In 2024, Thanassis Cambanis wrote, “Leave Syria, Keep Fighting the Islamic State,” where he argued the United States should withdraw from Syria, but continue to invest in counter-terrorism measures to combat the Islamic State. Two years later, after an American withdrawal from Syria and a new Syrian government in power, we asked Thanassis to revisit his article.Image: Photo by Staff Sgt. Jacob Connor In your 2024 article, “Leave Syria, Keep Fighting the Islamic State,” you argued the United States should withdraw from Syria, allow the Syrian government to fight and control the Islamic State, and invest in sustainable counter-terrorism measures. Now that the United States has withdrawn from al-Tanf and handed control to the Syrian government, is the situation developing as you argued it should? Was the withdrawal conducted favorably for the United States and Syria?Alas, no. I argued two years ago that the United States should leverage an orderly withdrawal to enhance its relationship with Iraq — and minimize disruption to the fight against the Islamic State. What we got instead was exactly the sort of chaos and power vacuums we should have tried to avoid. The new Syrian government more or less conquered the Kurdish enclave once the United States gave up on its Kurdish partners. We still don’t know how many high-risk Islamic State detainees escaped in the bungled transition, but it could have been zero. In a similar vein, the United States gave up its Syrian position for little credit with either the Syrian or Iraqi government. Presumably, Syria’s government appreciates Washington not standing in the way of the Damascus takeover of Syrian Democratic Forces territory. With Iraq, I think Baghdad did Washington a favor (and not the other way around) by accepting a bulk transfer of Islamic State detainees.Since your article was written, the Assad regime has
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