WASHINGTON — The Pentagon extended the deployment of National Guard troops on Monday amid reports of Guard units trying to return to armories in Maryland and Northern Virginia being stuck in traffic on the Beltway and Connecticut Avenue, sources confirmed today.

“Jesus, D.C. drivers are the worst,” said Maryland National Guard 1st Lt. Geordan Jackson, who sent a text message to the National Capital/Capitol Counterinsurgency Saving Democracy Center of Excellence command post after his Mine Resistant Ambush Protection vehicle had moved only “about six fucking car lengths” in 30 minutes along Connecticut Avenue, a major north-south route between the District and Maryland.

“I thought the pandemic meant traffic was better,” Jackson said. “We should have just taken the Metro. But that would have been like six grand in fare cards, and I don’t know if DTS would reimburse me.

“Also, a bike messenger just passed us and flipped me off," he added.

President Biden was “monitoring the situation closely,” according to Pentagon officials.

“He asked if he should send a helicopter with his motorcade’s red light clicker,” said Navy Lt. Cmdr. Daisy Gosnell.

When asked why the Pentagon had ordered the withdrawal in the first place, a public affairs officer at the Counterinsurgency Saving Democracy Center of Excellence said it was “because that’s the next item in the COIN [counterinsurgency] checklist.”

“We dug three wells and built four schools in the Capitol Hill neighborhood last week, and we’ve already distributed all the bags of cash we were allocated to local councilors, shopkeepers, and religious leaders,” said Master Sgt. John Boone. “We’ve reached chapter seven in the COIN manual: ‘Declare victory and get the hell out.’”

A source in the Secretary of Defense’s office indicated that planners knew they “had to do something” to “improve the ‘tics’,” or metrics and optics, after the price of a pint of New Belgium’s White IPA nearly doubled at the Hawk and Dove, an important meeting place for local political figures.