WASHINGTON (Dispatches) – The U.S. military intends to reduce its military occupation forces in Syria to less than 1,000 troops in the coming months, according to Pentagon officials.
“This deliberate and conditions-based process will bring the U.S. footprint in Syria down to less than a thousand U.S. forces in the coming months,” chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said in a statement on Friday.
The U.S. military has about 2,000 U.S. troops in Syria across several bases, mostly in the northeast.
The Pentagon did not specify in the release how many troops will be pulled out, but The New York Times reported on Thursday that the number is 600.
The release also did not provide a specific timeline for the withdrawal.
U.S. President Donald Trump said in late January that the U.S. “will make a determination” on troops in Syria following a report that said he intends to withdraw American forces.
“I don’t know who said that, but we’ll make a determination on that,” Trump told reporters at the White House at the time. “We’re not involved in Syria. Syria is in its own mess. They’ve got enough messes over there. They don’t need us involved.”                                         
The U.S. military has since 2014 deployed its forces and equipment in northeastern Syria with no authorization from the Arab country’s government, with the Pentagon claiming that the deployment is aimed at preventing the oilfields in the area from falling into the hands of Daesh terrorists.
Damascus, however, maintained the deployment was meant to plunder the country’s natural resources.
Over the past years, multiple footage has emerged revealing that the U.S. occupation forces have used tankers to smuggle Syrian crude oil from the country’s northern provinces to their bases in northern Iraq, as part of Washington’s systematic plundering of Syria’s basic commodities.
Trump has also admitted on several occasions that American forces were in the Arab country for its oil wealth.
Moreover, there have been several reports showing Washington’s direct or indirect support through its regional allies for the Daesh terrorist group over the past years.