History of the Australian Army with automatic weapons; and shoot army personnel or others until they were killed or captured. Australia, as one of the many countries who sent troops to Afghanistan, provided specialist SAS teams for use against Taliban/Al Qaeda forces. Australia was one of the countries to provide combat forces for the US-led invasion of Iraq. In Australia it was known as Operation Falconer. In all Australia contributed some 2,000 personnel. The Army contribution to this was 500 soldiers. Following the end of major combat operations, Australia announced a withdrawal of most of its forces in Iraq. It left behind approximately 950 troops
Withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq revision was to extend the original date of 30 June 2009 for an additional 10 months, to 31 August 2010. After which all but a "transitional force" of 35,000 to 50,000 troops would be withdrawn from the Middle Eastern nation. President Obama reaffirmed commitment to the original complete withdrawal date of 31 December 2011, set by the agreement between the Bush Administration and the Iraqi government. President Obama defined the task of the transitional force as "training, equipping, and advising Iraqi Security Forces as long as they remain non-sectarian; conducting targeted counter-terrorism missions; and protecting our ongoing civilian and military