Trump to Riyadh: Pay $4 Billion to Leave Syria

US president Donald Trump asked Saudi Arabia’s King Salman for $4 billion in December, in return for the end of the US presence in Syria’s seven-year conflict.

US president Donald Trump asked Saudi Arabia’s King Salman for $4 billion in December, in return for the end of the US presence in Syria’s seven-year conflict.
US officials said Trump believed he had a deal for the money to rebuild parts of Syria taken from the Islamic State and now under the control of the American-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces. This would pursue a goal of preventing the Assad government, backed by Russia and Iran, from claiming the areas in northern and eastern Syria.
The $4 billion requested by Trump is in comparison with $200 million announced by the US last month for “stabilization” after all ISIS areas — including the city of Raqqa — were taken in a campaign between autumn 2015 and early 2018.
According to the media, officials at the Saudi Embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment.
Syria is now a fragmented country, with the Assad government holding much of it but the opposition, now linked with Turkey, controlling much of the northwest — and taking more territory with an offensive against the Kurdish canton of Afrin — and Kurdish groups holding much of the north and northeast.
But, asked on Tuesday in a Congressional hearing if Bashar al-Assad had “won”, Gen. Joseph Votel, head of US Central Command, replied, “I do not think that is too strong of a statement. I think [Russia and Iran] have provided him with the wherewithal to be ascendant at this point.”
Senator Lindsey Graham asked Votel, “And it is not your mission in Syria to deal with the Iranian-Assad-Russia problem?” Graham asked Votel. “That’s not in your ‘things to do,’ right?”
The general replied, “That’s correct, senator.”