President Trump makes surprise visit to troops in Iraq
President Donald Trump in Iraq for an unannounced first visit with American troops serving in a troubled region.
This is the President’s first visit to troops stationed in the Middle East in office.
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“President Trump and the First Lady traveled to Iraq late on Christmas night to visit with our troops and Senior Military leadership to thank them for their service, their success, and their sacrifice and to wish them a Merry Christmas,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said, according to ABC News.
{“url”:”https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1078009322783805440″,”author_name”:”ABC News”,”author_url”:”https://twitter.com/ABC”,”html”:”&#lt;blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”&#gt;&#lt;p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”&#gt;”President Trump and the First Lady traveled to Iraq late on Christmas night to visit with our troops and Senior Military leadership to thank them for their service, their success, and their sacrifice and to wish them a Merry Christmas,” Sarah Sanders says &#lt;a href=”https://t.co/1QRvJdZIUG”&#gt;https://t.co/1QRvJdZIUG&#lt;/a&#gt; &#lt;a href=”https://t.co/vEk39VpUgf”&#gt;pic.twitter.com/vEk39VpUgf&#lt;/a&#gt;&#lt;/p&#gt;— ABC News (@ABC) &#lt;a href=”https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1078009322783805440?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”&#gt;December 26, 2018&#lt;/a&#gt;&#lt;/blockquote&#gt;n&#lt;script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″&#gt;&#lt;/script&#gt;n”,”width”:550,”height”:null,”type”:”rich”,”cache_age”:”3153600000″,”provider_name”:”Twitter”,”provider_url”:”https://twitter.com”,”version”:”1.0″}
The President says he wants to get U.S. soldiers home from Syria and that Iraq can still be used as a base to stage attacks on Islamic State militants if needed.
Trump told reporters traveling with him that if needed, the U.S. can attack IS “so fast and so hard” that they “won’t know what the hell happened.”
{“url”:”https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1078009757229813760″,”author_name”:”ABC News”,”author_url”:”https://twitter.com/ABC”,”html”:”&#lt;blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”&#gt;&#lt;p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”&#gt;MORE: First lady Melania Trump joined the president on the unscheduled visit. &#lt;a href=”https://t.co/13trG63wwl”&#gt;https://t.co/13trG63wwl&#lt;/a&#gt; &#lt;a href=”https://t.co/ubYiwsuL1r”&#gt;pic.twitter.com/ubYiwsuL1r&#lt;/a&#gt;&#lt;/p&#gt;— ABC News (@ABC) &#lt;a href=”https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1078009757229813760?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”&#gt;December 26, 2018&#lt;/a&#gt;&#lt;/blockquote&#gt;n&#lt;script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″&#gt;&#lt;/script&#gt;n”,”width”:550,”height”:null,”type”:”rich”,”cache_age”:”3153600000″,”provider_name”:”Twitter”,”provider_url”:”https://twitter.com”,”version”:”1.0″}
The president’s decision to exit Syria stunned national security advisers and allies, including Iraq, and prompted the resignation of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis.
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