President Trump sought to reassure nervous allies on Wednesday that his administration would continue an unrelenting hunt for Islamic State fighters \u201cfor many years to come,\u201d even as the United States prepares to withdraw troops from the war zones of Syria and Afghanistan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mr. Trump, speaking to international diplomats at the State Department, said he expected to soon announce that the United States and its partners, including Syrian Arab and Kurdish allies, will have reclaimed the last slivers of territory that Islamic State fighters control in Syria.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the president acknowledged that even after that happens, militants will go underground and continue to pose a serious threat wherever the extremist group operates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cRemnants can be very dangerous,\u201d Mr. Trump said. \u201cThey\u2019re sick. They\u2019re demented.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
His comments, echoing themes from his State of the Union address on Tuesday<\/a>, was a notable departure from the bluster of his assertion in December<\/a> that the Islamic State had been defeated. For a commander in chief who frequently ridicules international organizations \u2014 including the European Union<\/a> and NATO<\/a> \u2014 Mr. Trump was uncharacteristically solicitous of the 79 nations and international organizations that make up the global coalition to fight ISIS.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis struggle against terrorism is a shared fight. We do it together,\u201d Mr. Trump said in his 10-minute speech to the diplomats, who greeted him with warm applause. \u201cWe will be working with you for many years to come. I say that unfortunately.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The president said he was looking forward to giving \u201ca warm welcome back home\u201d to the 2,000 American troops he ordered to pull out of Syria, but he offered no timetable for when the withdrawal would conclude. Military commanders have said it will take about four months; some equipment has left, but so far no troops.Video00:0010:1310:13First Came ISIS, Then Iran: How the Mission at a U.S. Base in Syria Kept Growing<\/strong>President Trump has ordered the withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Syria. But the unexpectedly large role of Al-Tanf, a small U.S. outpost in Syria, reveals why leaving the country won\u2019t be so easy.CreditCreditCarlos Lopez\/U.S. Marine Corps<\/p>\n\n\n\n Earlier at the conference, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo aimed to play down the impact of the American forces\u2019 departure. \u201cThe drawdown will be well coordinated, and our policy priorities in Syria have remained unchanged,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There was no mention on Wednesday of the warning issued a day earlier<\/a> by the top American general overseeing operations in the Middle East, Joseph L. Votel. In Senate testimony, General Votel said the Islamic State could stage a resurgence in Syria once the Pentagon withdraws its troops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The president also avoided any mention of the future role of American troops in Iraq. Mr. Trump, during an interview that aired Sunday on CBS\u2019s \u201cFace the Nation,\u201d said he wanted American troops to remain in Iraq<\/a> to \u201cwatch Iran\u201d \u2014 a sudden announcement that angered Iraqi leaders<\/a> and surprised the Pentagon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Subscribe for original insights, commentary and discussions on the major news stories of the week, from columnists Max Fisher and Amanda Taub.SIGN UP<\/p>\n\n\n\n ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n\n\n\n Iraq\u2019s foreign minister, Mohammed Ali al-Hakim, speaking to the State Department conference after Mr. Pompeo, emphasized Iraqi sovereignty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIraq welcomes the efforts of the international coalition in Iraq,\u201d he said. Its actions, he said, \u201cinclude most importantly the complete respect of the territorial integrity of Iraq and for all operations to take place with the knowledge of the government of Iraq.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A senior administration official, speaking to reporters on a background call before the conference, doubled down on Mr. Trump\u2019s earlier comments about monitoring Iran from Iraq, saying the administration was \u201cperfectly justified in wanting to keep a close eye on them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n In northeastern Syria, where an American-backed militia faced tough fighting on the ground, one commander, Adnan Afrin, put the long-term challenge confronting the United States and its allies this way: \u201cISIS may be defeated on the ground, but it lives on in people\u2019s brains.\u201d President Trump sought to reassure nervous allies on Wednesday that his administration would continue an unrelenting hunt for Islamic State fighters \u201cfor many years to come,\u201d even as the United States prepares to withdraw troops from the war zones of Syria and Afghanistan. Mr. Trump, speaking to international diplomats at the State Department, said he expected to soon announce that… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":108,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3088","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3088","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/108"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3088"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3088\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3089,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3088\/revisions\/3089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3088"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Sign up for The Interpreter<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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