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Trump Makes Surprise Visit to Iraq to See American Troops Trump Makes Surprise Visit to American Troops in Iraq
(about 3 hours later)
President Trump visited American military forces in Iraq on Wednesday, a surprise trip and the first visit to troops stationed abroad in a combat zone by a commander in chief who has made withdrawing the United States from foreign wars a signature issue. President Trump visited American military forces on Wednesday in Iraq, making his first trip to troops stationed in a combat zone only days after announcing his intention to withdraw the United States from foreign wars in Syria and Afghanistan.
The trip, shrouded in secrecy, came in the midst of a partial government shutdown and less than a week after Mr. Trump disrupted America’s military status quo and infuriated even some of his staunchest political allies by announcing plans to withdraw all troops from Syria and about half of those stationed in Afghanistan. The president’s decision on Syria, made over the objections of American military generals and civilian advisers, led to the resignation of Mr. Trump’s defense secretary, Jim Mattis, and fueled tensions within the national security establishment. The trip, shrouded in secrecy, came during a partial government shutdown and less than a week after Mr. Trump disrupted the military status quo and infuriated even some of his political allies by announcing plans to withdraw all troops from Syria and about half from Afghanistan. The president’s decision on Syria led to the resignation of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis.
The place Mr. Trump chose to visit is the one theater of war where he has not promised a rapid drawdown of forces — and it is where he claims his greatest military victory, the defeat of the Islamic State in Mosul, the Iraqi city where the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared the beginning of its self-proclaimed caliphate. The assault on Mosul by Iraqi forces, backed by Americans, began under President Barack Obama but culminated in the summer of 2017 under Mr. Trump. Speaking to troops at Al Asad Air Base, Mr. Trump defended his move in Syria.
Mr. Trump told reporters on the ground at Joint Base al Asad that he has no plans to withdraw troops from Iraq. Instead, he said, America may use Iraq as a military base to carry out operations on Syria and fight the Islamic State. “We’re no longer the suckers, folks,” the president said. “Our presence in Syria was not open-ended and was never intended to be permanent. Eight years ago, we went there for three months and we never left.”
“If we see something happening with ISIS that we don’t like, we can hit them so fast and so hard they really won’t know what the hell happened,” Mr. Trump said, according to Bloomberg News. “We’ve knocked them silly.” Mr. Trump, who visited the air base with his wife, Melania, said he had rejected requests from military commanders to remain in Syria for another six months.
Mr. Trump’s statement reflects one of the strategies proposed by the Pentagon after he announced his decision to withdraw troops from Syria last week. With British and French forces still on the ground, American commandos would be based in Iraq on the border where they could launch raids and other missions into Syria. “I said, ‘Nope.’ I gave you a lot of six months,” the president said. “And now we’re doing it a different way.”
The Iraqi government declared an end to combat operations against the Islamic State in Iraq earlier this year, though there have been sporadic airstrikes in parts of the country where small groups of the militants have reappeared. Mr. Trump told reporters that the United States might base American commandos on the border in Iraq to launch raids and other missions into Syria. Such a move would reflect one of the strategies proposed by the Pentagon after he announced his decision to withdraw troops from that country.
According to one American official, these fighters are no longer trying to hold territory like the militant group did in 2014, but act more as an insurgent groups bent on smaller-scale attacks. Visiting troops abroad is a presidential tradition. President George W. Bush served Thanksgiving turkey to the soldiers in Baghdad in 2003, in the early days of the Iraq war. President Barack Obama flew to Baghdad in April 2009 and won cheers when he told the troops that it was time for the Iraqis to take responsibility for their own country. He also visited Afghanistan four times while in office.
At its height, the group controlled an amount of territory the size of Britain that stretched between Iraq and Syria. Now they hold less than 20 miles of ground near the Syrian town of Hajin.
Most of the fighting has been relegated to Syria, and the roughly 5,000 American troops in Iraq are largely assigned to training the Iraqi military and police. There have been no American combat deaths in Iraq this year, but in March an Air Force helicopter crashed near the city of al Qaim, killing all seven aboard, after it ran into electrical wires. That same month, Master Sgt. Jonathan J. Dunbar, an elite Army commando, was killed by a roadside bomb in Syria, marking the second American combat death in the country since ground troops were sent there in 2015.
