Trump call with Turkish leader led to US pullout from Syria

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's decision to withdraw American

troops from Syria was made hastily, without consulting his national security team or
allies, and over strong objections from virtually everyone involved in the fight against
the Islamic State group, according to U.S. and Turkish officials.

Trump stunned his Cabinet, lawmakers and much of the world with the move by
rejecting the advice of his top aides and agreeing to a withdrawal in a phone call with
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan last week, two U.S. officials and a Turkish
official briefed on the matter told The Associated Press.

The Dec. 14 call, described by officials who were not authorized to discuss the
decision-making process publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity, provides
insight into a consequential Trump decision that prompted the resignation of widely
respected Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. It also set off a frantic, four-day scramble to
convince the president either to reverse or delay the decision.

The White House rejected the description of the call from the officials but was not
specific.

"In no uncertain terms, reporting throughout this story is not true," National Security
Council spokesman Garrett Marquis said. "It is clear from the context that this false
version of events is from sources who lack authority on the subject, possibly from
unnamed sources in Turkey."

The State Department and Pentagon declined to comment on the account of the
decision to withdraw the troops, which have been in Syria to fight the Islamic State
since 2015.

Despite losing the physical caliphate, thousands of IS fighters remain in Iraq and
Syria, and the group continues to carry out insurgent attacks and could easily move
back into territory it once held if American forces withdraw.

The Dec. 14 call came a day after Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his Turkish
counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu agreed to have the two presidents discuss Erdogan's
threats to launch a military operation against U.S.-backed Kurdish rebels in northeast
Syria, where American forces are based. The NSC then set up the call.

Pompeo, Mattis and other members of the national security team prepared a list of
talking points for Trump to tell Erdogan to back off, the officials said.

But the officials said Trump, who had previously accepted such advice and convinced the
Turkish leader not to attack the Kurds and put U.S. troops at risk, ignored the script.
Instead, the president sided with Erdogan.