The Defense Department is seeking roughly $15 billion as part of the government's proposed settlement with tobacco companies.
Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon said Tuesday the military has calculated that it spends $584 million each year on smoking-related health care. In a Sept. 22 letter to the White House, DoD counsel Judith Miller expressed the Pentagon's interest in being included in the huge settlement with the tobacco industry, which will reap states billions of dollars. The Defense Department is the first federal agency to seek inclusion in the settlement.
"We, like states and other entities in the United States, are trying to see if it's possible to get some reimbursement for the additional costs of caring for smoke-related illnesses," Bacon said.
Bacon said 32 percent of active-duty military personnel smoke, down from 51 percent in 1980. The department is trying to reduce the number of smokers to 20 percent by the year 2000.
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