{"id":27052,"date":"2018-12-27T01:23:14","date_gmt":"2018-12-27T01:23:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=27052"},"modified":"2018-12-27T01:23:14","modified_gmt":"2018-12-27T01:23:14","slug":"president-trump-makes-surprise-visit-to-iraq","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=27052","title":{"rendered":"President Trump makes surprise visit to Iraq"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\nAL-ASAD AIR BASE: President Donald Trump used a lightning visit to Iraq \u2014 his first with US troops in a conflict zone since being elected \u2014 to defend withdrawing from Syria and to declare an end to America\u2019s role as the global \u201cpoliceman.\u201d
Trump landed at 7:16 p.m. local time at Al-Asad Air Base in western Iraq, accompanied by his wife Melania, following what he described as a nerve-wracking, secrecy shrouded flight on a \u201cpitch black\u201d Air Force One.
The president spoke to a group of about 100 mostly special forces personnel and separately with military leaders before leaving a few hours later, an AFP correspondent said. A planned meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi was scrapped and replaced by a phone call, the premier\u2019s office said.
White House video showed a smiling Trump shaking hands with camouflage-clad personnel, signing autographs and posing for photos.
Morale boosting presidential visits to US troops in war zones have been a longstanding tradition in the years following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, and Trump has taken considerable criticism for declining to visit in the first two years of his presidency.
But speculation had been mounting that he would finally make the gesture following his controversial decision to slash troop levels in Afghanistan and withdraw entirely from Syria.
At the military base, Trump sought to defend his \u201cAmerica first\u201d policy of pulling back from multinational alliances, including what to many Americans seem like the endless wars of the Middle East.
\u201cIt\u2019s not fair when the burden is all on us,\u201d he said. \u201cWe don\u2019t want to be taken advantage of any more by countries that use us and use our incredible military to protect them. They don\u2019t pay for it and they\u2019re going to have to.\u201d
\u201cWe are spread out all over the world. We are in countries most people haven\u2019t even heard about. Frankly, it\u2019s ridiculous,\u201d he added.
Trump told reporters he had overruled generals asking to extend the Syria deployment, where about 2,000 US forces and other foreign troops mostly assist local fighters battling the Islamic State jihadist group.
\u201cYou can\u2019t have any more time. You\u2019ve had enough time,\u201d he said he told the top brass.
The drawdowns \u2014 and the abrupt way that they were announced \u2014 helped lead to the resignation of Trump\u2019s defense secretary, Jim Mattis, who has been one of the administration\u2019s key heavyweights.
In his unusually forcefully worded resignation letter, Mattis appeared to chide Trump when he stressed his own \u201cstrongly held\u201d views on \u201ctreating allies with respect and also being clear-eyed about both malign actors and strategic competitors.\u201d
Trump has also taken flak from France and other foreign partners and senior figures in his own Republican party.
However, the president has made disentangling America from its wars a priority since his 2016 election and he says the time is right.
The Daesh group, which once controlled swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria, has been driven mostly into hiding and Trump said Wednesday: \u201cWe\u2019ve knocked them out.\u201d
In Afghanistan, he wants to withdraw about half of the 14,000 soldiers locked in a war against Taliban guerrillas that has long resembled a stalemate.
The Iraq trip will also go some way to ending criticism over Trump\u2019s failure to meet soldiers on the ground, even as he repeatedly touts his support for the military in campaign rallies.
And it provides some distraction from a rising tide of domestic political problems, including the government shutdown caused by Trump\u2019s row with Congress over funding for a US-Mexico border wall. Pressure is also mounting from a series of criminal probes into Trump\u2019s finances and links to Russia.
According to Trump, the flight into Iraq was unlike anything he\u2019d previously experienced.
\u201cIf you would have seen what we had to go through in the darkened plane with all window closed with no light anywhere \u2014 pitch black,\u201d he said.
\u201cI\u2019ve been on many airplanes. All types and shapes and sizes.\u201d
\u201cSo did I have a concern? Yes I had a concern.\u201d
The office of Iraq\u2019s prime minister said he \u201cwelcomed\u201d Trump and had \u201cinvited him to visit Baghdad.\u201d
Trump invited Abdel Mahdi to Washington, the office said, and \u201cthe two sides agreed to continue to strengthen the common relations between the two countries.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AL-ASAD AIR BASE: President Donald Trump used a lightning visit to Iraq \u2014 his first with US troops in a conflict zone since being elected \u2014 to defend withdrawing from Syria and to declare an end to America\u2019s role as the global \u201cpoliceman.\u201dTrump landed at 7:16 p.m. local time at Al-Asad Air Base in western…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":27053,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27052"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27052\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}