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Pentagon says the additional forces have been in Syria for ‘a while’, before fall of President Bashar al-Assad, though they were not publicly disclosed.
After years of telling the public that the United States has about 900 troops in Syria, the Pentagon has revealed there are approximately 2,000 soldiers there — double the previous estimate.
Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Pentagon spokesperson Pat Ryder said the additional US forces have been in Syria since before the ouster of former President Bashar al-Assad this month, though he did not specify a timeframe.
“We have been briefing you regularly that there are approximately 900 US troops deployed to Syria. In light of the situation in Syria and the significant interest, we recently learned that those numbers were higher,” Ryder said.
“So, asked to look into it, I learned today that, in fact, there are approximately 2,000 US troops in Syria.”
He added that there are 900 soldiers on long-term deployment in Syria while the rest are “considered temporary rotational forces”.
According to Ryder, the previously undeclared 1,100 soldiers have been in Syria “for a while”. Pressed for further details by reporters, the Pentagon spokesperson said they had been deployed there for months “at a minimum”.
The US started sending troops to Syria in 2014 with the stated objective of defeating ISIL (ISIS), but US forces remained in the country after the group’s territorial defeat in 2017.
Washington has allied itself with the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which now control large parts of eastern Syria.
However, Turkiye, a NATO partner of the US, views the SDF as a threat to its national security over links to Kurdish armed organisations it labels as “terrorist” groups.
After opposition fighters captured western Syria and toppled al-Assad, they reignited fighting along the front lines in other parts of Syria, where the conflict had been frozen for months.
Turkish-backed Syrian fighters and Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which dominates the new government in Damascus, have captured areas previously held by the SDF over the past two weeks.
The prospect of an all-out war between Syrian forces supported by Turkiye and the SDF has raised questions about the future role of US troops in Syria.
On Thursday, Ryder said there are no planned changes to the US military presence in the country.
“There are no plans to cease the ‘defeat ISIS’ mission. I mean, again, ISIS continues to maintain or to pose a significant threat,” he said.
Beyond its troops in eastern Syria, the US has said it is engaging directly with the new authorities in Damascus, although it continues to officially label HTS as a “terrorist” group.
Washington has put forward a set of demands it said it wants to see in Syria, including non-sectarian governance.
“The transition process and new government must also uphold clear commitments to fully respect the rights of minorities, facilitate the flow of humanitarian assistance to all in need, prevent Syria from being used as a base for terrorism or posing a threat to its neighbors, and ensure that any chemical or biological weapons stockpiles are secured and safely destroyed,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement last week.
Meanwhile, one of the US’s top allies, Israel, has been bombing Syrian military assets and expanding its occupation beyond the Golan Heights in a land grab widely condemned across the Middle East.