GOP front-runner Donald Trump Thursday said he thinks the United States should not "move too fast" when it comes to Russian airstrikes possibly being aimed at Syrian rebel forces, rather than at ISIS targets, saying the United States government may be supporting rebels when "we have no idea who they are."
"I spoke to one of the generals, they didn't even know who they are we're fighting for," Trump told
Fox News' "Fox & Friends" program, asking if the rebels who want to oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad would be worse than the leader already in power.
But still, he insisted that Russia could end up getting "bogged down again" in Syria, just like the Soviet Union did when they "spent so much money in Afghanistan."
At the same time, based on what happened in Iraq and Libya, when the United States helped oust dictators Saddam Hussein and Muammar Gaddafi, the Syrian rebels are "probably going to be worse than what you have right now. And what you have right now is very bad," Trump told the program.
But he does believe that ISIS is "absolutely the enemy," and the United States should be "bombing the hell out of them."
"Frankly, go beyond the lines, you have to go beyond the lines of Syria," he said. "You know, we're talking about Syria. But ISIS is in Iraq very big league. ISIS is all over the place. We have to be bombing ISIS. But, I don't think we should act so fast. We could just slow it down a little bit. Let's see what happens."
Meanwhile, on Wednesday, Trump told
CNN's Don Lemon that he does believe Russia is targeting ISIS forces in Syria, and that the United States should not interfere in the mission.
"They don't respect our president. They really don't respect us anymore. And that's why they're doing this," Trump said in the lengthy interview. "At the same time, if they want to hit ISIS, that's okay with me."
Further, Trump told Lemon that the United States should not try to be "the policemen of the world," and he has heard that the Russian bombers "are hitting both" when it comes to ISIS and Syrian opposition forces.
"If Russia wants to go in and if Russia wants to fight — in particular ISIS, and they do and one of the reasons they do is because they don't want ISIS coming into their country and that's going to be the next step. So that's why they're there," he said.
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