Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan just had a phone call with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin on Nov. 24 in which the former reportedly talked up plans to expand cooperation as the two countries have done in recent years. Part of that includes years of Moscow holding the hands of Erdogan and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in an effort to mend ties due to Türkiye’s key role in the dirty war effort to topple the Assad government.
Beijing was also interested in seeing that reconciliation happen and were led by Erdogan to believe it was in the cards and that Türkiye’s days of launching jihadi operations were over.
The Turkish people are also overwhelmingly against the Israel-US rampage through the Middle East, and Erdogan has spent the past year-plus railing against their crimes and selling the people on stopping the flow of supplies to Tel Aviv vital for its genocidal operations (in reality he’s only been disguising it).
Erdogan stabbed them all in the back when it launched its paramilitary forces in northwestern Syria into action last week in the most intense fighting in northwestern Syria since 2020, when Russian-backed government forces seized areas previously controlled by opposition fighters.
US proxies — Ukrainian neo-Nazis, Islamic fundamentalists, and Zionist genocidaires — are all converging on Syria in a renewed attempt to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad or at least peel off more territory ahead of any potential settlement and weaken the influence of Tehran in the country.
Türkiye, as the biggest backer of the Islamist paramilitaries Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham (HTS), formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, is playing a central role. Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan is denying Ankara involvement, but while that’s implausible enough given that Türkiye has long provided all types of support, it’s even more so considering that the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army militia reportedly participated in the battle alongside HTS. Elsewhere, Turkish security sources are saying they attempted to prevent the offensive but were unsuccessful while adding that it’s only “a limited offensive.”
While many in various corners are celebrating the offensive thinking this will weaken Russia (reports are that Russia is having to send reinforcement to Syria) and finally topple the hated Assad, a few things to keep in mind:
-HTS aren’t “rebels”, they’re the strongest iteration of AQ, ever
-Türkiye’s SNA/partnership with HTS don’t make it a “threat” to Israel, as Türkiye actively aids Israel (see: Aleppo)
-US/West is in favor of, if not behind this operation (see: scumbag thinktankers celebrating)— Lindsey Snell (@LindseySnell) November 29, 2024
What Is Türkiye Doing in Syria?
Here is the state of the situation in Syria as of Sunday morning, according to Elijah J Magnier:
The Syrian opposition forces, primarily led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and Ahrar al-Sham, with support from Islamist jihadist groups, have launched a significant ground offensive over the past 48 hours in rural Idlib, rural Aleppo, and parts of Aleppo city supported by drones and armoured battalions. In a rapid and well-coordinated advance, they have captured dozens of villages, including strategic areas along the M4 and M5 international highways connecting Damascus to Aleppo and Aleppo to Latakia, as well as the critical cities of Saraqeb and most of Aleppo. With the Syrian army’s defensive lines nearly nonexistent, it appears only a matter of time before opposition forces gain complete control of Aleppo city. Reclaiming these losses would require tens of thousands of troops, a resource the Syrian army does not currently possess.
Some reports now say that the opposition groups are already in control of Aleppo and Syrian government forces fell back to prepare for a counterattack.
The Turkish-backed offensive is conveniently timed to coincide with the Lebanon “ceasefire,” and according to Yedioth Ahronoth, Israeli officials view the advance on Aleppo as an opportunity to weaken Syria. That is unsurprising as it’s widely believed that Israel, thwarted in its ground invasion of Lebanon, has circled back to its previous backup plan following its 2006 failure in Lebanon, which is to eliminate Iran’s ability to resupply Hezbollah via Syria.
Türkiye is helping. As Syrian Foreign Minister Bassam Sabbagh said on 29 November, the Turkish-HTS offensive comes “within the framework of serving the goals of the Israeli occupation entity and its sponsors.”
Not only are Erdogan’s denunciations of Tel Aviv empty words, but it appears he is actively conspiring with Netanyahu and the US in Syria.
