Figure 1. U.S. Armed Forces and Contractor Personnel in Afghanistan

(Q4 FY2007-Q1 FY2017)

Source: Contractor levels drawn from U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) Quarterly Contractor Census Reports; troop levelsCENTCOM Quarterly Contractor Census Reports; U.S. Armed Forces levels through Q4 FY2017 drawn from "Boots on the Ground" monthly reports to Congress.

Notes: DOD did not begin releasing data on contractors in CENTCOM until Q4 FY2007. U.S. Armed Forces personnel figureslevels include all active and reserve component personnel.

Figure 2. U.S. Armed Forces and Contractor Personnel in Iraq

(Q4 F72007-Q1 FY2014; Q1 FY2015-Q1 FY2017Q4 FY2018)

Source: ForceContractor levels drawn from CENTCOM Quarterly Contractor Census Reports; U.S. Armed Forces levels from Q4 FY2007-Q1FY2012 areQ1 FY2012 drawn from the DOD's "Boots on the Ground" monthly reports to Congress. U.S. Armed Forces personnel figures for Q4 FY2007-Q1FY2012 include all active and reserve component personnel. Force levels for Q1FY2015-Q1FY2017 arelevels for Q1 FY2015-Q4 FY2017 drawn from the White House's semiannual "War Powers Resolution Report" to Congress. All listed contractor levels are drawn from CENTCOM Quarterly Contractor Census Reports.

Notes: DOD did not begin releasing data on DOD-funded private security contractor personnel levels in CENTCOM until Q1FY2008Q1 FY2008, and ceased reporting data on DOD-funded private security contractor personnel in Iraq in Q4 FY2013. As of Q1 FY2017Q4 FY2018, CENTCOM has not resumed reporting data on DOD-funded private security personnel in Iraq. U.S. force levels for Q4 FY2007-Q1 FY2012 include all active and reserve component personnel. See Table 3 for further discussion of recent U.S. troopArmed Forces and contractor levels in Iraq.

See 32 C.F.R. 158.3, "Definitions";;" see also Department of DefenseDOD Instruction 3020.41, Operational Contract Support (OCS), December 20, 2011August 31, 2018, p. 48, at http://www.dtic.mil/whs/directives/corres/pdf/302041p.pdf.

See Joint Publication 4-10, Operational Contract Support, July 2014, p. 211, at http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/new_pubs/jp4_10https://www.esd.whs.mil/Portals/54/Documents/DD/issuances/dodi/302041p.pdf.

See, for example, U.S. Government Accountability Office, Iraq and Afghanistan: DOD, State and USAID Face Continued Challenges in Tracking Contracts, Assistance Instruments, and Associated Personnel, GAO-11-1, October 1, 2010. For further discussions of efforts to improve DOD contractor management and oversight, see CRS Report R40764, Department of Defense Contractors in Afghanistan and Iraq: Background and Analysis, by Moshe Schwartz and Joyprada Swain.

Email correspondence with DOD official, received by CRS on September 7, 2016.

IraqiIraq areas of operation are defined by CRS as Iraq, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, and Jordan. AfghanAfghanistan areas of operation are defined by CRS as Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.

In the 1980s, Congress first implemented the use of force management levels in Europe under Sec. In 2008, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) published a report (CBO, Contractors' Support of U.S. Operations in Iraq, August 2008) that tracked the U.S. government's obligations in the Iraqi theater from FY2005-FY2007 using Federal Procurement Data System (FPDS) data that considered most countries bordering Iraq, with the exception of Iran, to be part of the Iraqi area of operations. CRS replicated CBO's methodology for defining the Iraq areas of operation for the purposes of this data analysis, and used a similar methodology in determining the approximate value of annual contract obligations in the Afghanistan areas of operation. The data used by CRS allocates place of performance based on the principal contract place of performance as identified by FPDS. Because FPDS only allows for one country to be listed as the place of performance, contracts listed as being performed in one country can also involve substantial performance in other countries. As such, activities undertaken primarily in other countries excluded from these definitions in support of U.S. operations in the Afghanistan and Iraq areas of operation (such as contracted activities undertaken at CENTCOM's headquarters at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida in support of U.S. operations within CENTCOM's area of responsibility) would not be included in this analysis. See also Appendix A, "FPDS Background, Accuracy Issues, and Future Plans" to CRS Report R44010, Defense Acquisitions: How and Where DOD Spends Its Contracting Dollars, by Moshe Schwartz, John F. Sargent Jr., and Christopher T. Mann, for an overview of known issues associated with FPDS data, including accuracy, completeness, and timeliness of the contract award data.

Established force management levels may be adjusted in response to operational needs or changing circumstances within a country or region, such as the Obama Administration's decision in July 2016 to maintain approximately 8,400 troops in Afghanistan through January 2017. See White House Office of the Press Secretary, "Statement by the President on Afghanistan," July 6, 2016, available at https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/07/06/statement-president-afghanistan.

