The Pentagon confirmed that the U.S. would roughly halve the number of troops it has deployed in Syria to less than 1,000 in the coming months.
Washington has had troops in Syria for years as part of international efforts against the Daesh terrorist group, which rose out of the chaos of the country's civil war to seize swaths of territory there and in neighboring Iraq over a decade ago.
The terrorists have since suffered major defeats in both countries.
"Today the secretary of defense directed the consolidation of US forces in Syria... to select locations," Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement, without specifying the sites where this would take place.
"This deliberate and conditions-based process will bring the US footprint in Syria down to less than 1,000 US forces in the coming months," he said..
"As this consolidation takes place... US Central Command will remain poised to continue strikes against the remnants of (IS) in Syria," Parnell added using a different acronym for Daesh, referring to the military command responsible for the region.
President Donald Trump has long been skeptical of Washington's presence in Syria, ordering the withdrawal of troops during his first term but ultimately leaving American forces in the country.
As anti-regime forces pressed forward with a lightning offensive last December that ultimately overthrew Syria's Bashar Assad, Trump said Washington should "NOT GET INVOLVED!"
"Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT," Trump, then the president-elect, wrote on his Truth Social platform.
Washington stepped up military action against Daesh in Syria in the wake of Assad's overthrow, though it has more recently shifted its focus to strikes targeting Yemen's Houthi rebels, who have been attacking international shipping since late 2023.
U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria were repeatedly targeted by pro-Iran militants following the outbreak of the Gaza war in October 2023, but responded with heavy strikes on Tehran-linked targets, and the attacks largely subsided.
Washington for years said it had some 900 military personnel in Syria as part of international efforts against Daesh, but the Pentagon announced in December 2024 that the number of U.S. troops in the country had doubled to around 2,000 earlier in the year.
While the United States is reducing its forces in Syria, Iraq has also sought an end to the U.S.-led coalition's presence there, where Washington has said it has some 2,500 troops.
Meanwhile, the U.S. is prepared to recognize Russian control of the Ukrainian region of Crimea as part of a broader peace agreement between Moscow and Kyiv, Bloomberg News reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the matter.
