Experts say the president will use today's visit to Fort Bliss to remind the public that he kept his promise to end the war in Iraq.

It was two years ago to the day that President Barack Obama announced his drawdown of U.S. troops in Iraq at Fort Bliss.

According to our media partners at the El Paso times, Obama is expected to sign an executive order to boost mental health services for troops and veterans.

The president will be meeting with military leaders, troops and their families.

He's expected to discuss the suicide rate of soldiers, an issue Fort Bliss Commanding Gen. Dana Pittard tells KFOX14 Fort Bliss has done well to prevent.

"We have the lowest number of suicides of any major insulation in the Army, so we're really doing some neat things here, and he and his team are coming to find out about that," said Pittard.

So far this year, two Fort Bliss soldiers have committed suicide, but Gen. Pittard adds that's a small number compared to other posts of the same size where they have three to four times as many.
Gen. Pittard says nearly a quarter of his troops go through a suicide intervention class called ASSIST.

Since last month, all troops at Fort Bliss are required to go to the program.

Obama is also expected to talk about sequestration, a congressional debt reduction process that could cut $500 billion from the defense budget, which according to Pittard, could have an impact on the construction of the new William Beaumont medical center.

The executive order reportedly will keep the budget cuts from affecting mental health services to active military and veterans.

"Over the last 10 years, 11 years of war, it has caused a stress on our force overall, but we're dealing with that," said Pittard.