A Pentagon spokesman told reporters on Thursday that revenues from Syrian oil secured by U.S. troops will go to the majority Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), not to the United States.
The SDF is a U.S.-allied coalition that has played a fundamental role in the eradication of the Islamic State from Syria, particularly from the jihadist caliphate’s “capital,” Raqqa. President Donald Trump announced last month that he would withdraw American troops from the SDF’s territory, Syrian Kurdistan (Rojava), as the Islamic State no longer posed a threat to the region.
American troops are only legally allowed in Syria to combat al-Qaeda and its offshoots and allies. The Islamic State, formerly al-Qaeda in Iraq, split from the group in 2013.
Following the withdrawal from Rojava, President Trump announced that some American troops would remain elsewhere in Syria to “secure the oil.” The Islamic State funded many of its terrorist activities using black market oil sales from territories captured during its peak in 2014-2017.
“The revenue from this is not going to the U.S. This is going to the SDF,” Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman confirmed, dispelling criticisms from Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad and others that America is colonizing and exploiting Syrian resources. “So it’s preventing ISIS (from getting) it, allowing the Kurds and the SDF in there to have control of it as well.”
Following the departure of U.S. troops from Rojava, President Trump insisted that the U.S. would “keep the oil.” READ MORE
