(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump sought Wednesday to take credit for a permanent cease-fire in Syria, painting it as a victory springing from his unconventional approach to foreign policy.

Yet the agreement hailed by Trump on Wednesday cedes to virtually all of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s demands -- including the removal of U.S. sanctions imposed after Turkey launched a military operation aimed at Kurds who until recently were American allies.

Even as Trump spoke, his envoy to the Syria crisis was on Capitol Hill, offering implicit criticism of the agreement, saying it could spark the reemergence of Islamic State. Some key Republicans added that the deal largely benefits Russia and Turkey.

“We obviously had troops there for a mission and that mission was defeating ISIS,” Ambassador James Jeffrey told the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “So if you remove those troops before that mission is complete, then you have a problem. And we do have a problem right now.”

While Trump has said one of his goals in the region was to bring home U.S. troops, his move didn’t do that. Trump is relocating several hundred from one danger zone (Syria) to another (Iraq).

Trump received almost nothing in exchange, such as a commitment from Erdogan to stop buying a Russian missile defense system. And the longer-term cease-fire for the region was actually brokered between Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin, without U.S. officials present.

Lifting Sanctions

Nonetheless, Trump said he’s lifting U.S. sanctions imposed Oct. 14 on five top Turkish officials and ministries in response to Erdogan’s offensive into northeastern Syria -- a key Erdogan demand during negotiations last week with Vice President Mike Pence. Trump said he’d reimpose them if Turkey doesn’t comply with the cease-fire.

“The sanctions will be lifted unless something happens that we’re not happy with,” Trump announced at the White House. “Countless lives are now being saved as a result of our negotiation with Turkey, an outcome reached without spilling one drop of American blood: no injuries, nobody shot, nobody killed.”

But Jeffrey warned that more than 100 Islamic State militants have escaped from prisons in northern Syria. Trump told reporters escaped terrorists have “largely been recaptured,” but did not address the discrepancy with his envoy’s testimony, which occurred at about the same time as his White House address.

Representative Michael McCaul, the panel’s top Republican, appeared to agree with Jeffrey’s assessment. “The Russians and Assad and Iran are going to fill the vacuum” left by the U.S. withdrawal, McCaul said.

Defending Cease-Fire

Trump spent much of his 15-minute statement defending the cease-fire, saying it “validates” that his foreign policy approach can bring about peace in the region and fulfill a campaign vow to wind down involvement in “endless wars.”

But unlike some of his previous statements, he didn’t say the U.S. troops that had been in northern Syria are “coming home.” The Pentagon has signaled troops leaving Syria will be restationed in Iraq, while Trump added that a residual force will still protect oil fields in Syria.

A senior administration official, briefing reporters after the speech on condition of anonymity, said the oil-field forces will help keep a lid on Islamic State.

The outcome provided more fodder for Trump’s political rivals who have accused him of abandoning Kurdish forces who bore the brunt of casualties in the fight against Islamic State.

“Who’s going to believe America’s word as we give it?” former Vice President Joe Biden said in Scranton, Pennsylvania ahead of the president’s remarks.

Trump emphasized his view that the regional tensions were a matter for countries closer to the action to work out, not the U.S. “It’s their neighborhood. They have to maintain it. They have to take care of it,” he said.

--With assistance from Josh Wingrove.

To contact the reporters on this story: Jordan Fabian in Washington at jfabian6@bloomberg.net;Daniel Flatley in Washington at dflatley1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Bill Faries, Justin Blum

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