The United States is determined to prevent the Islamic State group from reestablishing safe havens in Syria, as well as the fragmentation of the country, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday.
"ISIS will try to use this period to reestablish its capabilities, to create safe havens. As our precision strikes over the weekend demonstrate, we are determined not to let that happen," Blinken said at an event at the State Department.
In a tacit differentiation with President-elect Donald Trump, who has insisted that the United States has little at stake in the long-troubled nation, Blinken said that Washington had a series of interests in Syria -- including keeping it together.
"We have a clear interest in doing what we can to avoid the fragmentation of Syria, mass migrations from Syria and, of course, the export of terrorism and extremism," he said.
Blinken said that the United States also has a "clear interest in ensuring that whatever weapons of mass destruction or components are left in Syria do not fall into the wrong hands."
Before his ouster by rebels, Bashar al-Assad clung on to power with support from Russia, which maintains a Mediterranean base at Tartus and an airbase in Hmeimim.
President Joe Biden and Blinken have linked Assad's fall to the distraction of Russia since it invaded Ukraine as well as Israel's battering of Assad's other key ally, Iran, and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah.
Asked if the United States was asking the new authorities in Damascus to kick out the Russians, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said it was "ultimately a decision for the Syrian people to make, not for the people of the United States."
"But I don't think you can look at the influence that Russia has had through those bases inside Syria and determine that they have been anything other than disastrous for the Syrian people over the past 10 to 12 years," Miller told reporters.