There is "no reason" for U.S. troops to remain in Syria, but the U.S. still had to "respond appropriately" last week by carrying out multiple air strikes against Iran-aligned groups that were blamed for a drone attack that killed an American contractor and wounded another contractor and five U.S. troops, Rep. Tim Burchett said Monday on Newsmax.
"[Rep.] Matt Gaetz authored legislation a couple of weeks ago, which I'm a co-sponsor of, to pull us out of Syria," the Tennessee Republican told Newsmax's "Wake Up America." "There is no reason for us to be in Syria, but we are, and Americans have lost their lives, and we have to respond appropriately."
At the same time, foreign adversaries are not taking the U.S. seriously because "we have too many men in our military and our administration wearing dresses and doing crazy things, and that is the kind of thing our international media picks up on," said Burchett.
The U.S. must respond to aggression in Syria from "a bunch of terrorists [and] thugs," said Burchett. "It's a shame that an American died, and it's a shame that we're in Syria."
U.S. troops remain in Syria as "part of the ongoing 20- or 30-year-plus war going on over there" to fight the Taliban, "which we've been told no longer exists, but then we're told it exists in some areas," said Burchett.
"We need to focus on our border, not the Syrian border," he added. "I'm disappointed that we're there. I wish that we would pull out of these foreign countries that we have no business [being] in.
"When you sign up for the military, you hold up your right hand and uphold your oath to the Constitution of the United States, and there's nothing constitutional about Syria. These people do not want democracy, clearly. We need to bring our boys and girls home."
The Senate, meanwhile, was to vote Monday on whether to invoke cloture on a bill to repeal the authorization of military force against Iraq, but Burchett said that if "they attack us, then we hit them back harder."
"We can't let that go," he said. "But again, why are we over there? Is it to support the United States of America? It's about oil, and more or less that's why we're in these wars over there. That's the bottom line. Let's get our oil at home. Let's get it all from home. We can do it. We have hundreds of years of oil in the ground."
There have been "all these incredibly crazy laws, environmental laws, passed to protect the environment, Burchett added, but "all we're doing is getting Americans killed … it's about oil. It's not about bringing these people home."
Meanwhile, the U.S. should not be "very worried at all" about the threat posed by Iran, Burchett said.
"We can knock them down," he said. "We know when they step outside, these guys are clowns. They're terrorists."
The potential of Iran having nuclear weapons capabilities is a worry, but "having troops on the ground over in that area, it does little or nothing for us other than feed a lot of people's stock portfolios," Burchett said.
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