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despite abruptly announcing last week that he was pulling troops out of syria. we have fox team coverage tonight. tomlinson with more on the progress being made in the fight against isis but we begin with correspondent ellison barber from the north lawn of the white house. good evening, allison. >> good evening, bret. the president is on his way back from his unannounced trip to iraq. he is set to make a second stop at an undisclosed location before returning her to the white house. >> under the cover of darkness they boarded air force one and made their way to iraq west of baghdad. roughly three hours on the ground visiting with troops stationed at the airbase. if president trump gave a 20 minute speech to cheering troops. >> we came to share our eternal gratitude for everything you do to keep america safe, strong, and free. >> this is the president's first visit to a combat zone since taking office and it comes on the heels of his decision to
hundreds of isis fighters. more evidence the terrorists army isn't quite defeated. u.s. officials warned isis and its ideology has spread to other continents including europe and africa. terror attacks have been launched in recent days. and in iraq not all u.s. troops are training local forces. u.s. artillery and iraq's border with syria has been shelling isis positions around the clock in eastern syria. the last known isis stronghold is a city located within range of these canons. if at its height in 2014, isis controlled area the size of ohio. during president trump's first year in office air strikes against the group increased 33%, roughly 40,000 bombs were dropped on ice as last year. this year, air strikes have been sharply reduced as fewer isis targets remain on the battlefield. today, isis only holds 1% of the territory of ones held in iraq and syria. despite the gains against isis, the security situation in iraq remains tense. one of the reasons the presidents visit remain secret and the president and first lady
hundred of thousands of federal workers are expected to be impacted. congress returns tomorrow. bret. >> bret: allison, thank you. as ellison reported, touting success in the fight against isis. lucas tomlinson joins us now from the pentagon with a look at what the president believes is the dwindling dominance by the terror group. good evening, lucas. >> evening, bret. more than 5,000 troops are currently deployed to iraq and include special operations forces. those troops are used to train and advise local iraqi forces and could be used against isis in the future. president trump says the terror group isn't as threatening as they once were. >> two years ago when i became president they were a very dominant group. there were very dominant. today they are not so dominant anymore. >> since the president announced all 2,000 troops will be leaving syria, the pentagon says more than 30 air strikes have been launched in eastern syria going
bloodthirsty killers known as isis. we've done a very, very major job on isis. >> we have defeated isis. >> intelligence shows that al qaeda has been alive and well and making inroads into vulnerable regions. >> weekly linkages from al qaeda in west africa to al qaeda in syria to al qaeda in south asia. so in my judgment they are trying to regain relic relevance. >> al qaeda is looking to make a comeback and reassert itself as the world's most high-profile terrorist group. it's been hit hard by the u.s.-led coalition's ground wars inside iraq and syria. their manpower in those countries has been decimated over the past several years. so instead, the group has turned its attention to aviation attacks. officials say first up on al qaeda's agenda is developing new technologies to take down passenger jets including bomb carrying drones, naturalized bombs, new chemicals and new explosion methods. terrorism experts tell fox news
so let's start there with our panel. marc theissen, a fellow at the american enterprise institute. karen timothy, opinion writer for "the washington post" and tom bevan, real clear politics cofounder and president. you know the importance of presidents visiting troops in the field. especially after all that has happened after the syria announcement. what about this day? >> it's a great day. all credit to the president for making the trip. all credit to him for taking the first lady, which is a historic first and i'm sure our troops really appreciated having her along as well and getting a chance to meet her. and this is the president's first trip to a combat zone since he took office and it's really important to do that because you get a chance, president bush always said i need the advice and are just kind of confirmed to my commanders on the ground. now he had a chance to sit down today with the commanders on the ground and what i'm sure and i hope you listen to them because i'm sure those commanders on the ground told him that isis is not defeated. it's true the president is right
do them and us harm. >> bret: tom, the security was extremely tight. they had some kind of thought that there was a breach heading over, that they were being tracked, air force one, as it landed in the airbase and i think it might have tighten things even further. they did not meet one-on-one with the iraqi prime minister on the ground. there was a phone call but just being there and saying that the u.s. troops were staying is probably a relief to the iraqis. >> i'm sure it is. and also i think it shows trump -- to his point, there has been some discussion about whether this is a wise move or not. certainly the pullout of troops of syria. certainly was something trump talked about a lot, campaigned on, wanted to do and is finally doing it but i think there's also reassurance that he's not going to be shy if isis wears rears its head. to go back and knock the heck out of them as trump would say. so i think he absolutely is going to be committed to the fight against isis.
when he's said we have knocked the hell out of them. and he had to knock the hell out of them because of the precipitous withdrawal that his predecessor barack obama made. they turned into tens of thousands and took over territory the size of ohio in syria and iraq. right now according to our military they have about 30,000 fighters. if they have lost their physical caliphate and president trump deserves great credit for removing their physical caliphate for what they've done is reverted into a classic insurgency and according to our military isis is as powerful today as they were before the surge in 2007. so they are not defeated yet and we have a lot of work to do before they are. >> bret: karen? >> i think it was a great thing that he went and i'm sure the troops very much appreciated it and certainly after christmas eve with more than a dozen tweets it was interesting. he was relatively disciplined for donald trump. i think the only thing that really marred it when he kind of
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there's no longer any doubt. the amount of it i don't want to get into. we don't reveal some of that detail because we don't want to reveal how we're finding out. >> meantime, fox has learned from senior u.s. defense officials that the isis capitol raqqa has been surrounded by u.s.-backed troops. isis fighters cannot escape raqqa north of the euphrates river. there's a small corridor that others are using. fox has learned that isis moved its capitol and two months ago, isis leaders set up the bureaucratic government in an outside town where centcom killed a mid-level associate of the isis leader. he was killed in a u.s. air strike. >> isis on the run.
>> bill: we're learning more about what led to the attacks on police officers in busy champs-elysees in paris. this was the scene today in the area near where that happened. you can see a memorial has been set up with lots of people leaving flowers and candles. neighbors telling local media that the shooter had a longstanding problem with police. isis claiming responsibility for the shooting that killed one officer yesterday and injured two others, a german tourist also injured according to a french official there. greg palkot spoke to a witness about the attack. >> we saw the shooter with the gun. he started shooting bullets in the air. the police were in the street. it was a terrifying moment.