I had it all set. Mattis didn't want to do it.
En 2017, el presidente estadounidense Donald Trump quiso ordenar el asesinato del mandatario sirio Bashar al-Assad tras un ataque químico contra civiles, pero fue frenado por su secretario de Defensa, Jim Mattis. Tres años después, Trump confirma lo que antes negó, con la calma de quien ya no siente necesidad de disimular. La revelación no es solo una contradicción personal: es una ventana a las tensiones profundas entre el impulso ejecutivo y la prudencia institucional que definieron aquella era, y a las preguntas sin respuesta sobre cómo se toman las decisiones más irreversibles del poder.
- Trump admitió ante Fox News que en 2017 tenía todo listo para eliminar a Assad, contradiciendo directamente lo que él mismo declaró en 2018 cuando negó que el plan hubiera existido.
- La única barrera entre la intención presidencial y una acción sin precedentes fue la negativa de Mattis, quien desvió la orden hacia ataques aéreos limitados en lugar de un asesinato de Estado.
- Trump no muestra arrepentimiento por no haber actuado, y describe a Mattis como un general 'sobrevalorado' y obstruccionista, revelando una fricción que marcó todo su primer mandato.
- La confesión llega en plena campaña electoral de 2020, amplificando el debate sobre los límites del poder presidencial y la legalidad de los asesinatos selectivos de jefes de Estado extranjeros.
- Siria sigue atrapada en una guerra civil que ha costado cientos de miles de vidas, y la pregunta de cuándo y cómo intervenir continúa sin respuesta clara en la política exterior estadounidense.
Donald Trump confirmó esta semana algo que había negado rotundamente dos años antes: en 2017, quiso matar al presidente sirio Bashar al-Assad y tenía los medios para hacerlo. Lo que lo detuvo fue la negativa de su secretario de Defensa, Jim Mattis.
En una entrevista con Fox News, Trump habló con la soltura de quien ya no siente necesidad de guardar las apariencias. "Habría preferido eliminarlo. Lo tenía todo listo", dijo. Mattis, agregó, simplemente se negó a proceder. La revelación contrasta directamente con sus propias palabras de septiembre de 2018, cuando el libro de Bob Woodward sacó a la luz el plan y Trump lo descartó como una invención: "Eso ni siquiera fue contemplado", afirmó entonces.
Según el relato de Woodward, el deseo de Trump de actuar contra Assad surgió tras el ataque químico sirio contra civiles en abril de 2017. El presidente quería que las fuerzas estadounidenses entraran y mataran a Assad. Mattis recibió la instrucción, prometió encargarse del asunto y regresó con una propuesta mucho más acotada: ataques aéreos selectivos. Esa fue la operación que finalmente se ejecutó.
La relación entre Trump y Mattis siguió una trayectoria conocida: del elogio entusiasta al desprecio público. En 2020, Trump lo describía como obstruccionista y sobrevalorado, alguien que frenó sistemáticamente sus impulsos más directos. Cuando se le preguntó si lamentaba no haber procedido con el asesinato, Trump respondió que no.
Lo que la confesión ilumina va más allá de la anécdota: muestra que, al menos en una ocasión crítica, la decisión de no escalar no vino de la moderación presidencial, sino de la resistencia de un subordinado. En un país que lleva una década debatiendo cómo responder a la guerra civil siria —un conflicto que ha dejado cientos de miles de muertos y un régimen acusado de torturas, ejecuciones y uso de armas químicas— esa distinción importa.
Donald Trump said this week what he had denied two years earlier: in 2017, he wanted to kill Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and he had the machinery in place to do it. The only thing that stopped him was his Defense Secretary, Jim Mattis, who refused.
Trump made the admission to Fox News on Tuesday, speaking with the ease of someone unburdened by the contradiction. "I would have preferred to take him out," he said. "I had it all set." Mattis, he added, would not go along with it. "Mattis didn't want to do it. Mattis was a highly overrated general, and I let him go."
The timing of the revelation is notable because it confirms reporting that Trump had previously dismissed as false. In September 2018, when journalist Bob Woodward's book "Fear: Trump in the White House" surfaced with accounts of the assassination plan, Trump told reporters the idea had never even been considered. "That wasn't even contemplated," he said. Now, two years later, he was saying the opposite—not defensively, but almost matter-of-factly.
According to Woodward's account, Trump's interest in killing Assad came after Syria's chemical weapons attack on civilians in April 2017. The president wanted American forces to "go in" and "kill" Assad. Mattis, when presented with the order, told Trump he would handle it, but returned instead with a more limited proposal: a targeted air strike rather than an assassination. That became the operation that actually happened.
Trump's relationship with Mattis had followed a predictable arc. When he appointed him to lead the Pentagon, Trump called him "a great man." By late 2018, when Mattis resigned, Trump was attacking him publicly. Now, in 2020, Trump was characterizing him as overrated and obstructionist. "Mattis was against all those things," Trump said, suggesting a pattern of resistance to the president's more aggressive impulses.
When asked if he regretted not going through with the assassination, Trump said he did not. "I certainly didn't consider him a good person. I had the chance to take him out if I wanted to, but Mattis was against it," he said. The phrasing—"I had the chance"—suggested something already decided, merely awaiting execution.
The exchange illuminates a tension that ran through Trump's first term: the gap between his instincts toward direct action and the institutional resistance of senior military figures. Mattis, a retired Marine general with significant influence in defense circles, apparently saw risks in targeted assassination of a sitting head of state that Trump did not, or did not weight as heavily.
Syria itself remains locked in a civil war that has killed hundreds of thousands. Assad's government stands accused of systematic torture, extrajudicial killings, rape, and repeated use of chemical weapons against its own population. The question of whether and how to intervene militarily in Syria has haunted American foreign policy for a decade. Trump's revelation adds a new dimension to that debate: it shows that at least once, the decision not to escalate came not from presidential restraint, but from a subordinate's refusal.
Citas Notables
I would have preferred to take him out. I had it all set. Mattis didn't want to do it.— Donald Trump, to Fox News
I certainly didn't consider him a good person. I had the chance to take him out if I wanted to, but Mattis was against it.— Donald Trump
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why does Trump bring this up now, two years after denying it?
He's no longer constrained by the need to maintain a working relationship with Mattis or the Pentagon. He's also running for reelection, and this plays to a certain audience—people who see him as willing to act decisively where others hesitate.
But doesn't it undermine him? He's admitting he wanted to kill a foreign leader and was stopped by his own general.
That depends on your perspective. To his supporters, it shows strength and willingness to do hard things. To critics, it reveals either recklessness or a president overruled by his own staff—neither flattering.
What was Mattis actually doing when he said he'd "handle it" but came back with airstrikes instead?
He was buying time and redirecting. He was telling Trump what he wanted to hear while actually planning something more limited and, in Mattis's view, more defensible under international law.
Did the airstrikes accomplish anything?
They struck Syrian military targets in response to the chemical attack, but they didn't change the trajectory of the war or remove Assad. The civil war continued, and Assad remained in power.
So Mattis prevented an assassination that might have destabilized the region even further?
That's one reading. Another is that Mattis prevented Trump from acting on his instincts, for better or worse. The counterfactual—what would have happened if Assad had been killed—is impossible to know.