Washington DC, May 23: The United States department of defense was considering to send additional 5,000 American troops to the Middle East amid rising tensions with Iran, as told by two US officials to Reuters on Wednesday.
According to Reuters news reports, the official, while speaking on a condition of anonymity, stated the request has been made by the US central command, but however, added it was unclear whether the Pentagon would green flag the request. One of the US officials said the request to Pentagon would be defensive in nature.
The Pentagon generally regularly receives and rejects the requests for additional help from the US combatant commands from across the globe.
However, it was not clear if any specific appeal would be presented to the White House. The development report comes as the latest request for additional help and resource in the face of Iranian threats to American forces and interest in the Middle East.
On Wednesday, a Pentagon spokesperson, commander Rebecca Rebarich said, “As a matter of longstanding policy, we are not going to discuss or speculate on potential future plans and requests for forces.”
On Tuesday, acting defence secretary Patrick Shanahan has said while Iranian threats remained high in the Middle East, concrete measures by the Pentagon had “put on hold” the possible for attacks on the US.
Also read: It’s ‘quite possible’ Iran behind Gulf attacks, US’ Mike Pompeo says
US President Donald Trump administration has on Tuesday said it was “quite possible” that Iran was behind the sabotage of Persian Gulf oil interests, but, stated vigorous response had helped to stop potential attacks on Americans.
US secretary of state Mike Pompeo has said Washington had made no “definitive conclusion” that could be presented publicly on sabotage incidents of Saudi Arabian oil tankers off the coast of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), even drone attack over crude oil shipments and pipelines in Saudi Arabia.
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Explosive-laden drones attacked oil facilities near capital Riyadh, Saudi Arabia says