No, US And Russian Troops Are Not Shooting At Each Other In Syria, US Official Clarifies

There are screw-ups and there are major-league screw-ups, but the U.S. Special Representative for Syria Engagement takes the prize for...

By Jeff Schogol | Published Nov 28, 2018 6:13 PM EST

There are screw-ups and there are major-league screw-ups, but the U.S. Special Representative for Syria Engagement takes the prize for the mother of all screw-ups by implying that U.S. and Russian troops are shooting at each other in Syria – they aren’t.

Let’s recap. Ambassador James Jeffrey recently told Russian media that U.S. troops have had to defend themselves “about a dozen times” in Syria, according to a transcript of the interview that was posted on the Russian embassy’s website.
When a reporter asked Jeffrey if any of those incidents involved Russian forces, he replied: “As I said there have been various engagements, some involving exchange of fire, some not.”
To news outlets, it appeared that Jeffrey had announced the United States and Russia were fighting a quiet war in Syria. That made sense, considering Russian military contractors attacked U.S. troops and their Syrian allies in February – and they were nigh annihilated.
The U.S. government did damage control on Wednesday, explaining what Jeffrey meant to say.
“The ambassador was speaking broadly about U.S. forces in Syria to defeat ISIS and their right to defend themselves when threatened,” a U.S. official told Task & Purpose. “Ambassador Jeffrey was not confirming ‘multiple incidents’ occurred between Russian and American forces in Syria.”
For the moment, World War III has been averted.