Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said Wednesday morning that a decision was made Tuesday about U.S. troops in Syria and whether they will be withdrawn, CBS News’ Mary Walsh reports. He told reporters at a breakfast that a statement would be coming shortly.
President Trump said Tuesday that he expected to decide “very quickly” whether to remove U.S. troops from war-torn Syria, saying their primary mission was to defeat the Islamic State group and “we’ve almost completed that task.”
However, a decision by Mr. Trump to withdraw from Syria would conflict with the views of his top advisers.
In fact, while he addressed reporters at the White House, high-ranking U.S. officials spoke elsewhere in Washington about the need to stay in Iraq and Syria to finish off the militant group, which once controlled large swaths of territory in both countries, and keep it from rising up again.
At a news conference with the presidents of the Baltic nations, Mr. Trump was asked whether he still favored pulling U.S. troops out of Syria.
“As far as Syria is concerned, our primary mission in terms of that was getting rid of ISIS,” Trump answered, using an acronym for the Islamic State group. “We’ve completed that task and we’ll be making a decision very quickly, in coordination with others in the area, as to what we will do.”
The mission is “very costly for our country and it helps other countries a helluva lot more than it helps us,” he said.
“I want to get out. I want to bring our troops back home. I want to start rebuilding our nation,” he said during the appearance with his counterparts from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Trump also noted that the Baltic states are partners with the U.S. in the anti-IS coalition and “we will not rest until ISIS is gone.”
Later Tuesday, the president met with his national security team to discuss Syria. According to officials familiar with the preparations for the meeting, his entire national security team, including CIA chief Mike Pompeo, who has been nominated to be the next secretary of state, strongly advised against a hasty withdrawal from Syria. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal talks.
Also on the meeting agenda was the fate of some $200 million in U.S. stabilization assistance for Syria that the White House put on hold after Trump said during a speech in Ohio last week that he wanted to leave Syria “very soon.” The State Department was to have spent the money on building up the country’s infrastructure, including power, water and roads.
Mr. Trump in recent weeks has asked Saudi Arabia to contribute $4 billion for reconstruction in Syria, according to a U.S. official, as part of the president’s effort to get other countries to pay for stabilizing the country so the U.S. isn’t on the hook. The United States is awaiting a response from the Saudis, said the official, who wasn’t authorized to discuss the conversations publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Many have warned that a premature U.S. withdrawal from Syria would cede the country to Iran and Russia, which have supported Syrian President Bashar Assad. Iran’s continued presence in Syria is especially troubling to neighboring Israel, a U.S. ally that regards Iran as an existential threat.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
© 2018 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
