Turkish president Erdogan threatens military action against Syrian Kurds if they take more land from the Islamic State

After Kurdish YPG forces in Syria came under fire recently in the northern border town of Tel Abyad, Turkish President Recep Erdogan warned that more attacks would be coming if the Kurds attempted to make further gains against the Islamic State.

+ Add Image

Unlike the U.S. who considers the Kurds prime allies against the Islamic State in northern Syria and in Iraq as well, Turkey is concerned about the de facto growth of a Kurdish enclave in northern Syria on its border. Turkey's policies are anti-Kurdish and of late have become even more so, as Erdogan attempts to whip up anti-Kurd nationalist sentiments in Turkey in the hope of winning a majority in the elections on Sunday.

While Turkey recently joined the US-led coalition in air strikes against the islamic State, it also at the same time launched strikes against the Kurdish PKK in northern Iraq. The PKK has long fought against the ruling Turkish government. Although Erdogan had earlier agreed to a ceasefire with the PKK, that agreement has been terminated by Turkey's recent bombing activity against Kurds in northern Iraq.

Erdogan's threats against the Kurds for seizing more territory from the Islamic State, threatens relations with both the U.S. and Russia. Erdogan sees airstrikes by both the Russians and the US-led coalition as benefiting the Kurds. As mentioned earlier, Erdogan fears an autonomous Syrian Kurdistan on its borders. He feels this development would feed into secessionist sentiment among Kurds in Turkey. No doubt that sentiment is already growing in any case due to Erdogan's attacks on the Kurdish minority within Turkey.

When units of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) advanced west of the Euphrates recently into Islamic State held territory, they were twice attacked by Turkish jets. The Kurds had been warned by Turkey that they should not advance west of the Euphrates. Erdogan said: "This was a warning. 'Pull yourself together. If you try to do this elsewhere - Turkey doesn't need permission from anyone - we will do what is necessary.'" The local leadership council recently declared that the town was part of a system of self-governing cantons set up and run by the Kurds. Erdogan accused the US of supporting terrorism through its aid to the Kurds: "The PYD is committing ethnic cleansing here (of) Arabs and Turkmen. If the Kurds withdraw and don't form a canton, there's no problem. But if the mindset continues, then what is necessary will be done or we face serious problems. We are determined to (combat) anything that threatens us along the Syrian border, inside or out."

The Kurdish enclave in Syria is called Rojava or Western Kurdistan and is divided into several cantons. The PYD or Democratic Union Party has links to the Kurdistan Worker's Party(PKK) that many countries, including the U.S., consider a terrorist organization but many other countries do not classify it as such including Egypt, China, and Russia. The U.S. and many other countries do not consider the PYD a terrorist group. Erdogan lashed out at the US saying: "They don't even accept the PYD as a terrorist organization. What kind of nonsense is this?The West still has the mentality of 'My terrorist is good, yours is bad.'"That mentality seems common to almost every country. Turkey is after all complaining that the Kurds are seizing territory from the Islamic State. If any group deserve to be called terrorists it is surely them. Erdogan claims that 1,400 PKK militants are fighting in Syria alongside the YPG.

Erdogan seems bound and determined to exacerbate relations with the Kurds in the hope that this will gain him a majority in the upcoming elections on Sunday. He is also clamping down on other opposition forces in Turkey including media outlets critical of him and his regime. If Erdogan gains a majority, he is sure to increase his powers and clamp down even more on opponents a move certain to create even more conflict with the Kurds both within and outside of Turkey.

Kurds applaud Russian airstrikes in Syria want weapons from them

Russia in its latest strikes in Syria has targeted several Islamic State positions after earlier being accused of hitting other targets including rebels supported by the United States.

+ Add Image

The United States itself targets other groups than the Islamic State. It considers the Al Qaeda-linked Al Nusra Front a terrorist group to be targeted, angering rebel groups who regard it as a key player against Assad in many areas. However, Russia tends to accept the Assad view that all rebels are terrorists and legitimate targets.

The United States has itself created a sharp contrast between its own priorities and those of the rebels and its allies such as Turkey and many Gulf States. The rebels together with these supporters have as their first priority defeating Assad and regime change. The U.S. and its Kurdish allies have a different agenda. The U.S. wants first and foremost to defeat the Islamic State. In order to do this it has supported the Kurds. The Kurds, however, want to extend the territory they hold, consolidate their power and eventually carve out an autonomous or even independent area in northern Syria. They are not interested in fighting Assad unless he attacks them and tries to take back territory they hold. The Kurds publicly welcomed the latest Russian air strikes and asked for weapons. Salih Muslim, co-president of the Democratic Union Party, whose militia the YPG have closely co-ordinated their operations with the United States, said the YPG would fight alongside whoever fights the Islamic State. The fact that the Russians are supporting Assad does not concern the Kurds as it does the U.S. The Kurdish interests are first and foremost consolidating their power and extending their territory rather than fighting Assad. This strategy has been in place since early in the civil war as this article points out: The Syrian Kurds tried to play a neutral role to control as much as territory as possible and benefited from the ongoing civil war in the rest of the country. The Democratic Union Party (PYD) affiliated with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) managed to become the dominant actor on the ground due to the influx of experienced PKK fighters that trained Syrian Kurds, grassroots supporters, and organizational networks. Moreover, while Assad and his opponents fought each other for power in the rest of Syria, the PYD managed to cement its control over three Kurdish enclaves in the country’s north.

