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U.S. troops have completed their withdrawal from the strategic military base of Al-Tanf in southern Syria, where they helped local forces combat the notorious Islamic State, ISIS, group for more than a decade, and another base in the northeast. These are the latest steps in the U.S. military's consolidation of its modest troop presence in Syria ahead of an eventual complete withdrawal. The remaining U.S. troops in Iraq are also scheduled to complete their withdrawal by September.
Analysts are divided over whether this means a complete withdrawal of U.S. troops from both Syria and Iraq will ultimately transpire this year.
"The forces of the Syrian Arab Army have taken over the Al-Shadadi military base in the Hasakah countryside following coordination with the American side," the Syrian defense ministry announced in a statement on Sunday.
That follows the U.S. Central Command announcement on Thursday that the "orderly departure" from Al-Tanf was completed the day before, and that it was "part of a deliberate and conditions-based transition" by the U.S.-led coalition against ISIS. Furthermore, CENTCOM announced the completion of an operation to transfer thousands of ISIS detainees from Syria to Iraq. The mission started on January 21 and was also completed on Thursday, with "more than 5,700 adult male ISIS fighters" securely transferred throughout those 23 days.
The latter operation was necessitated by internal instability in Syria after the central government launched a military offensive against the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, America's main partner on the ground in Syria throughout the ISIS war. Until that government offensive, the SDF had guarded these captured ISIS fighters and their families in various detention centers and camps throughout northeast Syria. The U.S. has declared that the "original purpose" of its anti-ISIS partnership with the SDF has now "largely expired" and supported a deal for the group's integration into the new Syrian military.
"I think the Al-Tanf garrison withdrawal signals that the U.S. has seen the SDF-Damascus integration deal as an 'open window' it can use for the rapid withdrawal from both Syria and Iraq, already planned for the end of 2026," Caroline Rose, the director of the Crime-Conflict Nexus and Military Withdrawals portfolios at the New Lines Institute, told me.
"The Trump administration, having wanted to withdraw from the counter-ISIS mission since its first term in office in the autumn of 2019, sees the potential of stability through the SDF-Damascus agreement as a pretext for departure, transferring its security responsibilities to the new Syrian Army."
At the Munich Security Conference on Friday, representatives from the Syrian government and the SDF met with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and discussed recent developments, including integration.
"America's relationship with Syria continues to grow," Myles B. Caggins III, a senior nonresident fellow at the New Lines Institute, retired U.S. Army colonel, and former spokesman for the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, told me.
"Weeks ago, it was difficult to imagine a summit between Secretary of State Rubio with the Syrian Minister of Foreign Affairs, as well as Syrian Democratic Forces commander General Mazloum and Îlham Ahmed on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference," he said.
"The U.S.-Syria partnership will continue to focus on security and counterterrorism with new emphasis on economic growth and investments -- particularly in the oil and gas industry."
These critical developments in Syria come less than a month after Iraq announced that it had reassumed full control over its strategic Ain al-Asad airbase in the western Anbar province. The move follows what the Iraqi government described as a "full withdrawal" of U.S. troops from all military facilities in federal Iraqi territory.
Under a transition timetable announced in September 2024, the U.S. said it had a broad plan for wrapping up its military mission in Iraq in two phases. The first one, withdrawal of all U.S. coalition forces from federal Iraqi territory by September 2025, is now complete. Under the second phase, U.S. troops would operate out of the autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan Region until September 2026.
"With rapid drawdown in northeast Syria, a detainee transfer mission that is now winding down, and consolidation of U.S. troops into northern Iraq, it's very possible that the Trump administration will try and 'beat' this timeline and conduct a more premature departure," Rose said.
"This situation is exacerbated if Maliki enters office, given his history of sectarianism that Washington perceives could, potentially, embolden adversarial Shiite militia networks that have targeted U.S. forces in the past and prompted the gradual U.S. withdrawal process."
President Donald Trump warned in January that the U.S. would withdraw all support from Iraq if Nouri al-Maliki is nominated for a third term as Iraqi prime minister. Under his last term, Maliki presided over the disastrous ISIS takeover of large parts of northern Iraq, including the country's second city, Mosul. The Trump administration is wary of Maliki's longstanding ties with Iran.
Conversely, Caggins highly doubts that U.S. troops will leave Iraqi Kurdistan before September 2026 or even after it.
"In Iraq, the U.S. has announced the 'end of combat,' 'reduction of troops' and 'end of coalition' seemingly every year, mostly for political purposes," he said. "As the U.S. shifts to a bilateral security relationship with Iraq, it is likely the presence of U.S. troops will continue well beyond 2026 because the deployment supports President Trump's 'America First' security and energy objectives, as well as providing critical advice and technology support for the Iraqi Security Forces."
Furthermore, the Iraq analyst warned, any potential U.S. withdrawal from Iraq will not "occur in a vacuum" and it could have "immediate and structural" consequences.
"Syria today remains saturated with jihadist networks, including foreign fighters who battled alongside Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham against the Assad regime," Ghafuri said.
HTS was the armed Islamist opposition group previously commanded by the incumbent Syrian interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa during the civil war with former President Bashar al-Assad. It was officially dissolved after al-Sharaa led the ousting of Assad's regime in December 2024 and became president.
"There is no comprehensive disarmament framework, no reintegration mechanism, and no credible long-term plan for managing these foreign militants," Ghafuri added. "Many remain ideologically committed to transnational jihadism. Their presence is not a dormant issue - it is an unresolved security time bomb."
Consequently, should Damascus make any serious effort to "disarm, marginalize, or fracture these factions," the risk of spillover could become much more acute, posing a severe security threat to Iraq.
"Geography matters," Ghafuri said."Iraq's western frontier is vast, porous, and historically difficult to control.The Sunni-majority areas bordering Syria provide both terrain and social depth that could be exploited by militant networks seeking relocation or operational space."
"In such a scenario,Iraq would not be insulated - it would be the most immediate pressure valve."
'Geopolitical recalibration'
New Lines Institute's Rose anticipates that heightened tensions between the United States and Iran could affect the timetable of an otherwise inevitable U.S. withdrawal.
"I think the standoff with Iran has thrown a wrench into U.S. designs for a speedy drawdown in the Middle East," she said."The weakening of Hezbollah in Lebanon as a byproduct of Israeli attacks and the relative stability in Syria as a byproduct of the Assad regime's surprise fall was seen as a key opening for the U.S. to begin reducing its presence, as deterrence against Iran-backed proxies was no longer deemed necessary."
"However,tensions with Iran and the Trump administration's imperative to ramp up pressure through warship deployments personnel buildup and threats of strikes delays--if not reverses--that strategy."
In the longer term,Ghafuri expects that any complete U.S.troop withdrawal from Iraq will ultimately "structurally weaken" Baghdad.
"It would reduce Iraq's strategic balancing capacity vis-à-vis Tehran while simultaneously increasing its vulnerability to security spillover from Syria," he said."Iraq would find itself squeezed between two pressure fronts: Iranian leverage on one side and jihadist instability on the other - with diminished deterrence and fewer external buffers to manage either."
"In this equation,withdrawal is not simply a military decision," he said."It is a geopolitical recalibration - one that could leave Iraq strategically exposed at its most fragile fault lines."