“Under the so-called Force Management Level policy, the Pentagon doesn’t count troops who are in the war zones for fewer than 120 days in the public numbers. That includes … combat units like Marine artillery batteries that have deployed to Syria….”
THE RESULT: PHONY NUMBERS “The U.S. already (as of August 2017) has as many as 12,000 troops in Afghanistan, significantly higher than its 8,400-person cap. If President Donald Trump sends nearly 4,000 additional troops, as officials predict, the total will be nearly double the current public number. In Iraq, where the Baghdad government faces political resistance to a large American troop presence, the 5,200 troop figure the Pentagon uses in public serves as a useful fiction. In fact, more than 7,000 U.S. troops are in Iraq, according to recent reports.
And in Syria the official 503 U.S. troops mostly covers special operations units. But hundreds of other troops who support them and their local allies remain classified — including the Marine artillerymen and Army Rangers whose vehicles are frequently photographed by local journalists.”
“We will not talk about numbers of troops or our plans for further military activities,” Trump said in his address.”
Source:
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/26/mattis-trump-troop-numbers-war-zone-242055