In comments Thursday, President Trump dismissed the reports of a plan for 10,000 more US troops being sent to the Middle East, telling reporters that “I would certainly send troops if we need them,” but that “I don’t think we’re going to need them.”



The call for troops was initially instigated by CENTCOM, who requested troops from the Pentagon, who then have to solicit approval from the White House to actually do it. CENTCOM cited the US-Iran tensions as the reason they want more troops.



CENTCOM’s push was claimed to be based on intelligence about Iranian threats, though President Trump has already dismissed that idea, too, saying earlier this week that there is “no indication that anything’s happened or will happen” with Iran.



This makes it very unlikely that President Trump is going to be coaxed into signing off on the deployment based on claims of classified evidence, since he’s already told the public that such intelligence doesn’t exist at all.





Author: Jason Ditz Jason Ditz is news editor of Antiwar.com. View all posts by Jason Ditz