House Votes Down Resolution to Remove US Troops from Syria

On March 8, the House of Representatives rejected a resolution to withdraw US troops from Syria.

It was totaled 103-321

Rep. Matt Gaetz (Republican from Florida) introduced the resolution requiring President Joe Biden’s withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria within fifteen days after its passage.

Around 900 U.S. troops are currently stationed in Syria. U.S. troops are mainly there to defeat ISIS.

The chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee (Republican Michael McCaul, Texas) expressed his opposition to this resolution. He warned ahead of the vote that an American troop withdrawal would be in order. “a win for the ISIS terrorists.”

Gregory Meeks (D.N.Y.), the ranking member on the committee, expressed his objections to this resolution. Meeks stated that any withdrawal would be illegal. “a premature end” The American mission to Syria would endanger allies and U.S. partner countries, as well as the Kurds. He lamented the possibility of an ISIS resurgence if the United States withdraws.

a speech Gaetz gave reasons to his colleagues that they should vote for the resolution before the vote.

“Since we have been there, we have seen Americans die. We have seen tens of billions of dollars wasted,” He said.

“What is hilarious about the 2001 AUMF that the neoconservatives wave around like some permission slip for every neoconservative fantasy of turning an Arabian desert into a Jeffersonian democracy is that very 2001 AUMF would justify attacking the people that we’re fighting against and the people we’re funding because both have ties to Al Qaeda,” continued Gaetz.

Authorization for the Use of Military Force – 2001 AUMF – allowed the U.S. to use military force against those responsible for the 9/11 attacks.

Gaetz attempted to discredit those who claimed that pulling out troops would permit ISIS’s reemergence.

“I do not believe what stands between a caliphate and not-a-caliphate are the 900 Americans who have been sent to this hellscape with no definition of victory, no clear objective, and purely existing as a vestige to the regime-change foreign policy of multiple former presidents,” He said.

“Congress has never authorized the use of military force in Syria. The United States is currently not in a war with or against Syria, so why are we conducting dangerous military operations there? President Biden must remove all U.S. Armed Forces from Syria. America First means actually putting the people of our country first — not the interests of the military-industrial complex,” He said.

Donald Trump, while president, withdrew U.S. soldiers from northeastern Syria on October 2019, in what was seen as a betrayal of Kurdish allies. Turkey invaded northeastern Syria after Trump’s withdrawal to pursue the Kurds.