US boosted troops in Syria 'before fall of Assad regime,' Pentagon announces

Updated figures shows Washington had more than doubled its presence in Syria

US troops patrol near oil wells in Al Qahtaniyah in Syria's north-eastern Hasakah province, close to the border with Turkey, on June 14, 2023. AFP

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US President Joe Biden's administration has boosted its troop presence in north-east Syria from 900 to about 2,000, the Pentagon announced on Thursday, in a move it says was made before rebels overthrew the regime of president Bashar Al Assad.

“Many of our deployment numbers will fluctuate from time to time, but given that this number is significantly higher than what we've been briefing, I wanted to let you know,” Pentagon spokesman Maj Gen Pat Ryder told reporters, adding the extra troops had been there for at least some months.

“There are diplomatic and operational security considerations oftentimes with our deployments and some of those numbers … I will also highlight that again, as it was explained to me, these forces which augment the Defeat ISIS mission were there before the fall of the Assad regime."

This month, a coalition of opposition forces removed Mr Al Assad in an offensive that swept across Syria in only 11 days.

The updated troop figures show that Washington doubled its force in the country's north-east, where it is in partnership with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in their continuing anti-ISIS mission.

Since Mr Al Assad's defeat in Damascus, Israel and Turkey have launched military operations in Syria, including Ankara's offensive against the SDF in the north-east.

The Biden administration sought to end Washington's “forever wars” in the region. In 2021, it conducted the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan and moved the US into an advisory role in Iraq. But the administration kept US soldiers in Syria, with administration officials asserting the anti-ISIS mission has been “quite successful, and that’s something that we’ll continue".

News of increased troops also comes as the Biden administration prepares to depart Washington, making way for president-elect Donald Trump to enter the White House next month.

Mr Trump and many of his Republican allies on Capitol Hill have indicated that they do not support a US presence in Syria, because it is “not our fight".

But others, including Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, have said it is in Washington's security interests to maintain support for Kurdish forces in the north-east to protect against ISIS militants detained in the region.

“There are more than 50,000 ISIS prisoners being held in north-eastern Syria. If chaos in the region leads to an ISIS prison jailbreak, it would be a nightmare for America,” Mr Graham said this week.

Mr Graham was among a bipartisan group of senators this week who threatened to impose sanctions against Washington's Nato ally Turkey if Ankara-backed forces in Syria do not achieve a ceasefire deal with the Kurds in the north-east.

But even those outside the Trump-aligned Republican party have in recent days cast doubt on the partnership with the Kurds, including former president Barack Obama's ambassador to Damascus, Robert Ford, who said: “YPG-led forces have failed to achieve the enduring defeat of ISIS. After six years, time for an American rethink of strategy."

During his first presidency between 2017 and 2021, Mr Trump tried to withdraw US troops from Syria, but backed down after protests from his former defence secretary Jim Mattis.

At the start of his first term, the Pentagon made a similar announcement that Washington had 2,000 American troops in Syria, “the first time the military has admitted that it deployed well more than the Obama-era limit of 503 troops", Foreign Policy reported at the time.