Why Trump would need one million troops to control Iran

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Donald Trump is thinking about sending an extra 10,000 soldiers to the Middle East, to join around 3,000 paratroopers and 5,000 U.S. Marines in carrying out ground attacks on Iran. This is laughable. To succeed, Trump would have to deploy every single member of the U.S. armed forces to Iran – upwards of 1.3 million. At the height of U.S.-led operations in Iraq, during the 2007-2008 “surge” ordered by George Bush Jr, around 185,000 American and allied troops were sent to quell an insurgency that had grown since its dictator had been toppled four years earlier by an allied invasion. Add that number to the 450,000-550,000 Iraqi government forces working with the allies. And then remember that the so-called Islamic State, formed by thugs from al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein’s Baath party, took much of the north of the country in 2014, set up a “state,” and sponsored global terror for years. So three-quarters of a million soldiers were not enough to sort out Iraq. The U.S. is looking at sending an extra 20,000 or so of its finest to add to the 50,000 soldiers, sailors, airmen and women already deployed in multiple U.S. bases around the Gulf. The latter are busy bombing Iraq and fighting off Tehran’s missile and drone counterattacks. The number of U.S. troops currently tasked with, or being considered for, carrying out military operations against a nation of 90 million people, which is about the size of Western Europe, is less than were sent to fight in Helmand, southern Afghanistan, at the peak of that conflict. Helmand had the most intense allied concentration of forces anywhere in Afghanistan between 2009 and 2011. About 25,000 U.S. Marines surged into the province when the British-led operation there, which expanded from about 3,000 troops in 2006 to around 10,000, was unable to secure the region. Those 35,000, including the U.S. Marines, British troops, and soldiers from many other nations who contributed to operations there, were unable to secure a region 28 times smaller than Iran. The 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU), based around the USS Tripoli, and the 11th MEU, based around the USS Boxer, are America’s well-trained amphibious attack dogs. Each MEU has about 2,500 personnel. Their unit structuring could, arguably, be used for a blueprint to turn the shrivelled British armed forces back into an effective single force and a vertically integrated all-arms machine. The Tripoli and the Boxer are mini aircraft carriers carrying Marine fast jets, Marine Osprey vertical take-off planes, Marine helicopter gunships and transport helicopters, and Marine artillery. With no interservice rivalry, and non-stop training as a unit, MEUs would be ideal to send to capture targets like Kharg Island, the heart of Iran’s oil export system, which Trump has threatened. They might also be used to try to drive land-based threats from Iran, currently ranged against ships that are trying to get through the 21-mile-wide Strait of Hormuz. In both cases, they might even succeed. Until, that is, first-person drones perfected by Russia in Ukraine, and no doubt supplied by Vladimir Putin to Iran, come swarming in and transmit live, real-time footage of U.S. soldiers and their last moments of horror, freeze-framed by Iranian propagandists. Full article: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/us-iran-war-trump-troops-ground-forces-b2947046.html Watch more on Independent TV: https://tinyurl.com/yc7ukx9n The Independent is the world’s most free-thinking newsbrand, providing global news, commentary and analysis for the independently-minded. Subscribe: https://bit.ly/Subscribe-to-Independent Find us on social: TikTok / https://www.tiktok.com/@independent Instagram / https://www.instagram.com/the.independent/ X (Twitter) / https://twitter.com/Independent Facebook / https://www.facebook.com/TheIndependentOnline Download the iOS & Android app: https://tinyurl.com/2s3ts5dh Sign up to our newsletters: https://tinyurl.com/2bmw565x Help to support truly independent journalism. Every dollar you contribute will directly fund additional special reports and investigations from a free-thinking, award-winning newsroom you can trust: https://www.independent.co.uk/donations