One could be forgiven for concluding that the widespread national security panic following U.S. President Donald Trump's abrupt withdrawal of American forces from northeastern Syria was overstated.
As that withdrawal was happening, we now know, U.S. special forces were homing in on the location of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, Islamic State's leader and founder, in territory controlled by al- Qaida near the Turkish border. Trump himself said the intelligence that led to his capture came together in those fateful weeks as Kurds and Turks fought and dozens of Islamic State prisoners escaped.
What's more remarkable is that as the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces concluded that they were being betrayed by Trump, they nonetheless continued to track al-Baghdadi and work with their U.S. counterparts in the operation that killed him.