The Pentagon said Sunday that it would send about 3,750 U.S. forces to the southwest border to bolster Customs and Border Protection.
CNN writes that the support includes a mobile surveillance capability through the end of September 2019 as well as placing 150 miles of concertina wire between ports of entry. With the troops to be sent to the border, the total active duty forces there will be around 4,350, said the Defense Department.
The additional U.S. forces are being deployed for 90 days.
Another 3,500 active duty troops will be deployed to the southern border to provide additional support to security officers, CNN also wrote, adding that House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith slammed the Pentagon’s decision not to reveal that number during the committee’s hearing.
“The Members of the Committee would have been extremely interested in discussing what the 3,500 troops going to the border in response to DHS’s latest request will be doing there,” Smith wrote in a letter to acting Secretary of Defense Pat Shanahan.
He claimed that represented a “violation of the executive branch’s obligation to be transparent with Congress, which oversees, authorizes, and funds its operations.”
The additional troops mean that the DOD would fulfill a request by the Department of Homeland Security for assistance, approved by Shanahan in January.
The news that more active-duty troops would be sent to the border was also confirmed by President Donald Trump himself, who wrote on Twitter, “More troops being sent to the Southern Border to stop the attempted Invasion of Illegals, through large Caravans, into our Country. We have stopped the previous Caravans, and we will stop these also.”
The effort announced Sunday is separate from the possible White House-led effort to use existing Pentagon funds or personnel to help build new sections of a border wall with Mexico.
Be the first to comment