Inhofe no longer concerned about border troop readiness after Texas tour

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Jim Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Monday he is no longer concerned that troops stationed at the border are missing out on readiness training, but he does worry about the risks they face.

Troops receive better training at the border than they get at their regular duty stations, the Oklahoma Republican told reporters in a phone call after touring the border near Brownsville, Texas.

“This is in lieu of the training they would get artificially,” said Inhofe. “In training in most areas, you have very sophisticated training environments … very similar to actual conditions, but down here, it is actual conditions.”

Inhofe acknowledged he had feared President Trump’s decision to deploy thousands of troops to the southern border would have a negative effect on readiness. About 3,000 active-duty troops and 2,000 National Guard personnel are assisting the Department of Homeland Security along the border. The chairman suggested that future defense budgets could take into account troop training at the border.

“[I] would say we consider this to be replacing training that is not as effective as the training you’d get in garrison,” said Inhofe.

While his readiness worries have dissipated, Inhofe expressed concern about the disarming of U.S. troops by armed Mexican forces on the American side of the border earlier this month.

“There is always going to be risk involved in anything they would be doing,” said Inhofe, noting that military personnel know every mission carries a threat. “There is risk there, we realize it, and we will be doing what we can to minimize that.”

Gen. Robert Neller, commandant of the Marine Corps, said in leaked internal memos in March that deployments to the border and other “unplanned” expenses were posing an “unacceptable risk to the Marine Corps combat readiness.”

President Trump has said he plans to send more troops to the southern border, but acting Secretary of Defense Pat Shanahan said the Department of Homeland Security has not yet sent the Pentagon any new requests.

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