USA will send 'several thousands' of soldiers to the Mexican border.

There are currently 2,350 military personnel working along the border, where they help border patrol agents with logistical support and installing a barbed-wire fence.

The border mission was scheduled to end on January 31, but was extended until September.

US interim defense secretary Patrick Shanahan said his country will send "several thousand" more soldiers to the border with Mexico as part of a controversial mission to increase security at the border.

At this time there are 2,350 military personnel working along the border, where they help border patrol agents with logistical support and installing a barbed-wire fence.

The troops were deployed at the request of President Donald Trump before mid-term elections in November, when caravans with Central American migrants approached the border to seek asylum in the United States and thus flee violence and poverty in their countries.

The border mission was scheduled to end on January 31, but was extended until September.

The Department of Homeland Security called for help to lift the wire fence and to expand "surveillance," Shanahan explained at a press conference at the Pentagon.

Pentagon spokesman Lieutenant General Jamie Davis later said the military is currently evaluating which units will be involved in the mission and said there will be an increase of "a few thousand" soldiers.

"We will give more precision about the figures when we have it," he said.

The deployment of troops on the border was one of the issues on which Trump and former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis disagreed before the latter resigned in December after the president's controversial decision to withdraw troops from Syria.

Shanahan, who has been interim defense secretary, replaced Mattis on January 1.