U.S. Troops Leaving Syria Will Go Home

Oct. 23, 2019 (EIRNS)—Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, speaking to reporters before he left Riyadh, yesterday, explained that, in fact, the troops being pulled out of Syria will eventually go home, now that the Iraqi government has made clear it doesn’t want them. What’s not clear is how long it will take them to get there. “[W]e’ll reposition as they come out of northeast Syria into Iraq,” said Esper. “You know, eventually, their destination is home. But what we’ve got to do is pull them out deliberately, out of northeast Syria, and make our preparations to go home from there....” Esper arrived in Baghdad early this morning, where he was to discuss the matter with Iraqi government officials. He repeated, in response to a later question, that “the end state is to bring the troops home, which is what the President wants to do, and—and we’ll have those conversations, those details, as—as events unfold.”