US troops leaving Syria will move to Iraq: Pentagon
…from PressTV, Tehran
[ Editor’s Note: The five-day dance on the Syrian-Turkish border continues, with Turkey refusing to talk to Damascus directly, using the Russians as intermediaries.
What this process is blocking is any mention of Damascus insisting that all Turkish-backed jihadis and militias cleared out of Idlib and northeast Syria. If Russia goes along with this, it will put itself in a bad light as to why it would condone such a thing.
One possible answer would be that it wants the jihadis to remain in Idlib in force so its air force can stay there. Why would the Russians not pose to Erdogan that all sides should end the supporting of proxy fighters, including Saudi Arabia’s, with whom Russia also has good relations?
I have noticed that no one seems interested – the media or major country players – in asking Iraq why it lets the US seem to do whatever it wants there? Are Iraqi officers on the US bases that observe what they are really doing, that all missions inside Iraq and even into Syria have to be jointly approved?
Is the US blackmailing Iraq via energy import and export waivers to let the US do whatever it wants from its bases? Is it paying off Iraqi political leaders to go along?
We know these US bases were used as the critical link in moving weapons into the Syrian Kurdish areas to support their future planned state by breaking away from Syria. Some people might consider this a violation of the UN Charter – or is the Charter just a big joke with the handsomely paid UN people going along with the scam? … Jim W. Dean ]
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– First published … October 20, 2019 –
US Defense Secretary Mark Esper says all of the American troops pulling out of northeastern Syria will move to western Iraq.
“The US withdrawal continues apace from northeastern Syria… we’re talking weeks not days,” Esper told reporters en route to the Middle East late on Saturday, noting that the process is being conducted via aircraft and ground convoys.
He also put the number of US forces moving to Iraq at about 1,000, saying, “The current game plan is for those forces to re-position into western Iraq.”
In a major U-turn in the US military policy, the White House announced on October 6 that the US would be withdrawing its forces from northeastern Syria, clearing the path for an expected Turkish incursion into the region.
Three days later, Turkey launched the offensive with the aim of purging the northern Syrian regions near its border of US-backed Kurdish militants, whom it views as terrorists linked to local autonomy-seeking militants of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
Esper claimed that the US troops going into Iraq will have two missions, including helping “defend Iraq” and performing an alleged campaign against the Daesh terrorist group.
“Things could change between now and whenever we complete the withdrawal, but that’s the game plan right now,” he said.
The Pentagon chief further stressed that he had spoken with his Iraqi counterpart about the US plan. The additional troops are expected to add to the more than 5,000 American troops already based in Iraq.
Elsewhere in his remarks, Esper said he will discuss with other NATO allies at a meeting next week the way ahead for what he called the counter-Daesh mission.
On Thursday, Ankara agreed to pause its incursion into Syria for 120 hours while the US facilitates the withdrawal of Kurdish militants from a 20-mile safe zone along the Syrian-Turkish border.
The Pentagon chief said that the US-brokered truce in northeastern Syria was generally holding.
“I think overall the ceasefire generally seems to be holding, we see a stabilization of the lines, if you will, on the ground, and we do get reports of intermittent fires, this and that, that doesn’t surprise me necessarily,” he said.
Esper also claimed that the United States was still in contact with Kurdish YPG militants and that they appeared to continue to defend the prisons in northeastern Syria.
US should use ‘leverage’ with Kurdish militants: Turkey
On Saturday, Ibrahim Kalin, spokesman for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, urged Washington to use its “leverage” with Syria Kurdish militants to ensure their pullout under the ceasefire deal.
“Within five days they are supposed to leave and we have told our American colleagues to use their leverage, their connections to make sure that they leave without any incidents,” Kalin told AFP in an interview in Istanbul
He also emphasized that Turkey has been sticking to its end of the truce agreement.
“Since we reached this agreement with the American delegation, we have been committed to this deal,” he said. “Our president has ordered our troops to maintain their positions and not engage anybody.”
Kalin further accused Kurdish militants of perpetrating 16 attacks in the Syrian border towns of Ras al-Ayn and Tel Abyad.
Ankara has no intention of “occupying” any part of Syria or “staying there indefinitely,” he said, ensuring that there would be no forced return of Syrian refugees to the planned safe zone in the Arab country.
The Turkish official also ruled out any direct contacts with the Damascus government and said, “We have no dealings with the regime at this point. We do this through the Russians.”
Kalin further accused Kurdish militants of using Daesh prisoners as a “bargaining chip in this dirty war” by deliberately freeing them in an act of “blackmail basically to garner support from the West.”
Jim W. Dean is VT Editor Emeritus. He was an active editor on VT from 2010-2022. He was involved in operations, development, and writing, plus an active schedule of TV and radio interviews. He now writes and posts periodically for VT.
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Unfortunately, logic has had very little to do with American thinking in the last 35/40 years. ‘B’ actors, assassins, village idiots and conmen elected as presidents is a pretty good indication of where US voters have their heads. This is why I have resorted to calling the American voter the stupidest creature on planet Earth. Hell, when we’ve figured out we’ve been lied to and cheated, we reelect them. How smart is that?
Trump most Probably Every USA President is given Grim Warnng Advices about most Military Factors by old Officers and then the Premanent Resident Bureaucrats ……. so things the Establishment is Never Ready to Lose Control of ……. Trump at times must have been completely Shut up and been told to Reverse His Ideas and do the Critical Military Crap as Advised by the Holy Advisors …… Faces Change in the Oval Office but Men like Kissinger are Permanent Residents ……..
“..handsomely paid UN people going along with the scam?”..YES the UN is useless, worthless set of ‘yes’ men representatives who are too scared of the bogey man to stand up for anything. Only occasionally does the odd one say the truth, then its ignored hidden fast by the reporting (or lack of). It should really be in somewhere like Geneva (Asia?) not in NY, although whether that would do much better is highly questionable.
Could it all really be as simple as who’s pipeline gets to go where?
“Is the US blackmailing Iraq via energy import and export waivers to let the US do whatever it wants from its bases? Is it paying off Iraqi political leaders to go along?” – Answer: Yes of course. Same Vassal Satellite State’s formula Rome used.
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