Syrian security forces withdrew from parts of northern Syria back in the summer of 2012 allowing the Kurds to become the main power and military force in some regions.

Obama made it clear that he is not intending to increase US intervention in Syria even though Russian air strikes show increasing Russian support to prop up Assad:“We’re not going to make Syria into a proxy war between the United States and Russia. That would be bad strategy on our part.This is not some, you know, superpower chess board contest, and anybody who frames it in that way isn’t paying very close attention to what’s been happening on the chess board,”

Insofar as the US supported moderate rebels and encouraged its allies to support other rebels while Russia supports Assad it is a proxy war. What has changed is that the US now has a priority of defeating the Islamic State. The US now has some interests that converge with those of Russia which supports Assad and the Kurds whose priority is certainly not attacking Assad.

The Syrian situation is to a considerable degree a super-power chess board. The Kurds have been paying close attention to what is happening. The Kurds YPG and the US coordinated air strikes with ground action to break the siege of the city of Kobani. With the help of the US air cover the Kurds are estimated to have seized 6,800 square miles of territory in northern Syria in recent months.

Turkey has noticed what is happening on the chessboard as well. Under US pressure it finally joined the battle against the Islamic State but also at the same time attacked the Kurdish PKK in northern Iraq, violating a peace treaty and starting a campaign that threatens to create a civil war in parts of Turkey where the Kurds are a majority. Turkish president Erdogan is hoping to lead his party to a majority in upcoming elections. He is doing so by attacking the Kurds and fanning nationalist sentiment. While nationalist sentiment is rising so is the level of violence in Turkey and there is no guarantee that his strategy will even work. Obama may be right in that the conflict in Syria is not just a super-power chess game. It is a much more complicated conflict with many different external and internal players with vastly different agendas.

Militant Kurds taking control in Kurdish areas of northern Syria

Kurdish areas in Northern Syria seek to establish autonomy and to defend their own interests rather than joining the rebel cause. Kurds in the area are being provided weapons and training by the Peshmerga Kurdish militia in neighboring northern Iraq.

The Assad regime is pulling its armed forces out of Kurdish dominated areas in northern Iraq. Turkey is now not only facing a huge influx of refugees along its border with Syria but also the possibility of a virtually autonomous Kurdiish area contiguous with Kurdish areas of Turkey and also northern Iraq. This will give the Kurds hopes of eventually establishing an independent Kurdistan. Kurds inhabit parts of Iraq, Syria, Iran and Turkey.
The move by Assad to cease operations against the Kurds will enable the outlawed PKK to use northern Syria as another base for operations into Turkey. The PKK already operates out of bases in northern Iraq. While some reports say that Assad's forces were driven out by Kurdish fighters others indicate that Assad decided to cede control to those areas so that he could concentrate his forces in attacks on Aleppo. The move also creates problems for Turkey. Turkey has been supporting the rebels, allowing rebels to train in some areas and also allowing the transfer of weapons to the rebels through its borders with U.S. aid and blessings it would seem. Othman Ali who heads a Turkish-Kurdish Studies Center inside Iraq writes:
“Turkey cannot afford to see the PKK roam freely in Syria and use it as a base from which to launch armed attacks on the country...The Syrian president had decided it was time to play the PKK card against Turkey once again as was its policy in the 1990s,”These developments may lead to Turkish military incursions into Syria. Indications are that Turkish troops are being moved towards the Syrian border.
Ilnoor Shafiq a Turkish analyst said that Turkey would not launch any large scale operation into Syria without international support. Shafiq claimed
:“If there are any incursions by Kurdish fighters across the border, Turkey might respond with by pursuing them, but we will not see any large scale operation taking place,”
Turkish prime minister Erdogan had warned about developments in Northern Syria saying:
“We will not let the terrorist group [PKK] … set up camps [in northern Syria] and pose a threat to us..No one should attempt to provoke us. We will not bow to provocation but rather take whatever steps are necessary against terrorism.”
Erdogan claimed that the rebel Syrian National Council (SNC) is the legitimate representative of the Syrian people. The group is headed by a Kurd. Erdogan continued:
“Any such state there [in northern Syria] could not be seen as the Kurdish people’s own state. It would rather be a state of the terrorist PKK and the PYD.”

Leaders of the Kurds in Northern Syria have a quite different view. A senior but anonymous figure in the Kurdish Syrian opposition said to the Jewish newspaper Haaretz:
"We cannot depend on the fact that the Syrian National Council will be willing or able to ensure Kurdish rights in Syria after the fall of Assad,...We will take care of ourselves just as the Kurds in Iraq took care of themselves when they decided to set up an autonomous region, which is independent of the Iraqi government."The Kurds are not united. Many support the rebels and the Syrian National Council.The head of the Council, a Kurd himself, has been attempting to convince Kurds to join with the opposition and support a multi-ethnic Syria rather than an autonomous or independent state. However militant Kurds in northern Syria obviously have quite different ideas and are pressing for autonomy and ultimately no doubt a greater Kurdistan encompassing areas in several countries.