US says it has 2,000 troops in Syria, not 900 as previously announced | Syrian War News

The Pentagon says some forces were in Syria ‘for a while’, before the fall of President Bashar al-Assad, although it has not been publicly disclosed.

After years of telling the public that the United States has about 900 troops in Syria, the Pentagon has revealed that there are nearly 2,000 troops – double the previous estimate.

Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Pentagon spokesman Pat Ryder said more US troops had been in Syria since before the overthrow of former President Bashar al-Assad this month, although he did not specify the timeframe.

“We have been reporting to you regularly that there are about 900 US troops sent to Syria. Given the situation in Syria and the high interest, we just learned that those numbers are high,” Ryder said.

“So, I was asked to look into it, I learned today that, in fact, there are about 2,000 US troops in Syria.”

He added that there are 900 soldiers on long-term duty in Syria and the rest are “considered temporary rotating forces”.

According to Ryder, 1,100 undeclared troops were in Syria “for a while”. Pressed for further information by reporters, a Pentagon spokesman said they had been deployed there for “at least” months.

The US began sending troops to Syria in 2014 with the stated aim of defeating ISIL (ISIS), but US troops remained in the country after the group’s defeat in 2017.

Washington has aligned itself with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which now control large parts of eastern Syria.

However, Turkey, a NATO ally of the US, considers the SDF a threat to its national security due to its links with Kurdish armed groups it calls “terrorist” groups.

After opposition forces seized control of western Syria and toppled al-Assad, they dominated the war in other parts of Syria, where the conflict had been raging for months.

The Turkish-backed Syrian army and Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which heads the new government in Damascus, seized areas held by the SDF two weeks ago.

The emergence of an endless war between the Turkish-backed Syrian army and the SDF has raised questions about the future role of the US military in Syria.

On Thursday, Ryder said there are no planned changes to the US military in the country.

“There are no plans to stop the campaign to ‘defeat ISIS’. I mean, again, ISIS continues to maintain or pose a major threat,” he said.

Apart from its troops in eastern Syria, the US has said it is working directly with the new authorities in Damascus, although it continues to officially label HTS a “terrorist” group.

Washington has put forward a set of demands it says it wants to see in Syria, including impartial governance.

“The transition process and the new government must also emphasize a clear commitment to fully respect the rights of minorities, facilitate the flow of aid to people in need, prevent Syria from being used as a base for terrorism or pose a threat to its neighbors, and ensure that any chemical or biological weapons are secured and destroyed safely,” said US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a statement last week.

Meanwhile, one of the US’s top allies, Israel, has been bombing Syrian military assets and expanding its settlement beyond the Golan Heights in the most condemned land grab in the entire Middle East.