissions, sequestration, and transfers. It also provides funding data that was requested by the Administration, passed by the House of Representatives, passed by the Senate, and enacted by Congress for the two accounts that provide the bulk of the funding: the Worldwide Security Protection (WSP) and Worldwide Security Upgrades (WSU). Combined, these two subaccounts in most years comprise more than 90% of the funding available for diplomatic/embassy security.

This report will continue to track diplomatic/embassy security appropriations and will be updated as changes occur.