BANGUI, Central African Republic — The Pentagon is poised to significantly scale back a decade-long mission to capture or kill Joseph Kony, one of Africa’s most notorious warlords, in a sign that the United States and its African allies no longer see him as a regional threat.

Mr. Kony and his violent guerrilla group, the Lord’s Resistance Army, gained worldwide attention after the social media video “Kony 2012” was viewed more than 100 million times on YouTube. The L.R.A. is notorious for its use of child soldiers but has also carried out massacres, sexual violence, mutilations, pillage and abductions.

The Pentagon’s Africa Command now wants to shift from a counterinsurgency operation against the guerrilla group to building African defense institutions and a more narrow pursuit of Mr. Kony, whose fighting force has dwindled to about 100 soldiers from a peak of 3,000. That change could free up perhaps dozens of the approximately 150 United States troops now assigned to the effort, allowing them to undertake other Special Operations missions.

A decision on renewing the mission for six more months is scheduled for April, but the Trump administration, even before taking office, signaled its desire for change in a series of questions from its transition team to the State Department.

“The L.R.A. has never attacked U.S. interests, why do we care?” the Trump transition team asked. “I hear that even the Ugandans are looking to stop searching for him, since they no longer view him as a threat, so why do we?”

Mr. Kony and his militant force emerged in Uganda in 1987 to fight against President Yoweri Museveni. From 1987 to 2006, the armed group abducted more than 20,000 children to use as soldiers, servants or sex slaves, according to Unicef. The group’s violence has displaced more than 2.5 million people, the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center reports.

In 2005, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Mr. Kony, a self-proclaimed prophet, for crimes against humanity and war crimes. In 2008, the United States government declared him a “specially designated global terrorist.”

 

Yet, Mr. Kony, who is believed to be in his 50s, has avoided capture for three decades. His troops operate in small groups spread throughout 115,000 square miles of lawless territory in the border region of Central African Republic, South Sudan, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. All of those, except Sudan, contribute forces to an African Union task force fighting against the L.R.A.

Mr. Kony is widely believed to be hiding in the disputed, mineral-rich area of Kafia Kingi in Sudan’s south Darfur state. Sudan’s military has not participated in combating the guerrilla group and, in 2013, nonprofit organizations reported that Sudan’s military had been harboring and supporting Mr. Kony and his forces.

Since 2008, the United States has provided support to military operations against Mr. Kony’s guerrillas. In 2011, the Obama administration went further, and deployed troops to the region to work with the African Union soldiers against the L.R.A., providing advisory support, intelligence and logistical assistance.

Since then, the Defense Department has spent more than $780 million on the mission, according to a Pentagon spokeswoman, Maj. Audricia Harris. About 150 service members, including three teams of Green Berets, are deployed to the effort.

The Africa Command is looking at “transitioning to the next phase” of the mission, according to Brig. Gen. Donald C. Bolduc, who oversees American Special Operations forces in Africa. He said it would probably be a phased decrease rather than a shutdown.

Others in the American Special Operations community argue that a long-term United States presence on the ground in these countries is in America’s national security interest, and warn against a precipitous withdrawal.

“Persistent presence is the best way to help locals serve as an antibody to extremism,” said retired Lt. Col. D. Scott Mann, a former member of the Green Berets who founded the nonprofit Stability Institute. “Without long-term measures like this campaign, the threats always come back. A small footprint of well-trained and resourced advisers can make a big impact.”