US force in Syria is larger than previously known, Pentagon says

The U.S. military has some 2,000 troops in Syria—more than twice the figure of 900 that the Pentagon has cited for years, a spokesman said Thursday. The higher number includes “temporary rotational forces that deploy to meet shifting mission requirements,” Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said. “These forces, which augment the defeat-ISIS mission, were there before the fall of the Assad regime.”Ryder said that he only recently learned that the force in Syria was larger than