Biden authorizes 1,000 more troops to be sent to Afghanistan
By Donald Judd and Barbara Starr, CNN
President Joe Biden announced the authorization of an additional direct deployment of 1,000 troops to Afghanistan in a statement Saturday.
Biden said he authorized the deployment “to make sure we can have an orderly and safe drawdown of US personnel and other allied personnel and an orderly and safe evacuation of Afghans who helped our troops during our mission and those at special risk from the Taliban advance.”
Biden’s authorization of 5,000 troops in his Saturday statement included 1,000 who are already on the ground in country, according to a defense official. A battalion of 1,000 troops from the 82nd Airborne Division were redirected to Kabul, instead of their original standby position in Kuwait.
The Pentagon had previously announced 3,000 additional troops were on their way, the defense official said.
The 82nd Airborne troops redirected to Kabul were originally going to be part of up to 4,000 troops from the same division going to Kuwait on standby, to be used if needed.
The bulk of troops are expected in Kabul by the end of the weekend.
The-CNN-Wire
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