Trump says he’s told Kurds not to join Iran fight: ‘war is complicated enough’
The US president says he has ruled out such action despite Kurdish forces indicating they were ‘willing to go in’
US President Donald Trump said he had told Kurdish forces not to enter the Iran war as the US and Israel continued launching strikes against Tehran.
“The war is complicated enough without having – getting the Kurds involved,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Saturday on his way back to Florida after attending a military service for six fallen US soldiers.
“We’re very friendly with the Kurds, as you know, but we don’t want to make the war any more complex than it already is. I have ruled that out, I don’t want the Kurds going in,” the president said.
Israel’s military had been working to open the way for Kurdish forces to take up positions in Iran’s northwest, with the ultimate aim of encouraging armed Kurds to rise up against Tehran.
Trump said he “had a good relation” with the Kurds, and they had told him they were “willing to go in” to Iran. “But we really, I’ve told them, I don’t want them to go,” he added.
Lebanon on front line of Israeli strikes as Iran war threatens to spread beyond the region
Air strikes have targeted Iranian military and law enforcement in the largely Kurdish region next to northern Iraq, where US aerial protection in 1991 helped establish a semi-autonomous Iraqi Kurdish administration in Arbil.