New Pentagon report says Turkey's Syria incursion is helping ISIS mount a comeback
Turkey's decision to launch a military operation targeting America's Kurdish partners in northern Syria and the Trump administration's subsequent retreat has allowed ISIS to rebuild itself and boosted its ability to launch attacks abroad, the Pentagon's Inspector General said in a new report, according to CNN.
The Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency said in the report "that ISIS has exploited the Turkish incursion and subsequent drawdown of US troops from northeastern Syria to reconstitute its capabilities and resources both within Syria in the short term and globally in the longer term."
"The withdrawal and redeployment of US troops has also affected the fight against ISIS, which remains a threat in the region and globally," Glenn Fine, the principal deputy inspector general, wrote in an introduction to the report.
Referring to Kurdish-led forces, Fine said that "with SDF and US operations against ISIS in Syria diminished, ISIS was likely to exploit the reduction in counterterrorism pressure to reconstitute its operations in Syria and expand its ability to conduct transnational attacks."
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