WASHINGTON (Dispatches) -- The United States is deploying around 2,000 troops to Iraq despite Washington announcing plans to end its combat mission in the country, The New York Times reported.
Soldiers from the Fourth Infantry Division will replace the 256th Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the Louisiana army National Guard for a nine month period and become the primary U.S. force for the entire country.
The Gazette, a local Colorado news outlet, reported that the soldiers will purportedly provide security and protection, assist and advise Iraqi security forces, provide air defenses against attacks and train partner forces in the country.
Pentagon spokesperson Commander Jessica L McNulty told the Middle East Eye that the Fourth Infantry Division unit’s deployment to relieve a departing unit was a “part of a normal rotation of units” to support the continuity of the Combined Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve, a task force set up to allegedly coordinate operations against the Daesh group.
“U.S. and Coalition forces remain in Iraq at the invitation of the government of Iraq to support Iraqi forces as they continue to lead the fight against ISIS,” McNulty claimed, using another term to refer to the takfiri group.
In April, the U.S. and the Iraqi government said they had agreed to the withdrawal of all foreign combat forces operating under the umbrella of the U.S.-led military coalition.
In July, U.S. President Joe Biden announced the country’s combat mission would conclude by the end of the year, but the American military would retain a presence in Iraq to train and advise Iraqi forces.
McNulty told MEE that the “United States and Iraq decided the security relationship will fully transition to a training, advising,
assisting, and intelligence-sharing role, and that there will be no U.S. forces with a combat role in Iraq by December 31, 2021.”
U.S. combat troops withdrew from Iraq in 2011 in an agreement between the Iraqi government and the Obama administration, but returned as part of the alleged coalition against Daesh.
The Iraqi government declared the group defeated in late 2017, but the U.S. is using a variety of pretexts to stay in the Arab country.
Tensions rose between Iraq and the U.S. following the Trump administration’s decision in January 2020 to assassinate senior Iranian commander General Qassem Soleimani and Iraqi anti-terror leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis near Baghdad airport.
As a result, Iraq’s parliament passed a resolution calling for all U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraqi territory, which Washington did not abide by. There are currently around 2,500 U.S. troops in Iraq, according to the Biden administration.
Since the assassination, Daesh has dug in and escalated its operations, carrying out hit-and-run attacks and terrorist bombings in different cities in Iraq in recent months.