Donald Trump, US President said on Wednesday that the
United States could send as many as 15,000 troops to the border with
Mexico, as he hardens his stance against what he described as dangerous
groups of immigrants.
With more than 5,000 soldiers
already being sent, Trump told reporters: "We'll do up to anywhere
between 10 and 15,000 military personnel."
US
President Donald Trump speaks to the press before departing on Marine
One from the South Lawn of the White House, Washington, DC, US.
"It's a dangerous group of people," Trump
said of the latest caravan of mostly impoverished Central Americans
trying to walk through Mexico to the US border.
"They're not coming into our country."
The
numbers cited by Trump are significantly higher than defense officials
have disclosed. The Pentagon said on Monday it was deploying more than
5,200 troops to the border but that the number would rise. On Wednesday,
it said more than 7,000 troops would support the Department of Homeland
Security along the border.
Several groups, including
the American Civil Liberties Union, have accused Trump of politicizing
the military ahead of next week's congressional elections with his plans
to use active military personnel to buttress border patrol efforts.
Trump
did not say how many of those 15,000 would be National Guard. There are
already 2,100 US National Guard forces at the border, sent after a
previous Trump request in April, and they are authorized to go up to
4,000.
Some
of the thousands of Central American migrants in the caravan rest at a
camp for the evening in Juchitan de Zaragoza, Mexico, October 30, 2018.
If 15,000 troops were drawn into the
effort, it would mean there would be more US troops on the border with
Mexico than there are in Afghanistan, which has become America's longest
conflict.
A
caravan of Central American migrants estimated to number at least 3,500
people left Honduras in mid-October and is now in southern Mexico on its
way to the US border.