What lessons were learned after attack on US forces, civilians in Syria

What lessons were learned after attack on US forces, civilians in Syria

SETH J. FRANTZMAN

Sun, December 14, 2025 at 1:54 AM UTC

5 min read

US President Donald Trump meets Syrian counterpart Ahmed al-Sharaa in the White House, Washington, DC, November 10, 2025 (photo credit: SYRIAN PRESIDENCY PRESS OFFICE)

Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience.

Generate Key Takeaways

Cooperation between the US and Syria must be based on professional operations, without letting extremists infiltrate, and with the objective of stopping reliance on former militias.

An attack on US forces in Syria is a deadly reminder of the dangers that extremist groups continue to pose in Syria and the Middle East. As details continue to emerge regarding the perpetrator and how the attack transpired, it is important to draw several initial lessons from this attack. The attack illustrates the need to make sure that security forces in Syria, especially those being recruited and trained by the new government in Damascus, are vetted for extremists and that the force is professionalized.

The new Syrian government faces immense challenges in securing the country, and the US and partner countries all want Damascus to be stable and the security forces to continue to grow. For that to happen, safeguards, professional training, and vetting must happen. Another important issue is the integration of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces in eastern Syria with the new Damascus-led security forces in western Syria. The attack on US forces illustrates the threats that can happen when integrating forces.

The SDF has been an exemplary partner to the US in eastern Syria. The hurdle in western Syria is that some extremist outliers may oppose the SDF and seek to exploit this incident. Making sure extremists do not infiltrate Syria’s forces or derail Syria’s development is important.

To understand the challenges, it’s worth reviewing a few details of the attack. US Central Command said “two U.S. service members and one US civilian were killed, and three service members were injured, as a result of an ambush by a lone ISIS gunman in Syria.”

US President Donald Trump has pledged retaliation after two American soldiers and a civilian interpreter were killed in Syria. “We will retaliate…the loss of the three great American patriots,” Trump said. US Envoy to Syria, Tom Barrack, who is also the US Ambassador to Turkey wrote that “today’s cowardly terrorist ambush on U.S. personnel in Syria, which claimed the lives of two brave American soldiers and a dedicated civilian interpreter, is a stark and outrageous reminder that terrorism remains a vicious and persistent threat, capable of striking even as we work to eradicate it.”

A Coalition convoy of US-led international coalition against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) stops to test fire their M2 machine guns and MK19 grenade launcher in the Middle Euphrates River Valley in the Deir ez-Zor province, Syria, November 22, 2018 (credit: COURTESY MATTHEW CRANE/US ARMY/HANDOUT VIA REUTERS)

Kurdish media network Rudaw noted that the US soldiers were killed in an ambush in Syria’s western Homs province. “The American civilian killed in the ambush was a Christian from the Kurdistan Region, a US military source in Syria told Rudaw on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter.”

The Rudaw report also said that the US team that was attacked was based in the Tanf base in southern Syria near the Jordanian and Iraqi borders. This base has served as a garrison to train Syrians for a decade. The Syrian Free Army unit was the main partner force of the Americans there. It was made up of local Syrian Arabs. It later became part of the new Syrian security forces' 70th Division and was doing security work.

CNN notes that “a Syrian Interior Ministry spokesperson said Syrian forces had issued intelligence warnings to US-led forces and that the assailant was known to authorities ahead of the deadly attack.” Syrian state media SANA noted “a joint Syrian and US military patrol came under fire on Tuesday near the ancient city of Palmyra, wounding several personnel, a security source said.” Syrian Interior Ministry spokesperson Nour Eddin al-Baba has said that Syria is investigating if the perpetrator “had direct ties to ISIS or merely adopted extremist ideology.”

US wants Syria to join fight against ISIS

The details are concerning. The US-led Coalition against ISIS has been seeking to partner more with the new Syrian security forces over the last months. This is a result of Syria joining the coalition against ISIS in the wake of the meeting between Trump and Syrian President Ahmed al-Shara’a in November.

It is in the US's interests and Syria’s interests to continue to work together. It is also in the US interests that the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces integrate with the Damascus-backed security forces. For that to happen, ISIS and other extremists need to be guarded against.

ISIS or others can take advantage of the power vacuum to try to infiltrate and derail various developments in Syria. Another problem is the existence of extremist groups among Turkish-backed forces in northern Syria. Some of these groups were sanctioned by the US for abuses.

For instance, in October, Kurdistan24 pointed out that “the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) has sounded the alarm over the growing influence of former militia commanders who have re-emerged as powerful military and political figures within Syria’s reshaped power structure. Among them is the controversial figure Mohammed Hussein al-Jassem, widely known as ‘Abu Amsha,’ whose rise from a militia leader in Afrin to commander of the 25th Division in Hama has reignited fears of renewed militia dominance and the erosion of civilian governance.”

Damascus has leaned on some of these types of commanders and forces because of its close partnership with Turkey, and also because it needs manpower. However, as Damascus builds capacity in its forces, it needs to grow beyond relying on former militias. This means that commanders who previously were involved in abuses either need to reform themselves and be de-radicalized, or they need to be vetted better.

The attack on US forces should not derail US-Syria security cooperation. It should not derail the integration of the SDF. However, it should make it deadly clear that cooperation must be based on professional operations and not letting extremists infiltrate.

About Our Ads

Source