Secretary of Defense James Mattis told reporters at a Tuesday Pentagon press briefing that though the situation in Iraq has not stalled the formation of the Trump administration’s plan to defeat ISIS, it is “still going to take time” to develop.
“The counter-ISIL plan has been put in skeleton form,” the secretary of defense stated. “It’s being fleshed out now. It has to be done in a methodical way where we look at each element of it.”
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“A couple weeks ago, Secretary Tillerson had 60, 68 nations in town with his counterparts, the foreign ministers,” he continued. “They are working on the stabilization effort in in Syria.”
“This is not the United States working alone — a very, very complex security situation, and it is one that we we will have to address in a methodical manner.”
“It’s not something you can simply add water to a dehydrated plan and its all of the sudden a full-fledged plan,” Mattis stated. “This is hard work, and it’s going to take time.”