Shared from the 12/27/2018 Houston Chronicle eEdition

Trump makes his first visit to GIs in Iraq

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Andrew Harnik / Associated Press

President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump visit with troops Wednesday at al-Asad Air Base, Iraq. He defended his much criticized plan to withdraw from Syria.

AL-ASAD AIRBASE, Iraq — In an unannounced trip to Iraq on Wednesday, President Donald Trump staunchly defended his decision to withdraw U.S. forces from neighboring Syria despite a drumbeat of criticism from military officials and allies who don’t think the job fighting Islamic State militants there is over.

Trump, making his first presidential visit to troops in a troubled region, said it’s because the U.S. military had all but eliminated ISIS-controlled territory in both Iraq and Syria that he decided to withdraw 2,000 forces from Syria. He said the decision to leave Syria showed America’s renewed stature on the world stage and his quest to put “America first.”

“We’re no longer the suckers, folks,” Trump told U.S. servicemen and women at al-Asad Air Base in western Iraq, about 100 miles west of Baghdad. “We’re respected again as a nation.”

The decision to pull U.S. forces from Syria, however, stunned national security advisers and U.S. allies and prompted the resignations of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who was not on the trip, and the U.S. envoy to the coalition fighting the Islamic extremist group. The militant group has lost nearly all its territory in Iraq and Syria but is still seen as a threat.

Air Force One, lights out and window shutters drawn, flew overnight from Washington, landing in Iraq under darkness Wednesday evening.

During his three-plus hours on the ground, Trump did not meet with any Iraqi officials but spoke on the phone with Iraqi Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi.

The two major blocs in the Iraqi parliament both condemned the visit, likening it to a violation of Iraqi sovereignty.

The air base where Trump spoke is about 155 miles from Hajin, a Syrian town near the Iraqi border where Kurdish fighters are still battling ISIS extremists. Trump has said ISIS militants have been eradicated, but the latest estimate is that ISIS still holds about 60 square miles of territory in that region of Syria, although fighters also fled the area and are in hiding in other pockets of the country.

Critics said the U.S. exit from Syria, the latest in Trump’s increasingly isolationist-style foreign policy, would provide an opening for ISIS to regroup, give Iran a green light to expand its influence in the region and leave U.S.-backed Kurdish forces vulnerable to attacks from Turkey.

“I made it clear from the beginning that our mission in Syria was to strip ISIS of its military strongholds,” said Trump, who wore an olive green bomber style jacket as he was welcomed by chants of “USA! USA!” and speakers blaring Lee Greenwood’s song, “God Bless the USA.”

“We’ll be watching ISIS very closely,” said Trump, who was joined by first lady Melania Trump, but no members of his Cabinet or lawmakers. “We’ll be watching them very, very closely, the remnants of ISIS.”

Trump also said he had no plans to withdraw the 5,200 U.S. forces in Iraq. That’s down from about 170,000 in 2007 at the height of the surge of U.S. forces to combat sectarian violence unleashed by the U.S.-led invasion to topple dictator Saddam Hussein.

Trump said that after U.S. troops in Syria return home, Iraq could still be used to stage attacks on IS militants.

“We can use this as a base if we wanted to do something in Syria,” he said. “If we see something happening with ISIS that we don’t like, we can hit them so fast and so hard” that they “really won’t know what the hell happened.”

Trump said it’s time to leave Syria because the U.S. should not be involved in nation-building, and that other wealthy nations should shoulder the cost of rebuilding Syria. He also said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has agreed to battle “any remnants of ISIS” in Syria, which shares a border with Turkey.

“The nations of the regions must step up and take more responsibility for their future,” Trump said.

Trump, who speaks often about his support for the U.S. military, had faced criticism for not yet visiting U.S. troops stationed in harm’s way as he comes up on his two-year mark in office. He said in October that he “will do that at some point, but I don’t think it’s overly necessary.”

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