Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Sunday cautioned President Trump against pulling American troops out of Syria, saying that doing so would be “a disaster in the making.”
“If we withdrew our troops any time soon, ISIS [the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria] would come back, the war between Turkey and the Kurds would get out of hand, and you’d be giving Damascus to the Iranians without an American presence, and Russia and Iran would dominate Syria,” Graham warned on “Fox News Sunday.”
“It would be the single worst decision the president could make. I’ve seen this movie before when Obama did the same thing in Iraq,” the senator added.
{mosads}Trump said during a speech on Thursday in Ohio that the U.S. will be out of Syria “very soon” in light of successes in the fight against ISIS.
Trump also reportedly ordered the State Department to freeze $200 million in funds to help recovery efforts in Syria.
Roughly 2,000 U.S. troops in Syria are backing Kurdish fighters in the fight against ISIS in the region.
Former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson indicated earlier this year that the U.S. would remain in Syria indefinitely, adding that a total withdrawal of American forces would allow Syrian President Bashar Assad to “continue his brutal treatment of his own people.”
Trump fired Tillerson last month.
Graham on Sunday noted that all of Trump’s military advisers have advocated leaving U.S. troops in Syria. He added that pulling out of the region would risk losing the progress made in eliminating the threat of ISIS.
“We got [ISIS] on the ropes,” he said. “You want to let them off the ropes, remove American soldiers.”