Riyaz Patel
An element of the US Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment has been directed to the Middle East, joining other ground forces surging to the region as tensions escalate with Iran.
The contingent from the elite special operations raid force is deploying to the US Central Command area of operations, a Pentagon official with knowledge of Special Operations Command forces told Military.com Sunday evening.
Politico was first to report that a company-sized element of the 75th was deploying as part of a special operations contingent heading to the region.
The deployment comes after a series of short-notice deployments in the last few days after the Iranian government pledged to retaliate against a US drone strike in Baghdad killed Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard’s elite Quds Force.
It was confirmed Saturday that the amphibious assault ship USS Bataan, carrying some 2,200 Marines of the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit, is already moving to the Middle East.
The Pentagon ordered about 3,000 paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division’s 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment out of Fort Bragg, North Carolina to the region Friday.
An initial deployment of the 2nd Battalion, 504th boarded planes on New Year’s Day and flew to Kuwait to beef up American forces in the region.
On Sunday, American officials with Combined Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve announced that the command is suspending its anti-Islamic State mission, which involves about 5,000 US troops in Iraq, to help counter any Iranian reprisals.
A series of rocket attacks on US positions in Iraq, including two more Saturday night, “has limited our capacity to conduct training with partners and to support their operations against Daesh [another name for ISIS] and we have therefore paused these activities,” the task force said in the statement.
And late Sunday night, another attack on Baghdad’s Green Zone.
In Tehran also Sunday, Hossein Dehghan, the former defense minister and now top military adviser to spiritual leader Imam Khamenei, said the Iranian response would be limited to an attack on US forces.
Additional reporting by Sputnik and Military.com
