Trump: If we had taken Iraq’s oil ISIS couldn’t fund itself

WASHINGTON DC—US President Donald Trump says that when American troops withdraw from Iraq in 2011 they should have kept the country’s oil resources, both as payment for the sacrifice of US troops and to have prevented it from falling to ISIS.

“Well, we should've kept the oil when we got out.” Trump told ABC Television in his first interview since taking office. “And, you know, it's very interesting, had we taken the oil, you wouldn't have ISIS because they fuel themselves with the oil. That's where they got the money.”

He went on to say that ISIS “got the money from leaving -- when we left, we left Iraq, which wasn't a government. It's not a government now.”

The US president stirred controversy last week when he said that America should have kept Iraq’s oil for its sacrifices, prompting Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to say that “Iraq’s oil belonged to Iraqis only,” and such remarks were unacceptable.

In explaining his earlier statement, Trump linked the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq to ISIS access of abundance of oil which funded its Islamic state.

Trump stressed that “We should have taken the oil. You wouldn't have ISIS if we took the oil.”

“Now I wasn't talking about it from the standpoint of ISIS because the way we got out was horrible. We created a vacuum and ISIS formed. But had we taken the oil something else would've very good happened. They would not have been able to fuel their rather unbelievable drive to destroy large portions of the world.”

In response to critics who may say the US taking over Iraq’s oil would have been against international law, Trump said, “We should've kept -- excuse me. We should've taken the oil. And if we took the oil you wouldn't have ISIS. And we would have had wealth. We have spent right now $6 trillion in the Middle East. And our country is falling apart.”

Part of Trump’s criticism of the Iraq war and the eventual withdrawal was that it strengthened neighboring Iran.

He said: “And by the way, and I said something else, if we go in and do this. You have two nations, Iraq and Iran. And they were essentially the same military strength. And they'd fight for decades and decades. They'd fight forever. And they'd keep fighting and it would go -- it was just a way of life. We got in, we decapitated one of those nations, Iraq. I said, "Iran is taking over Iraq." That's essentially what happened.”