The Senate voted to confirm Army Lt. Gen. Michael Kurilla to be the next head of U.S. Central Command on Thursday evening.
Kurilla, the commander of the 18th Airborne Corps in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, will replace Gen. Frank McKenzie, whose tenure will end on April 1. The incoming CENTCOM leader will also be promoted to a four-star general in the move.
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He was born and raised in Minnesota, and he’s a 1988 graduate of West Point, according to his biography. He served in the Gulf War and served in CENTCOM for a 10-year period from 2004 to 2014. He was shot three times in a battle with Iraqi insurgents in 2005 when he was a Stryker battalion commander with the 25th Infantry Division, according to Military Times.
During his confirmation hearing last week, Kurilla was peppered with questions ranging from Islamic State threats to the Afghanistan withdrawal, Russia and Ukraine, and China. He promised to launch an investigation into a reported March 2017 drone strike that targeted a dam on the “no-strike” list while also raising concerns about the reconstitution of terror groups in the Middle East in light of the U.S.’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Following that hearing, Kurilla took off to meet the rest of his troops, which had been deployed to Europe amid the threat of a Russian invasion of Ukraine, which President Joe Biden said could happen any day.
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Kurilla was confirmed amid a slew of more than 700 military promotions that needed congressional votes.
