US troops leaving Syria to go to western Iraq – Esper

Defence Secretary Mark Esper says that under the current plan all US troops leaving Syria will go to western Iraq and the military will continue to conduct operations against the Daesh group to prevent a resurgence in that country.

Speaking to reporters travelling with him to the Middle East, Esper did not rule out the idea that US forces would conduct counterterrorism missions from Iraq into Syria. But he said those details will be worked out over time.

His comments were the first to specifically lay out where American troops will go as they leave Syria and what the counter-Daesh fight could look like. Esper said he has spoken to his Iraqi counterpart about the plan to shift the more than 700 troops leaving Syria into western Iraq.

The developments made clear that one of President Donald Trump's rationales for withdrawing troops from Syria was not going to come to pass any time soon. "It's time to bring our soldiers back home," he said on Wednesday. But they are not coming home.

As Esper left Washington on Saturday, US troops were continuing to pull out of northern Syria after Turkey's operation into the border region. Reports of sporadic clashes continued between Syrian National Army and the YPG terrorists despite a five-day pause agreement hammered out on Friday between US and Turkish leaders.

Trump ordered the bulk of the approximately 1,000 US troops in Syria to withdraw after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made it clear in a phone call that Turkish Armed Forces were about to enter Syria to push back YPG terrorists.

Esper said the troops going into Iraq will have two missions.

"One is to help defend Iraq and two is to perform a counter-ISIS [Daesh] mission as we sort through the next steps," he said. "Things could change between now and whenever we complete the withdrawal, but that's the game plan right now."

Counter-Daesh mission

The US currently has more than 5,000 American forces in Iraq, under an agreement between the two countries. The US pulled its troops out of Iraq in 2011 when combat operations there ended, but they went back in after the Daesh began to take over large swaths of the country in 2014. 

The number of American forces in Iraq has remained small due to political sensitivities in the country, after years of US occupation during the war that began in 2003.

Esper said he will talk with other allies at a NATO meeting in the coming week to discuss the way ahead for the counter-Daesh mission.

Asked if US special operations forces will conduct unilateral military operations into Syria to go after Daesh, Esper said that is an option that will be discussed with allies over time.

He said one of his top concerns is what the next phase of the counter-Daesh missions looks like, "but we have to work through those details. He said that if US forces do go in, they would be protected by American aircraft.

While he acknowledged reports of intermittent fighting despite the pause agreement, he said that overall it "generally seems to be holding. We see the stability of the lines, if you will, on the ground."

He added that the US withdrawal will be deliberate and safe, and will take "weeks not days."

According to a US official on Saturday, about a couple of hundred troops have left Syria so far. The US forces have been largely consolidated in one location in the west and a few locations in the east.

The official said it will still take a couple of weeks to get forces out of Syria.