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Roughly 300 Marines are en route to Afghanistan to help Afghan troops stop the Taliban from swallowing more of the hard-fought territory for which so many Marines have bled and died, Marine Corps Times has learned. The deployment of Marines from the II Marine Expeditionary Force at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, will be the largest Marine deployment to Afghanistan since 2014, when the U.S. military's combat mission known as Operation Enduring Freedom officially ended.

By the end of April, the Marines will be in Helmand province as Task Force Southwest, replacing the Armys Task Force Forge. During their nine months in Helmand, the Marines will train the Afghan National Armys 215th Corps and the 505th Zone National Police in marksmanship, indirect fire and small-unit tactics and other skills, Marine Corps officials said.

The advise-and-assist mission can give Afghan troops and police the support they need to reverse the momentum of the Taliban in that important province that sits astride the critical Ring Road that connects the southern and western parts of the country to Kabul, Petraeus said.

I think that was one of the problems the Obama administration had: Announcing withdrawals that came and went and really made no sense from any kind of point of view, Bergen said. They tended to undercut the government. They also, obviously, were really helpful to the morale of the Taliban.

Theyre winning the war, Forrest said. Theyre winning actual terrain and population control. They have no incentive to actually go to the table, especially as they are getting additional support from other malign regional actors, such as Russia and Iran.

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Marines headed to southern Afghanistan, where Taliban are ... - Marine Corps Times