US sending 4,000 troops to Middle East after Baghdad embassy siege – reports
by RT
US sending 4,000 troops to Middle East after Baghdad embassy siege – reports
Some 500 paratroopers from the US Army’s 82nd Airborne Division are already on their way to Kuwait, and 3,500 more are set to follow, after the US embassy in Baghdad was stormed and nearly taken by angry Iraqi militiamen.
The 82nd’s alert brigade has been ordered to deploy on Tuesday evening, Fox News reported citing multiple Pentagon officials.
The initial force has already departed Fort Bragg, North Carolina on board C-17 transports. Alert sequence for the Deployment Ready Brigade (DRB) calls for the full deployment within 96 hours.
Hundreds of members of the Iraqi Shia militia Kataib Hezbollah stormed the US embassy in Baghdad on Tuesday, chanting “Death to America” and setting the entrance checkpoint on fire. They were protesting the US airstrikes that killed 25 of their members over the weekend, in what the Pentagon said was retaliation for last week’s rocket strike at a US base in Kirkuk that killed one contractor.
The militia withdrew after a task force of some 100 US Marines, accompanied by attack helicopters, showed up to reinforce the embassy. US President Donald Trump has blamed Iran for the attack and openly threatened Tehran with a “big price” to pay.
There are currently 60,000 US troops in the Middle East at the moment, of which some 5,000 are in Iraq. Almost 14,000 of those have been added since May 2019, with the Pentagon citing a rising “threat” from Iran.
In May 2018, the Trump administration unilaterally repudiated the nuclear deal negotiated with Tehran in 2015, and imposed sanctions intended to destroy the Iranian economy. Despite Trump’s campaign rhetoric about ending US involvement in endless foreign wars, his advisers have repeatedly called for what amounts to regime change in Tehran.
