Senator said US President Donald Trump vowed to ‘destroy’ IS before leaving Syria, suggesting troop pull-out may not be immediate
A senior Republican senator said that US President Donald Trump had ordered a slowdown to the withdrawal American forces in Syria – just days after announcing he would be withdrawing troops immediately.
“I think we’re in a pause situation,” Senator Lindsey Graham said outside the White House after lunch with the president on Sunday.
“We had a great lunch. We talked about Syria. He told me some things I didn’t know that made me feel a lot better about where we’re headed in Syria.”
Earlier this month, the White House announced that the United States would move quickly to withdraw its 2,000 troops from Syria, a decision that defied the warnings of Trump’s top advisers.
“We have defeated ISIS in Syria, my only reason for being there during the Trump Presidency,” Trump tweeted at the time, referring to Islamic State using an alternative acronym.
Trump’ s announcement also had shocked lawmakers and American allies, including Kurds who have fought alongside the US against Islamic State and face an expected assault by Turkey.
In the wake of the announcement, Graham issued a scathing statement in which he denounced the decision as “an Obama-like mistake made by the Trump Administration”.
Graham has been an outspoken critic of Trump’s policy and is an influential voice on national security policy who sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“I think we’re slowing things down in a smart way,” Graham said Sunday, adding that Trump was very aware of the plight of the Kurds.
Critics had contended that the US withdrawal would embolden Iran and Russia, which have supported the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
