Pentagon Focuses on Middle East for "Spring Cleaning" in Brand New Military Decision
The Pentagon is prepared to do a bit of “spring cleaning” in one of the most dangerous areas of the Middle East, and it’s not going to make extremist groups happy.
According to a report from The Washington Post, the Trump administration’s Pentagon is possibly planning to send an additional 1,000 troops to Afghanistan to help secure the country.
The increase, which would take place this spring, would raise the number of U.S. troops in the country from 14,000 to 15,000.
“The possible increases have the support of the Army’s senior leadership, which has been working to determine the mix of troops required to execute a strategy centered on a new combat formation,” The Post reported.
Defense Secretary James Mattis hasn’t signed off on the increase yet, which is supposed to take effect before the fighting season starts in earnest.
According to the Post, the move is part of the Trump administration’s strategy to “deploy newly created combat advisory teams to some of the most violent, remote and heavily contested areas of Afghanistan.”
“The Obama administration, as part of its plan to wind down the Afghanistan war in 2015, limited advisers to higher headquarters far from the fighting,” The Post noted.
“The new strategy that President Trump approved in August would push U.S. advisory teams to the battalion level, far closer to the front lines.”
“This is a concept that got accelerated for Afghanistan, and it has been quite a process,” a senior military official told the Post regarding the Army’s decision to send a Security Force Assistance Brigade to Afghanistan for the first time this spring. “It has been a roller coaster.”
The possible troop increase was reported just days after one of the highest-profile terrorist attacks in Afghanistan in recent years.
At least 18 people were killed in a weekend attack on the Intercontinental Hotel, a six-story luxury hotel in the Afghan capital of Kabul that dates from the 1960s. Six Ukrainians were among the dead, according to Reuters.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, which ended Sunday after a 12-hour battle with Afghani forces.
As for the possible troop increase, it yet again underscores the difference between the Trump administration and Obama administration when it comes to dealing with Afghanistan.
As The Hill notes, the president’s administration has not only increased the troop level in Afghanistan from 8,500 at the beginning of his term to the current 14,000, they’ve taken the battle to the insurgents and given more power to the Pentagon in terms of setting strategy.
H/T The Daily Caller
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