WASHINGTON _ The number of U.S. service members deployed to the Guantanamo Bay prison may be cut as part of the Pentagon's worldwide look at where it can reallocate forces, U.S. Southern Command commander Navy Adm. Craig Faller said Thursday.
Faller told the Senate Armed Services Committee that Southern Command is looking at the detention facility to determine if there's "a more efficient way to conduct that mission set."
Faller said there are currently about 1,800 U.S. National Guard forces serving at the military prison at Naval Base Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. The detention facility opened in 2002 to hold prisoners affiliated with al-Qaida and the Taliban caught during the almost two-decade-long war on terrorism.
