Defense Secretary casually brushes off fact that over 100 ISIS fighters are now on the loose
In an interview with CNN's Christiane Amanpour, Esper essentially turned this fact into a positive, no doubt impressing public relations and political talking heads everywhere with some truly masterful spin.
Defense Secretary Mark Esper on Tuesday casually brushed aside the disturbing news that, holy shit, MORE THAN 100 ISIS FIGHTERS HAVE ESCAPED FROM JAIL.
In an interview with CNN's Christiane Amanpour, Esper essentially turned this fact into a positive, no doubt impressing public relations and political talking heads everywhere with some truly masterful spin.
“Of the 11,000 or so detainees that were imprisoned in northeast Syria, we've only had reports that a little more than a hundred have escaped,” Esper said, adding that the Syrian Democratic Forces were continuing to guard prisons, and the Pentagon had not “seen this big prison break that we all expected.”
Exclusive: U.S. Defense Secretary @EsperDoD says that "of the 11,000 or so detainees that were in prisons in northeast Syria, we’ve only had reports of a little bit more than a hundred that have escaped… So right now we have not seen this big prison break that we all expected." pic.twitter.com/N4wcr3FJXv
— Christiane Amanpour (@amanpour) October 22, 2019
Well, I feel better. How about you?
On Wednesday, the top U.S. envoy in charge of the global coalition to defeat ISIS said much the same, while adding another cherry on top: The United States has no idea where those 100+ fighters went.
“We do not know where they are,” James Jeffrey told members of Congress of the 100+ escaped detainees. ISIS has about 18,000 “members” left in Iraq and Syria, according to recent Pentagon estimates.
A senior administration official told reporters on Wednesday the White House's understanding is that the SDF continues to keep the “vast majority” of ISIS fighters under “lock and key.”
“It's obviously a fluid situation on the ground that we're monitoring closely,” the official said, adding that released fighters will be “hunted down and recaptured.” The official said it was Turkey's responsibility to do so.
President Trump expressed optimism on Wednesday about what was happening on the ground in northeast Syria, when he announced that a ceasefire between Turkey and the Kurds was expected to be made permanent.
“Turkey, Syria, and all forms of the Kurds have been fighting for centuries,” Trump said. “We have done them a great service and we've done a great job for all of them — and now we're getting out.”
The president boasted that the U.S.-brokered ceasefire had saved the lives of tens of thousands of Kurds “without spilling one drop of American blood.”
Trump said that “small number of U.S. troops” would remain in Syria to protect oilfields.
