Pentagon officials recently said that around 500 to 600 US troops remain in northeast Syria, centering around the oilfields that President Trump has promised to keep. They said they didn’t expect more troops to arrive, but that doesn’t mean the US isn’t adding forces to the area.
Indeed, it seems at this point they’ve got a truck for every US soldier in Syria, with an estimated 600 trucks deployed to the oilfields in just the past two months, following Defense Secretary Mark Esper’s talk of strengthening “mechanized forces.”
It’s not clear what the US forces, and their many trucks, will actually be doing. There is no indication that this US-held territory is under any threat from anybody. Turkey is invading the Kurdish-held parts of the northeast, and that’s got most of the forces on alert in the region for something the US isn’t directly involved in.
Control over the oilfields is seen as important, being one of the few revenue streams for post-war Syria to rely on. President Trump has insisted the US will keep this oil, but there is no sign that any production is ongoing, and many doubt the site could produce enough for the US to even break even on the presence.
many doubt the site could produce enough for the US to even break even on the presence.
I don’t think that’s the point. We hold the site to keep Syria from from selling its own oil. We are there to de-stabilize Syria.
Of course, a chaotic, violent and poor Syria is fertile breeding grounds for terrorism and, conversely, a stable prosperous Syria would allow Assad to erase ISIS from its borders.
But US policy seems to be more concerned with preventing Iran and Russia from expanding its influence in the region – and with Syria selling its oil in something other than Petrodollars – than confronting terrorism.
These are good points. US militant policy is to keep the ME in chaos and destruction. Refugees are a feature, not a problem. While the flow of arms continue into the region, doesn’t matter who gets em, sunni, shia, secular, long as they use em.
Maybe the trucks are just topping off their tanks…..
U..S is recreating Alamo in Syria so they can talk about it for years to come in the warfare history.
Oil Thieves….!