Trump wants US troops out of Syria
Ns News online Desk: President Trump said Tuesday he wants to bring US troops home from Syria now that ISIS is nearly defeated on the battlefield — a move that puts him at odds with some of his top military advisers.
“I want to get out. I want to bring our troops back home. I want to start rebuilding our nation,” he said during an appearance with his counterparts from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
The president said the primary US mission in the war-torn country was to defeat brutal ISIS jihadis who had conquered large swaths of territory. “As far as Syria is concerned, our primary mission in terms of that was getting rid of ISIS,” Trump said. “We’ve completed that task and we’ll be making a decision very quickly, in coordination with others in the area, as to what we will do.”
The president bemoaned the trillions the US had spent in the Middle East on wars and foreign aid, arguing that Americans got little in return and would have been better spending that money at home. Some high-ranking Trump administration officials urged caution — saying an abrupt US withdrawal could strengthen Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad and increase Russian strongman Vladimir Putin and Iran’s influence in the region.