Mr. Trump, who was accompanied by his wife, Melania Trump, was expected to make two stops on his post-Christmas trip, delivering a holiday message to the more than 5,000 American forces stationed in the country.
“President Trump and the First Lady traveled to Iraq late on Christmas night to visit with our troops and Senior Military leadership to thank them for their service, their success, and their sacrifice and to wish them a Merry Christmas,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House spokeswoman, said in a tweet.
Visiting troops abroad is a cherished tradition for presidents. President George W. Bush served Thanksgiving turkey to the soldiers in Baghdad in 2003, in the early days of the Iraq War. Mr. Obama flew to Baghdad in April 2009, four months after his inauguration, winning cheers when he told the troops it was time for the Iraqis to take responsibility for their own country. He visited Afghanistan four times while in office.
But nearly two years into his presidency, Mr. Trump had yet to visit any troops abroad, drawing criticism from various corners.But nearly two years into his presidency, Mr. Trump had yet to visit any troops abroad, drawing criticism from various corners.
After he canceled a rainy-day visit to an American cemetery outside of Paris last month during a World War I battlefield commemoration, he told Chris Wallace, the Fox News anchor, that he had not visited troops abroad because of “an unbelievably busy schedule.” After he canceled a visit last month to an American cemetery outside Paris during a World War I battlefield commemoration, he told Chris Wallace, a Fox News anchor, that he had not visited troops abroad because of “an unbelievably busy schedule.”
Mr. Trump ran for the presidency on a platform of bringing the troops home from Afghanistan and Syria, part of a broader strategy of ending nearly two decades of American military interventions — from Iraq and Libya to Syria and Afghanistan — that he criticized as costly, ineffective and at odds with his “America First” foreign policy. On Wednesday, about 100 American servicemen and women, some of whom were wearing red “Make America Great Again” caps, greeted Mr. Trump with a standing ovation in the base’s dining facility, which had been decorated for Christmas. He and Mrs. Trump spent about 15 minutes there talking with the troops.
But the United States still has 14,000 troops in Afghanistan and about 2,000 in Syria. While the number of casualties in these conflicts is a fraction of what it was during the two previous administrations, the fact that American troops are still on the ground — in the case of Afghanistan, 17 years after they were first deployed — attests to the difficulty of extracting the country from these entanglements. The president told reporters that he had chosen Iraq for his first visit with troops abroad because “it’s a place I have been talking about for many years — many, many years.
Mr. Trump’s trip came at a sensitive moment, as the president’s clash with Mr. Mattis over the troop withdrawals opened a rift between the commander in chief and the military. “I was talking about it as a civilian,” he said.
Over the weekend, Brett McGurk, the special presidential envoy to the coalition fighting the Islamic State, accelerated his resignation, telling colleagues that he could not in good conscience carry out Mr. Trump’s newly declared policy of withdrawing American troops from Syria. Mr. McGurk, a seasoned diplomat who was considered central to the fight against the terrorist group, had originally planned to retire in February. Mr. Trump, who left the White House late Christmas night, said he harbored some safety concerns about making the trip.
Mr. Trump’s announcements on Syria and Afghanistan have left a trail of confusion, with White House officials unable to explain the timetable for the withdrawals or their strategy to prevent a return of radical extremism in either country. “I had concerns about the institution of the presidency,” he said. “Not for myself, personally. I had concerns for the first lady, I will tell you. But if you would have see what we had to go through in the darkened plane with all window closed, with no light anywhere. Pitch black. I’ve been on many airplanes. All types and shapes and sizes. So did I have a concern? Yes, I had a concern.”
Adding to the sense of uncertainty around Mr. Trump’s trip is the partial shutdown of the government, which does not affect active-duty military but had led Mr. Trump to cancel his holiday visit to his Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, and remain sequestered in the White House. Mr. Trump ran for the presidency in 2016 on a platform of bringing the troops home from Afghanistan and Syria, part of a broader strategy of ending nearly two decades of American military interventions — including in Iraq, Libya, Syria and Afghanistan — that he criticized as costly, ineffective and at odds with his “America First” foreign policy.
