US Sending 1,000 More Troops to Middle East Over Growing Iran Threat

June 18, 2019 Marcy Oster

Two Navy men attach cargo to a Sea Hawk helicopter from the flight deck of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln in the Red Sea, May 10, 2019. (Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Amber Smalley/U.S. Navy via Getty Images)

(JTA) — The United States will send 1,000 more troops to the Middle East over what is being deemed to be the growing threat of Iran.

In announcing the additional troops, acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan said June 17 that the troop movement was in response to “hostile behavior by Iranian forces and their proxy groups that threaten United States personnel and interests across the region.”

A U.S. official told CNN the deployment will include intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft and missile defense for force protection.

In a Time magazine report June 17, President Donald Trump said he would take military action against Iran to prevent the Islamic Republic from acquiring nuclear weapons, but that similar action to protect global oil supplies is a “question mark.”

Trump also told Time that the Gulf of Oman, where two oil tankers were attacked last week by what is believed to be magnetic mines, is less strategically important for the United States now than it used to be since the United States gets “very little oil” from the region. The U.S. and others blame the attack, which Trump called “very minor,” on Iran.

The news of the troop movement came after Iran announced earlier June 17 that next week it will break the uranium stockpile limit set by the 2015 nuclear deal.