New York: The Bush administration's top budget official has revised downwards the cost of a possible war with Iraq to $ 50-60 billion from earlier estimates of between $ 100 and 200 billion.

Director of the office of management and budget, Mitchell E Daniels, would not provide specific costs for either a long or a short military campaign against Iraq. But he said the administration was budgeting for both, and that earlier projections of $ 100 to 200 billion in Iraq war costs by Lawrence B Lindsey, President George W Bush's former chief economic adviser, were too high, the 'New York Times' said.

However, he emphasised that his budget projection does not mean a war with Iraq is imminent, and that it is impossible to know what any military campaign against Iraq would ultimately cost.

"This is nothing more than prudent contingency planning. At this point there is no war," he told the 'Times'.

Daniels's projections place the cost of an Iraq war in line with that of the 1991 Persian Gulf war, which cost more than $ 60 billion, or about $ 80 billion. But the US paid for only a small part of that conflict, with Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Japan bearing the brunt of the costs.

This time, the Gulf nations are less supportive of the United States and the 'Times' quoted diplomats as saying Americans are likely to bear most of the cost of a war with Iraq.

Daniels declined to explain how budget officials had reached the $ 50 billion to 60 billion range for Iraq war costs, or why it was less in current dollars than the 43- day Gulf war in 1991, the 'Times' said.

Daniels also declined to specify how much had been budgeted for munitions and troops. "All of these are major costs," he said.

The driving expense for the military in any war, the paper said, would be the size of the American force and the length of the conflict. In the 1991 war, 550,000 American troops were based in Saudi Arabia, which picked up the cost of virtually all housing, fuel, food and water.

If Bush orders an attack against Iraq, the American force would be half the size of that in the 1991 war. The Pentagon's war plans call for deploying as many as 250,000 troops, but the initial offensive should start with a much smaller number, with a sizable force in reserve, the 'Times' said.

The budget director's projections served as a more politically palatable corrective to figures put forth by Lindsey in September, when he said a war with Iraq might amount to one per cent to two per cent of the national gross domestic product (GDP), or $ 100 billion to 200 billion, the 'Times' said.

Pentagon officials were quoted as saying that the cost of munitions in a potential war with Iraq will not be materially more than the cost of munitions in the 1991 Gulf war. The reason, they say, is that the military now uses more precision-guided bombs, which are far more accurate, and so fewer are needed.

In 1991, about 10 per cent of bombs and munitions were precision guided. In the conflict in Afghanistan, the share of precision weapons rose to about 60 per cent.

PTI