Eli Lake, Columnist

Deal With Turkey Threatens Trump’s Iran Strategy

Negotiations to remove Kurdish troops from a small Syrian town could push away America's allies.

June 7, 2018 at 6:23 PM UTC

Eli Lake is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering national security and foreign policy. He was the senior national security correspondent for the Daily Beast and covered national security and intelligence for the Washington Times, the New York Sun and UPI.

U.S. forces have a foothold in the area.
Photographer: Delil Souleiman/AFP/Getty Images

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If you want a sense of how disjointed U.S. strategy in the Middle East is, pay attention to the small Syrian town of Manbij.

On June 4, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his Turkish counterpart, Mevlut Cavusoglu, appeared to reach an understanding that U.S.-backed Kurdish fighters and political leaders would pull out of the town. While Cavusoglu said the withdrawal would happen in the next few months, U.S. officials stressed to reporters that there was no timeline and that many details still needed to be negotiated. Meanwhile, Kurdish militia leaders say some of their military advisers have already left.