The U.S. will retain much of its capacity for combating IEDs, officials say, even after it withdraws troops from Afghanistan and shrinks its military.

 

Faced with a defense budget reduction of about $450 billion over 10 years, the military plans to cut more than 100,000 troops from all branches of service. However, officials hope to hold on to most of the capacity that has been built up to dismantle one of the most deadly devices that the U.S. military has faced in the past decade.

Early this Saturday morning in the Florida Panhandle, in keeping with a schedule set in motion decades ago, a crowd will gather around a memorial for a solemn roll call – the names of a specialized group of American service members, 289 in all, who have died in the line of duty since 1942.