(CNN) Several hundred members of an 82nd Airborne Division infantry battalion are scheduled to begin returning from the Washington, D.C., region to their base at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, starting Thursday evening, two defense officials with knowledge of the current plan tell CNN.
The movement out of the area comes just days after the Pentagon announced that 1,600 active duty troops were in the Washington region to be ready if called upon amid unrest over the death of George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, in the custody of Minneapolis police officers.
Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy secured the agreement of Defense Secretary Mark Esper to send the troops home, the officials said. The Pentagon view was there is now sufficient law enforcement and National Guard personnel to deal with any civil disturbances in the nation's capital.
A senior defense official tells CNN that "the Department made the decision to return members of some of the active duty units in the capital region to their home base. Military leaders are continuously monitoring this dynamic situation. Return of the remainder of the active duty service members will be conditions-based."
The official added that about 700 personnel are returning to Fort Bragg.
Currently there are over 4,500 National Guard members currently in Washington assisting local and federal authorities, a defense official told CNN.
Still, no active duty forces have been deployed anywhere in the US. There had been an initial discussion earlier this week about returning troops, but the personnel were held at their locations in the Washington area.
President Donald Trump on Monday had declared himself "your president of law and order" and vowed to return order to American streets using the military if widespread violence isn't quelled.
"If a city or state refuses to take the actions necessary to defend the life and property of their residents, then I will deploy the United States military and quickly solve the problem for them," Trump said in the White House Rose Garden.
Esper, however, specifically rejected the use of active duty forces in a law enforcement role on Wednesday -- comments that put him on shaky ground with the White House.
Speaking from the Pentagon briefing room podium, Esper noted that "we are not in one of those situations now."
"The option to use active duty forces in a law enforcement role should only be used as a matter of last resort, and only in the most urgent and dire of situations. We are not in one of those situations now. I do not support invoking the Insurrection Act," he told reporters.
Defense officials previously told CNN there was deep and growing discomfort among some in the Pentagon even before Trump announced that he is ready to deploy the military to enforce order inside the United States.
"There is an intense desire for local law enforcement to be in charge," a defense official said, alluding to the laws that forbid the military from performing law enforcement roles inside the United States.
There is also discomfort with the civil order mission among some National Guard troops -- more of whom are now mobilized inside the US than at any previous time in history. And some of that sentiment has spilled into public view in recent days.
On Wednesday evening, former Secretary of Defense James Mattis castigated Trump as "the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people" in a forceful rebuke of his former boss.
"Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us," Mattis said in a statement obtained by CNN.