From Military.com:
"Pentagon Orders Training Pause
for 850 Saudi Troops in US”
The Pentagon has paused its
training in the U.S. with Saudi nationals until officials conduct a thorough
review. The directive follows a deadly shooting that killed three sailors and
injured eight other people at NAS Pensacola, Florida, according to a senior
defense official. Deputy Defense Secretary David Norquist issued a memo this
week following the incident saying leaders would review security and screening
procedures for foreign students attending training in the U.S., as well as
ongoing bilateral training programs. But Saudi students in particular have been
ordered to take a temporary operational pause in training in what the Pentagon
says is a "safety and security stand down" during the review, the
senior defense officials said in a phone call with reporters Tuesday. "This
will apply to all Saudi students in the United States. So they will all
continue to have classroom training, but operational training will pause during
the course of this review," the official said. There are roughly 850 Saudi
students in the U.S. at this time for various training programs, the official
said. The Navy first issued its own temporary grounding for Saudi aviation students
training at three Florida bases earlier on Tuesday. The latest development
comes as thousands of U.S. troops are in Saudi to deter malign behavior from
Iran in the Middle East. Norquist said he has directed the undersecretary of
intelligence "to take immediate steps to strengthen personnel vetting for
International Military Students (IMS) and to complete a review within 10 days
of policies and procedures for screening foreign students and granting access
to our bases," according to the memo. "These efforts will seek to
more closely align IMS vetting procedures with those we apply to US
personnel," the memo states. The senior defense official said the U.S.
military has trained more than 28,000 Saudi students over the life of our
security cooperation relationship "without serious incident." But
"we are going to take some short term looks at our programs to see how we
can address any shortcomings," the official added. At various events over
the weekend, Defense Secretary Mark Esper announced that he had ordered a
review of vetting and security following the shooting. The FBI identified the
suspect as 21-year-old Royal Saudi Air Force 2nd Lt. Mohammed Saeed
al-Shamrani, who allegedly used a handgun in his shooting rampage. The
Associated Press reported Saturday that the al-Shamrani hosted a dinner party
earlier in the week to watch videos of mass shootings. One of the students who
attended the dinner had videotaped the outside of the training building where
the shooting was taking place, the AP said, quoting a top U.S. official. Two
other students watched from a nearby car. "I want to immediately make sure
we're taking all necessary precautions appropriate to the particular base to make
sure our people are safe and secure," Esper said on "Fox News
Sunday." "I want to make sure those procedures are full and
sufficient," he said during the interview. During a panel at the annual
Reagan National Defense Forum on Saturday, Pentagon top brass discussed how the
U.S. has a variety of training events and programs with foreign partners, and
is looking to expand those programs. Ending those would have an adverse effect
on joint training down the line, said Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein. "The
biggest impact would be on our allies and partners and interoperability,"
Goldfein said of foreign partner training. "My biggest concern that we
would walk away from those key relationships and folks that we know we need
when we go into combat."
^ This makes complete sense. It
would be dumb to simply let things go on unchecked after this deadly shooting.
Once the review is done then maybe these Saudi Military students will be
allowed to fly – or at least those that pass the extra checks. ^
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