国际英语新闻:US Orders Special Operations Forces to Syria

PENTAGON—A small team of American ground troops will deploy to northern Syria to assist opposition groups in the fight against Islamic State militants.

These would be the first U.S. ground forces sent to Syria for more than a raid or a specific mission.

The White House said Friday that the president had authorized fewer than 50 U.S. special operations forces to coordinate Syrian local fighter movements with the U.S.-led coalition efforts.

The U.S. troops deployed to Syria will provide "some training, some advice and some assistance" to those fighting IS extremists, White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters.

"This is an intensification of a strategy that the president announced more than a year ago," Earnest said, adding that the "core" of the U.S. strategy in Iraq and Syria remained “building the capacity of local forces on the ground.”

'True intent'

The U.S. troops will enter Syria in the next few weeks and stay in the country for no more than 60 days at a time, according to a senior defense official. They will be based at a "quasi-headquarters" of local Syrian forces — Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen fighters — to help with tactics, operational planning and logistics.

"We need to get on the ground, meet them,” said the senior official. "There's nothing like the face-to-face contact."
 
Another senior U.S. official, speaking in an interview with VOA, said the special operations forces would stay "relatively close enough to the border" with Turkey so they could be pulled out quickly if needed.

The "true intent" of putting Americans in Syria, he told VOA, is to give the Syrian groups guidance on "basic level planning." There are about 17 tribal factions striving to remove Islamic State fighters from the militant group's headquarters in Raqqah. That effort needs coordination, he said, and the U.S. forces will be there to help “draw in the sand” how units can move forward as one force against the enemy.

A senior defense official said the U.S. troops would not be involved in unilateral U.S. raids or joint raids with Syrian forces. However, she would not rule out the possibility of “adjusting” their role in the future.

Russian strikes

The decision to place U.S. troops in Syria raises fears of potential attacks not only from Islamic State forces but also from Russian airstrikes. U.S. officials have said Russian warplanes are mainly targeting moderate rebels battling forces of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, but do occasionally hit Islamic State forces.

The U.S. special operations group will assist anti-Islamic State Syrian forces who are based away from where Russian planes have struck or would need to strike, according to a senior defense official.

"I think the Russians have quite significant visibility on what happens in and around Syria," she said. "That became very, very clear during our negotiations over these safety protocols."

The official added that the United States had not notified the Russians where U.S. troops will operate — nor did it plan to communicate to Russia their location in northern Syria — but would be "open" to potentially talking to the Russians if it was needed to keep the Americans safe.