The U.S. is planning to send hundreds of additional troops to Afghanistan to help government forces battle Taliban militants, marking the largest deployment of American troops outside major bases in the country since the end of the NATO combat mission in 2014, a military spokesman told The New York Times. The military said the troops won’t see active combat and instead will focus on protecting special-operations forces in Helmand province and providing extra support and training for the Afghan army, said Col. Michael T. Lawhorn, a spokesman for the U.S. military in Afghanistan. Lawhorn did not provide the number of troops or the unit involved. A senior military official told the Times the unit being sent, the Second Battalion, 87th Infantry, was slightly smaller than the usual battalion size of 700 or 800.