According to AFP and Russia’s Izvestia, Turkish intelligence gave the green light to and is helping to direct the offensive. It was coordinated between Turkish, Ukrainian, and French intelligence, with Israeli backing and US approval. HTS also receives considerable support from Ukrainian special forces with a focus on drone warfare to target Russian and Syrian positions — a connection facilitated by the Turks.
The US, like Turkey, is denying any involvement in the HTS-led offensive, but claimed the reason for Syria’s problems are Assad’s “reliance on Russia and Iran.”
Elsewhere in Syria, Israel is working in tandem with ISIS. Here’s what Syrian researcher, former soldier and journalist Ibrahim Wahdi told Vanessa Beeley about one such IAF attack on Syrian forces in Palmyra:
Local sources said that the Zionist aggression on the SAA and auxiliary forces in Palmyra city came during their rest after returning from military missions in the central Syrian desert.
According to field sources these units had been engaged in fierce clashes with ISIS terrorist groups in the Al Shoula area of the Deir Ezzor desert after they had been spotted infiltrating from within the US-imposed 55km exclusion zone around the US unlawful military base of Al Tanf on the border with Jordan, taking advantage of heavy fog to try and advance towards Syrian allied positions.
The Syrian allied forces routed the ISIS terrorists and caused significant injures and deaths among their ranks. Israel attacked Palmyra from the Al Tanf “protected” airspace therefore we can conclude that Israel was supporting the ISIS terrorist operations with airstrikes against the forces that have been entirely responsible for the defeat of ISIS in Syria with the help of the Russian Airforce since September 2015.
Beeley’s conclusion:
Israel is trying to decimate the Syrian Air Defence capability, demoralise and deplete Syrian armed forces and to destroy the essential infrastructure that provides a road link to Lebanon and the Hezbollah resistance forces. At the same time the US and Israel are bombing the Al Bukamal border crossing with Iraq to try to close the land bridge between Iran, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. Thus they are intending to isolate both Lebanon and Syria from their allies and to break the links in the Resistance chain of supply which includes humanitarian aid, energy resources to combat the US occupation of Syrian resources, and military equipment to support the Resistance.
…The plan is clear – to deplete Syrian military capability and to keep the Syrian Arab Army busy on multiple fronts – in the north-west (Idlib), in the north (Türkiye and former Free Syrian Army proxies), in the north-east (US and Kurdish Contras), in the east (US base at Al-Tanf incubator for terror gangs including ISIS) and in the south (possible land invasion by Israel and Druze separatists backed by Israel, remnants of illegal armed groups in Daraa and surrounding countryside).
HTS (at that time still known as Al Nusra) and other jihadist groups previously had control of the majority of Syrian territory in the mid-2010s, before a major intervention by Russia, Iran and Hezbollah swung the situation in the other direction. According to Military Watch, the only reason HTS can continue to operate northwestern Syria is because Turkey has the area under its protection with military bases. Past Syrian efforts to defeat HTS and retake Idlib were squashed by the Turks, including air and artillery support to target Syrian positions and protect jihadists.
Turkey by assisting HTS and others in the current offensive — if not directing it — is violating the 2019 agreement it sponsored along with Russia and Iran to freeze the line of the conflict.
Since that 2019 agreement the US has kept up sanctions in an effort to strangle Syria while Israel continued to bomb groups that it claimed were Iranian revolutionary guards or Hezbollah militants. It would appear Erdogan simply used the 2019 freeze not to work towards a permanent peace with Assad’s Syria, but to rearm and prepare.
Erdogan Calculations
Erdogan’s interests in this case overlap with the US-Ukraine-Israel group. The diehard neo-Ottoman ambitions of Erdogan and his clique, which wish to see Turkey strengthen its influence over much of the former empire, coincide with the US-Ukraine-Israel’s desire to curtail Russian and Iranian influence curtailed in the region.
