In a particularly frank moment during an exit interview, departing Syria envoy Jim Jeffrey acknowledged to me that when it came to troop levels there, “We were always playing shell games to not make clear to our leadership how many troops we had there.” https://t.co/0ws3mEF2Qo
— Katie Bo Williams (@KatieBoWill) November 12, 2020
Outgoing U.S. Envoy to Syria Jim Jeffrey revealed last week the Pentagon often hid the true number of troops in Syria from political leadership.
“We were always playing shell games to not make clear to our leadership how many troops we had there,” Jeffrey told Defense One. Jeffrey described the actual number of troops in Syria as “a lot more than” the roughly two hundred troops Trump agreed to leave there in 2019.
Four years ago, Jeffrey also signed a “Never Trump” letter condemning then-candidate Donald Trump as a danger to America. Jeffrey now recommends Joe Biden (should he be inaugurated as president) adopt Trump’s foreign policy posture in the Middle East.