Sri Lanka, Sept. 17 -- President Donald Trump has admitted he wanted to "take out" Syrian President Bashar Assad in 2017 but was deterred by then Defence Secretary James Mattis after having previously denyied an assassination was even discussed.

"I would have rather taken [Assad] out," Trump told Fox & Friends on Tuesday, insisting "I had him all set," but "Mattis didn't want to do it."

The admission flies in the face of Trump's 2018 claim during a White House briefing that the suggestion of killing Assad was "never even discussed." Journalist Bob Woodward reported in his 2018 Book Fair that Trump was itching to have the Syrian leader assassinated after an alleged chemical weapons attack in 2017 - a claim Trump denounced as "total ficti...