At the bare minimum Türkiye is looking to get more territory under its and its proxies control in Syria ahead of any permanent settlement (potentially under Trump II) for refugee return and which would also allow Ankara better positioning to neutralize the Kurdish forces it sees as a threat. Türkiye hosts more than three million Syrians, which Erdogan is under pressure domestically to do something about, and has been accused of coercing thousands into signing declarations of “voluntary return.” As the security environment “strengthens” in Syria, Erdogan says more Syrians will be expelled from Türkiye.
Turkish President Erdogan:
Voluntary returns to Syria will accelerate. pic.twitter.com/MDlOzRQoTy
— Clash Report (@clashreport) November 29, 2024
That’s the generous view. The other is that all Erdogan’s talk about joining the BRICS, SCO, statements against Israel, thawing ties with Assad, (Syria wants Erdogan to withdraw troops and Islamist paramilitary groups before normalizing ties, which Erdogan refuses to do) have been a big head fake.
Burning Moscow — Again
Ankara faces a difficult balancing act with Moscow. Türkiye does not want to see Russia (or Iran) become too strong in the region and has always used the US as a counterweight. At the same time, Russia and Türkiye have a mutually beneficial economic relationship — one that has been critical to Erdogan’s political survival and helpful to Moscow in bypassing Western sanctions.
The US is increasingly putting that arrangement under strain by slapping more sanctions on Turkish and Russian entities, including recent restrictions on Gazprombank, which is linked to the Russian gas giant. Ankara is trying to get the US to agree to a waiver, a decision Washington would be unlikely to take without something in return.
Türkiye gets nearly half of its natural gas and a quarter of its oil from Russia on good deals. Russia even showed flexibility on payment to help Erdogan get re-elected this year.
Russian tourism to Turkiye has gone through the roof since the war in Ukraine and western sanctions started. Russia is also completing work on a nuclear power plant in Türkiye, a major milestone for the country on a deal beneficial to Türkiye, which includes the training of nuclear engineers by the Russians. Not only that, but Ugur Gurses, a former Turkish central banker, believes the Russians were using that plant to transfer funds by purchasing Turkish bonds instead of direct bank transfers in a boost to Türkiye’s foreign reserves in a bid to help Erdogan get re-elected, which he did in the closest call in his two-decade rule.
Erdogan’s calculations in Syria likely conclude that Russia cannot retaliate too hard… yet. Erdogan similarly reneged on a deal with Russia last year when he returned Azov fighters in Turkish custody to Ukraine in violation of a prisoner exchange deal. While Moscow would no doubt be furious over Turkish support for the Syrian offensive, Russia also wants to ensure going forward that Türkiye will continue to keep the Turkish Straits closed to NATO warships thereby keeping them out of the Black Sea. Russia wants to continue to send oil and gas to and through Türkiye to remaining European customers. Russia also needs to maintain good ties with Azerbaijan, which is close to Israel and Türkiye, for transport corridor purposes.
Meanwhile, Türkiye is getting a lot of good will from the West recently.
It looks like the US is rethinking the sale of F-35s to Türkiye, which was dropped from the program over its purchase of Russian S-400 missile defense system. It was rumored that Türkiye would have to hand over the S-400s for readmission to the F-35 program, but in light of the recent developments in Syria, maybe that’s not what the Americans were after. Der Spiegel recently reported that Germany’s Federal Security Council, which meets in secret, is approving the sale of $368 million worth of heavy weaponry to Türkiye, as well as reconsidering Türkiye’s request to purchase Eurofighter warplanes. That’s big news as it marks the end of a years-long unofficial embargo imposed by Western allies on Türkiye, which has hampered its defense sector development.
Burning China and the SCO
One of the biggest items on the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) agenda at this summer’s summit, which Türkiye attended, was the resolution of the Syria issue.
The SCO has always emphasized the importance of combating terrorism and radicalism, especially in Central Asia where the US has tried to stir up trouble in recent years to no avail as investment by China and Russia in these countries dwarfs what the West has on offer. The recent summit, however, was seen as an expansion of the SCO’s ambitions to become the security provider to the Eurasian continent.
What the SCO wants to guard against above all else is efforts by the West to use terrorism or any other division strategies to thwart the growing power and economic integration of its member states.
