1:46
- ABC News
- October 16, 2019
Trump on Turkey and Syria: 'It's not our border'
He called his decision to move U.S. troops aside "strategically brilliant."
1:46
At a later news conference, Trump again defended his decision to abruptly withdraw U.S. military forces from northeastern Syria, insisting he wasn't surprised and didn’t give Turkey \"a green light\" to launch a military operation, calling a reporter's suggestion he did \"so deceptive.\"
\"When you make a statement like that, it's so deceptive. Just the opposite of a green light,\" Trump said. \"First of all, we had virtually no soldiers there. They were mostly gone, just a tiny little group. They would have been in harm's way. You have a massive army on the other side of the border. I didn't give them a green light. And If anybody saw the letter, and i can certainly release it, I wrote a letter right after that conversation, a very powerful letter. They've been fighting for many, many years. When you ask a question like that, it's very deceptive.\"
The president was meeting with congressional leaders Wednesday on the Syria situation -- many of them, including prominent Republicans -- angry about his handling of the situation.
\"My goodness, the lack of preparation and thinking about how we could have transitioned to a setting where we can protect the Kurds and also hopefully meet Turkey’s needs and interests — that's something we should have considered a long time ago before we pulled our troops out,\" Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said Wednesday.
\"But now, to go over and say let's talk to Erdogan is like, 'Hey guys, you let the horses out of the barn. This is, this is too late to be talking about locking the barn door,\" he added.
GOP Sen. Marco Rubio echoed Romney’s exasperation.
\"Frankly, I don’t know what we can do at this point to reverse some of the long-term damage,\" Rubio said.
Rubio said he fears Erdogan is planning an ethnic cleansing of the Kurds. \"This is a really problematic situation that’s unfolding.\"
GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham also blasted Erdogan for saying sanctions don’t matter and that he will refuse any ceasefire.
\"We’re going to sanction that hell out of Turkey. We're going to break their economy until they leave Syria. This is a defining moment of Trump's presidency. If we abandon the Kurds, it will be to our shame and our national security detriment and Trump will own the reemergence of ISIS,\" Graham said.
Just ahead of the meeting, the House overwhelmingly voted, 354-60, to pass a non-binding joint resolution opposing President Trump’s actions in Syria and condemning his decision to withdraw U.S. troops from northeastern Syria.
ABC News' Benjamin Siegel contributed to this report.
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