See Nancy A. Youssef, "The Pentagon Will Now Get To Decide How Many Troops To Send To Fight ISIS," BuzzFeed News, April 26, 2017; see also Luis Martinez, "Trump Gives Pentagon Authority to Set Troop Levels in Syria and Iraq," ABC News, April 26, 2017 and Ryan Browne, "Trump Gives Pentagon; Jim Garamone, "President Gives Mattis Authority to Set U.S. Troop Strength in Afghanistan," Defense Media Activity, June 14, 2017; and U.S. Department of Defense Press Release, "Statement by Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis on Afghanistan Troop Levels," June 14, 2017 Authority to Set Troop Levels," CNN, April 26, 2017. To date, the Trump Administration has not issued statements or other official announcements of planned deployments or changes in force management levels in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria. In a March 30, 2017 Los Angeles Times article, a DOD spokesperson reportedly noted that "[i]n order to maintain tactical surprise, ensure operational security and force protection, the coalition will not routinely announce or confirm information about the capabilities, force numbers, locations, or movement of forces in or out of Iraq and Syria."

See for example the statement as delivered as well as8.

See U.S. Department of Defense, Press Operations, "Department of Defense Afghanistan Force Management Level Accounting and Reporting Practices Briefing by Pentagon Chief Spokesperson White and Joint Staff Director Lieutenant General McKenzie in the Pentagon Briefing Room," transcript, August 30, 2017.

CRS October 26, 2018 correspondence with DOD officials; David Welna, "Pentagon Questioned over Blackout on War Zone Troop Numbers," NPR, July 3, 2018; and Tara Copp, "Pentagon strips Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria troop numbers from web," Military Times, April 9, 2018.

U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Armed Services, Situation in Afghanistan, 115^th Cong., 1^st sess., February 9, 2017. This concern was also echoed in a hearing before the House Armed Services Committee's Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations in December 2016, and in a hearing before the House Armed Services Committee's Subcommittee on Readiness on March 8, 2017.

Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan, "Transforming Wartime Contracting: Controlling Costs, Reducing Risks," final report of the Commission to Congress, August 2011, pp. 18-21. Available at https://cybercemetery.unt.edu/archive/cwc/20110929213922/http://www.wartimecontracting.gov/docs/CWC_FinalReport-highres.pdf.

See Department of Defense, Contractor Support of U.S. Operations in the USCENTCOM Area of Responsibility to Include Iraq and Afghanistan, October 2016, at http, October 2018, at https://www.acq.osd.mil/log/PS/.CENTCOM_reports.html; Boots on the Ground Report, September 2016.

See for example Thomas Gibbons-Neff and Mujib Mashal, "U.S. to Withdraw about 7,000 Troops from Afghanistan, Officials Say," The New York Times, December 20, 2018; Gordon Lubold and Jessica Donati, "Trump Orders Big Troop Reduction in Afghanistan," The Wall Street Journal, December 20, 2018; and Dan Lamothe and Josh Dawsey, "New Plans for Afghanistan Would Have Trump Withdrawing Fewer Troops," The Washington Post, January 8, 2019.

For further discussion of U.S. operations in Afghanistan under Operation Freedom's Sentinel (OFS), which includes the NATO-led Resolute Support mission, see CRS Report R45122, Afghanistan: Background and U.S. Policy In Brief, by Clayton Thomas.

See Department of Defense, Contractor Support of U.S. Operations in the USCENTCOM Area of Responsibility to Include Iraq and Afghanistan, October 2016. As "Boots on the Ground" reports do not currently provide OIR force levels, CRS is using the force management level for Iraq reported biannually by the White House to provide an indication of the current number of U.S. forces estimated to be in Iraq, October 2018, at https://www.acq.osd.mil/log/PS/.CENTCOM_reports.html/5A_October_2018.pdf.

Jim Garamone, "Pentagon Announces Troop Levels in Iraq, Syria," Defense Media Activity, December 6, 2017. DOD has not released updated troop levels for Iraq or Syria; observers and analysts have typically referenced the December 2017 figures in subsequent discussions of U.S. Armed Forces levels in Iraq and Syria—see for example Tamer El-Ghobashy, "Trump's Decision on Syria is Worrying Allies in Iraq and Emboldening Opponents," The Washington Post, December 20, 2018 and Dion Nissenbaum, Nancy A. Youssef, and Vivian Salama, "In Shift, Trump Orders U.S. Troops Out of Syria," The Wall Street Journal, December 19, 2018. For further discussion of the U.S. and its coalition partners' efforts to combat the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria under OIR, see CRS Report R43612, The Islamic State and U.S. Policy, by Christopher M. Blanchard and Carla E. Humud.