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To defend themselves? were they heavily defended or go in in light trucks not expecting much resistance. >> i'll answer the second part because i know and i'll give you in general the first part. so they did not expect resistance on this particular patrol. at least when they first planned it. again, what happened subsequently will be the investigation. because the rules in that part of west africa are that we will only accompany our partner forces when the chances of enemy contact are unlikely. so with that, they were equipped with machine guns, small arms and obviously had the ability with co...

Search for sergeant johnson's body, can you tell us how many u.s. troops took part in that search and how many partnered and allied forces as well. describe not just the drone that went in to look for him and other assets as well? >> i can't. again, that's down to a level of detail that is really going to require the investigation to lay all of that out. >> do you know how many u.s. troops took part in the search? >> i can't tell you -- again, i know how many u.s. troops were part of that original advise and assist mission. i don't know what each of those troops were doing at any given time on...

Is but you have to realize that niger is, you know, the operational area in niger is larger than the operational area in afghanistan, in iraq, and syria. so this is a very large area where the special operation forces count on their partners to provide the security necessary and of course as general dunford said, you know, enemy contact will be unlikely th. they were doing a civil military operation mission that is part of the special operation force missions there on the ground. so they were decentralized and dispersed, they were working in and among the populous. the commanders on the ground...

That they're taking too many risks. let's keep in mind, although i talked about enemy contact being unlikely on this particular mission, the reason we're in west africa is because it's an area of concentration of isis and al qaeda. the reason why our special operations forces are operating in libya is because there is a threat of isis attacks from libya. the reason they're in east africa is because there is an al qaeda and a smaller isis presence there. to the extent that they're taking risk, we have sent them there to operate in areas within which there are extremist elements that if we weren...

They're taking too many risks. let's keep in mind, although i talked about enemy contact being unlikely on this particular mission, the reason why we're in west africa is because the area of concentration of isis and l al-quaida. the reason why we're in libya is because of a threat of is superior attacks. and the reason why we're in libya is because there's a small al-quaida presence there. to the extent they're taking risk, we sent them there to operate in areas within which there are extremist elements that if we weren't conducting operations, our judgment is they would be the capability to ...