The U.S. military is withdrawing hundreds of troops from Syria, a shift the Pentagon is framing as a “consolidation” that reflects the changing security environment in the country.
“Recognizing the success the United States has had against ISIS, including its 2019 territorial defeat under President Trump, today the Secretary of Defense directed the consolidation of U.S. forces in Syria under Combined Joint Task Force – Operation Inherent Resolve to select locations in Syria,” Pentagon press secretary Sean Parnell said in a statement Friday.
Parnell said the drawdown is a “deliberate and conditions-based process” that will bring the U.S. forces in Syria down to fewer than 1,000 in the coming months.
The dip comes after the U.S. military under the Biden administration announced in December it had raised the number of troops in Syria from 900 to 2,000 to help with growing threats from ISIS and Iranian-backed militias in the region.
The Pentagon statement Friday did not say where troops will be pulled from, but The New York Times reported Thursday that the U.S. military would shutter three of its eight small outposts in northeast Syria, withdrawing some 600 service members. Two senior U.S. officials told the outlet the bases are Mission Support Site Green Village, M.S.S. Euphrates and a third smaller facility.
The move comes after President Trump during his first term attempted to withdraw all forces from Syria in 2018 but was met with opposition from Pentagon leaders. Defense officials contended that leaving entirely would abandon the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a Kurdish-led militia that aided the U.S. in defeating ISIS in the country. The split of opinion between Trump and his generals led to the resignation of his first defense secretary, Jim Mattis.
Pulling 600 American forces from Syria would place its ground numbers at the same level as it had been for years after the fall of ISIS in 2019. Washington kept about 900 troops in the country to keep the militant group from resurging, hold Iranian-backed militias at bay and keep Turkey from attacking the Kurdish forces, which Ankara views as associated with terrorists.
Despite the Pentagon’s assurance that the new force numbers will allow the U.S. to “maintain pressure on ISIS and respond to any other terrorist threats that arise,” the Trump administration’s decision is not without its risks given an uptick in attacks on American bases in the past year.
ISIS claimed 294 attacks in Syria last year, up from the 121 in 2023, a defense official told the Times.
Since the start of this year, ISIS has conducted at least 44 attacks in Syria, according to the Middle East Institute in Washington.
And three U.S. troops were killed in Jordan by a drone fired by an Iranian-backed group in January 2024.
The drawdown also comes after the fall of Syrian dictator Bashar Assad’s regime in December.