Military officials told U.S. lawmakers to scale back visits to Afghanistan as summer nears, citing escalated attacks expected from the Taliban.
Politico reported Friday that the order arrived during an "especially sensitive time" given the recent concession by the military that the security situation in the war-torn nation diminished last year following President Obama’s announcement that the U.S. was ceasing its combat mission.
The Pentagon has previously advised members of Congress to trim down trips to Afghanistan during the summer’s fighting season.
Defense Secretary Ash Carter and Joint Chiefs chairman Joe Dunford also sent a letter to lawmakers ordering travel restrictions from June 1 to Sept. 30 on Congress and senior U.S. officials. Carter and Dunford urged lawmakers to limit congressional delegation trips.
"We respectfully request that congressional and staff delegations to Afghanistan during this period be limited to the chairmen and ranking members of the national security authorization and appropriations committees, as well as other House and Senate leadership," the defense officials wrote, according to Politico.
"Retrograde and drawdown operations will place tremendous demand on intra-theater airlift, particularly helicopters," the officials continued. "Therefore, if exceptions are necessary, we will work closely with authorized congressional delegations to limit the trips to fixed-wing assets, with one stop in either Kabul or Kandahar."
The Taliban announced last month that it would ramp up "large-scale" attacks as the weather warms up, the Associated Press reported.
In December 2014, Obama declared that the war in Afghanistan was over. Troops that stayed behind ceased combat missions, instead serving as advisors to the Afghan military and executing counterterrorism missions. The 15-year war has raged on as terrorist threats continue to grow.