US won't police the ME forever, says president!

• In early morning tweets, Trump said he was fulfilling a promise from his 2016 presidential campaign to leave Syria.

US President Donald Trump on Thursday defended his surprise decision to declare victory over Daesh militants in Syria and completely withdraw US troops from the country, amid criticism from some Republicans and concern from allies and some US military commanders.

In early morning tweets, Trump said he was fulfilling a promise from his 2016 presidential campaign to leave Syria. Echoing a central plank of his foreign policy - that he seeks to stop the United States being taken advantage of - he said the United States was doing the work of other countries, including Russia and Iran, with little in return."Does the USA want to be the Policeman of the Middle East, getting NOTHING but spending precious lives and trillions of dollars protecting others who, in almost all cases, do not appreciate what we are doing? Do we want to be there forever? Time for others to finally fight," he tweeted.

The United States is also ending its air campaign against the militants in Syria, US officials said on Thursday. Trump had pledged to withdraw from Syria if elected, but the abrupt announcement on Wednesday to withdraw the roughly 2,000 US troops from Syria caught US lawmakers and others by surprise.

Some of Trump's fellow Republicans strongly criticised the move, saying they were not briefed ahead of time and that the move strengthened the hands of Russia and Iran, which both support Syrian President Bashar Al Assad.