On Christmas, Mr. Trump and Melania Trump, the first lady, made calls from the West Wing to troops stationed abroad, though he was criticized in the media for being the first president since 2002 not to visit troops or wounded warriors on the holiday. But the United States still has 14,000 troops in Afghanistan and about 2,000 in Syria. While the number of casualties in these conflicts is a fraction of what it was during the two previous administrations, the fact that American troops are still on the ground — in the case of Afghanistan, 17 years after they were first deployed — attests to the difficulty of extracting the United States from these entanglements.
Mr. Trump says he has “done more for the military” than many of his recent predecessors but had not made visiting active duty military personnel a priority. Mr. Trump, who was also accompanied to Iraq by his national security adviser, John R. Bolton, and a small group of reporters, said that “the United States cannot continue to be the policeman of the world.”
“I will do that at some point, but I don’t think it’s overly necessary,” Mr. Trump said in an interview with The Associated Press in October, when asked about visiting troops stationed abroad. “I’ve been very busy with everything that’s taking place here.” “We are spread out all over the world,” the president said. “We are in countries most people haven’t even heard about. Frankly, it’s ridiculous.”
“I’m doing a lot of things,” he added. “But it’s something I’d do and do gladly.” Iraq is the one theater of war where Mr. Trump has not promised a rapid drawdown of forces — and it is where he claims his greatest military victory: the defeat of the Islamic State in Mosul, the Iraqi city where the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, declared the beginning of its so-called caliphate. The assault on Mosul by Iraqi forces, backed by Americans, began under Mr. Obama but culminated in the summer of 2017 under Mr. Trump.
Wednesday’s trip also took Mr. Trump out of the White House, where he had been venting his grievances over the partial government shutdown triggered by the stalemate over his demand for funding to build a wall along the southern border. Mr. Trump’s trip came at a moment of tension with some of his top military officials. Over the weekend, Brett McGurk, the special presidential envoy to the coalition fighting the Islamic State, accelerated his resignation, telling colleagues that he could not in good conscience carry out Mr. Trump’s newly declared policy of withdrawing American troops from Syria.
Mr. Trump, who had been scheduled to leave for a 16-day vacation in Palm Beach last Friday, instead has complained on Twitter in recent days that he is “all alone (poor me) in the White House waiting for the Democrats to come back and make a deal on desperately needed Border Security.” The president’s announcements on Syria and Afghanistan have left a trail of confusion, with White House officials unable to explain the timetable for the withdrawals or a strategy to prevent a return of radical extremism in either country.
Mr. Trump tried to dismiss those concerns while in Iraq, saying that “there will be a strong, deliberate and orderly withdrawal of U.S. forces from Syria” and that having troops in Iraq would “prevent over any potential reformation of ISIS.”
“We can hit them so fast and so hard, they really won’t know what the hell happened,” he said.
The president’s trip also came in the midst of a partial government shutdown, which does not affect active-duty military but had led Mr. Trump to cancel his holiday visit to his Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, and remain sequestered in the White House. Mr. Trump, who had been scheduled to leave last Friday for a 16-day vacation in Palm Beach, Fla., instead has complained on Twitter in recent days that he is “all alone (poor me) in the White House waiting for the Democrats to come back and make a deal on desperately needed Border Security.”
While he was in Iraq, Mr. Trump spoke on the phone with the country’s prime minister, Adil Abdul-Mahdi, said Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary.
The two leaders had been scheduled to meet in person at the air base, but the meeting was canceled for security and logistical reasons, Ms. Sanders said. During the call, Mr. Trump invited the prime minister to visit the White House and the prime minister accepted, she said.
A senior administration official said the trip to Iraq had been in the works for weeks. The White House had tried to keep Mr. Trump’s travel plans under wraps for security reasons, but hiding a president’s whereabouts can prove to be difficult.
On Wednesday, the Marine who stands guard while the president is working in his office was notably not on duty. Bloggers and aircraft watchers in Europe, meanwhile, spotted a Boeing VC-25, the model of military plane used for Air Force One, flying over England. But Mr. Trump’s final destination was kept a secret until his arrival.