The Pentagon on Thursday said that it actually has 2,000 US troops in Syria, far higher than the previously public number of 900, saying that the additional troops are considered temporary forces that had been sent to support the counter-Islamic State militants mission.
Pentagon spokesman Major General Pat Ryder told reporters that he did not know how long the number had been 200, but it was probably months at a minimum and pre-dated the fall of Syria's Bashar al-Assad.
"I learned the number today... as somebody who's been standing up here telling you 900, I wanted to get you what we had on that," Ryder said.