Trump admits ISIS hasn’t been defeated — but says they’re Russia and Iran’s problem now

President Donald Trump on Thursday seemingly contradicted his own reasoning for pulling American forces out of Syria.

Writing on Twitter, the president seemed to acknowledge that Islamic State had not been totally defeated as he had claimed on Wednesday -- but he suggested that shouldn't be a concern because they were Russia and Iran's problem now.

"Russia, Iran, Syria and others are the local enemy of ISIS," the president wrote. "We were doing there (sic) work. Time to come home and rebuild."

This admission is a backtrack from Wednesday when Trump insisted that ISIS had been completely defeated, thus justifying his decision to bring American forces home.

In fact, a Pentagon spokeswoman on Wednesday flatly contradicted the president's declaration of victory by saying, "the coalition has liberated the ISIS-held territory, but the campaign is not over."

In a followup tweet, the president argued that America must withdraw because we cannot single-handedly solve all the Middle East's problems.

"Does the USA want to be the Policeman of the Middle East, getting NOTHING but spending precious lives and trillions of dollars protecting others who, in almost all cases, do not appreciate what we are doing?" he asked. "Do we want to be there forever? Time for others to finally fight."