US troops need to stay in Syria to counter ISIS, Pentagon chief says

RAMSTEIN AIR BASE, Germany — The U.S. needs to keep troops deployed in Syria to prevent the Islamic State group from reconstituting as a major threat following the ouster of Bashar Assad’s government, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told The Associated Press.

American forces are still needed there, particularly to ensure the security of detention camps holding tens of thousands of former IS fighters and family members, Austin said Wednesday in one of his final interviews before he leaves office.

According to estimates, there are as many as 8,000-10,000 IS fighters in the camps, and at least 2,000 of them are considered to be very dangerous.

If Syria is left unprotected, “I think ISIS fighters would enter back into the mainstream,” Austin said at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, where he traveled to discuss military aid for Ukraine with about 50 partner nations. He was using another acronym for the Islamic State group.

“I think that we still have some work to do in terms of keeping a foot on the throat of ISIS," he said.

President-elect Donald Trump tried to withdraw all forces from Syria in 2018 during his first term, which prompted the resignation of former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. As the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, or HTS, advanced against Assad last month, Trump posted on social media that the U.S. military needed to stay out of the conflict .

The U.S. has about 2,000 troops in Syria to counter IS, up significantly from the 900 forces that officials said for years was the total number there. They were sent in 2015 after the militant group had conquered a large swath of Syria.

The continued presence of U.S. troops was put into question after a lightning insurgency ousted Assad on Dec. 8, ending his family’s decadeslong rule .

U.S. forces have worked with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces on operations against IS, providing cover for the group that Turkey considers an affiliate of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which it identifies as a terror organization.

The Syrian transitional government is still taking shape , and uncertainty remains on what that will mean going forward.

The SDF “have been good partners. At some point, the SDF may very well be absorbed into the Syrian military and then Syria would own all the (IS detention) camps and hopefully keep control of them,” Austin said. “But for now I think we have to protect our interests there.”

Tara Copp is a Pentagon correspondent for the Associated Press. She was previously Pentagon bureau chief for Sightline Media Group.

德国拉姆施泰因空军基地——美国国防部长劳埃德·奥斯汀告诉美联社，美国需要继续在叙利亚部署军队，以防止伊斯兰国组织在巴沙尔·阿萨德政府被推翻后重新成为重大威胁。

奥斯汀周三在卸任前的最后一次采访中表示，美国军队仍然需要驻扎在那里，特别是要确保关押着数万名前“伊斯兰国”武装分子及其家属的拘留营的安全。

据估计，营地里有多达 8000 至 10000 名“伊斯兰国”武装分子，其中至少有 2000 人被认为非常危险。

奥斯汀在德国拉姆施泰因空军基地表示，如果叙利亚得不到保护，“我认为ISIS武装分子会重新融入主流社会”。他此次前往拉姆施泰因空军基地是为了与大约50个伙伴国家讨论对乌克兰的军事援助。他使用的是伊斯兰国组织的另一个缩写。

“我认为，在继续遏制ISIS方面，我们还有一些工作要做，”他说。

候任总统唐纳德·特朗普在其第一个任期内（2018年）曾试图从叙利亚撤出所有美军，这导致前国防部长吉姆·马蒂斯辞职。上个月，随着“沙姆解放组织”（HTS）向阿萨德政权推进，特朗普在社交媒体上发帖称，美军需要置身事外。

美国目前在叙利亚驻扎着约2000名士兵打击“伊斯兰国”，这一数字较多年来官方宣称的900人大幅增加。这些士兵是在2015年“伊斯兰国”占领叙利亚大片地区后被派往叙利亚的。

12月8日，一场闪电般的叛乱推翻了阿萨德政权，结束了他家族长达数十年的统治，美军继续驻扎在阿富汗的前景也因此受到质疑。

美国军队曾与库尔德人领导的叙利亚民主力量合作开展打击伊斯兰国的行动，为该组织提供掩护。土耳其认为叙利亚民主力量是库尔德工人党（PKK）的附属组织，而土耳其则将库尔德工人党认定为恐怖组织。

叙利亚过渡政府仍在组建中，其未来走向仍不明朗。

奥斯汀说：“叙利亚民主力量一直是很好的合作伙伴。在某个时候，叙利亚民主力量很可能会被并入叙利亚军队，届时叙利亚将拥有所有（伊斯兰国）拘留营，并有望继续控制它们。但就目前而言，我认为我们必须保护我们在那里的利益。”

塔拉·科普是美联社驻五角大楼记者。她此前曾担任Sightline媒体集团驻五角大楼分社社长。