Shaffer
03-26-04, 06:48 AM
WASHINGTON - About 2,000 Marines aboard ships in the Persian Gulf plan to go ashore in Afghanistan to join the search for al-Qaida and Taliban fighters, defense officials said Thursday.
The Marines are from the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, which began a six-month deployment on Feb. 19. They are aboard the USS Wasp, the USS Shreveport and the USS Whidbey Island, and are part of a larger expeditionary strike group that includes the cruisers USS Leyte Gulf and USS Yorktown, destroyer USS McFaul and attack submarine USS Connecticut.
Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a news conference that the addition of the Marines reflects a desire to improve security in advance of planned Afghan elections this summer, as well as a need to hunt down al-Qaida and Taliban forces.
Myers did not say when the Marines plan to arrive in Afghanistan or how long they would stay.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, appearing at the same Pentagon news conference, said he could not say how close U.S. forces may be to capturing Osama bin Laden. But he added that the overall military effort to put pressure on bin Laden's al-Qaida network was ``going well.''
Already, there are more than 13,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan. They are engaged in an intensified offensive against the al-Qaida and Taliban, mainly in the eastern part of the country.
U.S. forces in Afghanistan are led by the Army's 10th Mountain Division.
The Marines are from the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, which began a six-month deployment on Feb. 19. They are aboard the USS Wasp, the USS Shreveport and the USS Whidbey Island, and are part of a larger expeditionary strike group that includes the cruisers USS Leyte Gulf and USS Yorktown, destroyer USS McFaul and attack submarine USS Connecticut.
Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a news conference that the addition of the Marines reflects a desire to improve security in advance of planned Afghan elections this summer, as well as a need to hunt down al-Qaida and Taliban forces.
Myers did not say when the Marines plan to arrive in Afghanistan or how long they would stay.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, appearing at the same Pentagon news conference, said he could not say how close U.S. forces may be to capturing Osama bin Laden. But he added that the overall military effort to put pressure on bin Laden's al-Qaida network was ``going well.''
Already, there are more than 13,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan. They are engaged in an intensified offensive against the al-Qaida and Taliban, mainly in the eastern part of the country.
U.S. forces in Afghanistan are led by the Army's 10th Mountain Division.