Representative Mo Brooks (R-AL) was just one of 60 out of the 189 Republican members of Congress to vote against a resolution opposing President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. forces in Northern Syria.
During an appearance on Huntsville, AL radio’s WVNN on Friday, Brooks explained his decision to standby Trump and argued the effort to show opposition to Trump’s decision was done so to bolster the Democratic Party’s 2020 election efforts.
“This resolution contained too many false statements in it concerning President Trump and what was occurring between Syria, Turkey, and Kurds,” Brooks said. “And it was nothing but a PR piece with which to attack Donald Trump based on the false premises outlined in the resolution. I’m thankful that Bradley Byrne vote with me — voted ‘no.'”
“I’m disappointed that other Republicans voted ‘yes’ based on public pressure, Democrat pressure, media pressure, or whatever you want to call it,” he continued. “But the bottom line is if you really know what is going on in Syria with the Kurds and with Turkey, the right decision was to vote ‘no’ on this resolution that the Democrats put forth that went out of its way to attack Donald Trump for the sole purpose of helping the Democrats win the 2020 election.”
As for his GOP colleagues that voted for the resolution, Brooks said it was a matter of not fully understanding the circumstances.
“In my judgment, they did not do their homework,” he said. “They do not know the fact, and as a consequence, they cast a bad vote.”
According to the Alabama Republican, the Trump administration had become aware of Turkey’s plan to have an incursion into Syria, which according to White House officials, would have occurred with or without a U.S. presence in Northern Syria.
“[T]he president was put into the position of having to decide whether to leave 50 or 100 American troops, maybe more depending on how broad Turkey’s advance was, to defend against over 15,000 Turkish soldiers with the calamity that would have likely occurred, or to move them to safe ground to save American lives and decrease the risk an escalation that could result in a war with Turkey.”
Brooks pointed out there were 5,000 U.S. soldiers and nuclear weapons sanctioned in Turkey. He said if an armed conflict were to break out with the United States and Turkey, a NATO ally od the United States it would out those troops and nuclear weapons at risk.
“It would have been folly to sacrifice the lives of those 50 to 100 American soldiers in the face of an onslaught of 15,000 or more Turkish soldiers, bearing in mind further that you had elements to the south on the other side of the Turks. The Turks were coming from the north. You had Russian and various elements of Syrian forces to the south that were marching north, where our troops would have been between two different sets of fighters.”
“So, I’m thankful President Trump decided to minimize the risk of a war with Turkey, minimize the risk of these American soldiers being slaughtered simply because they would be overwhelmed by the numbers.”
Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor
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