Erdoğan attended the SCO summit and played up Türkiye’s potential contributions to the organization. Here he is alongside President Xi Jinping:
“The organization has become one of our important dialogue channels with Asia owing to our dialogue partner status, which we’ve held since 2013,” he said. “Our many years of experience fighting terrorism show that international cooperation is essential to dealing with this threat. In this context, we are ready to further strengthen our dialogue with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.”
In reality, Erdogan has done more supporting of terrorism than fighting. The Idlib governate straddling the Turkish border controlled by jihadist groups and supported by Ankara for is the primary hub of Islamist terror operations not only in Syria but also one of the biggest in the world.
Erdogan had an opportunity to wind that down, but instead looks to be doubling down, and Beijing is sure to be upset with his latest demonstration that he cannot be trusted.
Erdoğan, once an outspoken critic of Beijing due to its alleged treatment of Uyghurs, a Muslim minority of Turkic origin in western China, has almost completely dropped his criticism in recent years.
Both Erdoğan at the SCO summit and FM Fidan on his summer trip to China (where he said Türkiye “will not allow activities in Türkiye that undermine China’s territorial integrity” in reference to support for jihadists that could aid Xinjiang separatists) were asking for more investment from Beijing in Türkiye. (The EU-27 countries still contribute 59 percent of Türkiye’s foreign direct investment inflows.)
Beijing was slowly obliging. Chinese automotive company BYD recently announced that it will construct a $1 billion plant in western Türkiye. Ali Baba is planning to invest $2 billion in Turkiye. The Chinese lithium-ion power batteries company Farisis started production at a plant near Istanbul last year. Ankara is also in separate talks with Chinese EV makers SAIC Motor Corp., Chery Automobile, and Great Wall Motor Co for investments in factories in Türkiye.
One wonders if Beijing is rethinking.
Uyghur-led Turkestan Islamic Party advertising its involvement in the insurgent offensive, participating in the battles extended from Saraqeb in Idlib countryside to Morek in north Hama countryside pic.twitter.com/q6XRlVObVH
— Aymenn J Al-Tamimi (@ajaltamimi) November 30, 2024
Shortsighted Calculations?
Erdogan’s ongoing support for extremist groups not only puts the economic relationship with China and Russia at risk, but if he’s doing so in part due to promises from the West, that could end up coming back to bite him. Like Erdogan, the US-led West is not agreement-capable, and any sanctions relief, F-35 deals, or Zangezur corridor promises could be snatched away as quickly as they’ve been gifted.
There’s also a good chance that Türkiye is throwing in with the losing side. An Iranian response to Israel is supposedly still coming. This renewed push by US proxies in Syria makes it more likely it’s going to be a strong one this time.
And the Moscow and Damascus response is already underway in Syria. From Military Watch:
…it was reported that over 400 militants were killed in the first 24 hours of engagements. The casualties were reported by deputy chief of the Russian Center for Reconciliation of the Opposing Parties in Syria, Captain 1st rank Oleg Ignasyuk, who stated: “Illegal armed units linked to the Jabhat Al Nusra terrorist organization started to attack government-controlled areas in the provinces of Aleppo and Idlib at 7:50 a.m. on November 27. The Syrian army, backed by Russia’s Aerospace Forces, is engaged in heavy fighting. Terrorist units suffered major troop and equipment losses in the past 24 hours. At least 400 militants were eliminated.” The figures appear credible when considering Al Nusa’s demonstrated ability in the past to absorb massive casualties during its offensives, as well as the heavily fortified nature of the Syrian Arab Army’s positions between Aleppo and the Idlib governate where the jihadist group’s forces are based. Reports have indicated that foreign advisors supporting the offensives of have also been killed, with both Türkiye and Ukraine having provided such support to Al Nusra in the front.
Russian jets very active in Syria right now. Their job is to deplete militant resources, destroy logistics, inflict as many casualties as possible, anything that slows them down. Air power can’t hold a city, but it can make life very unpleasant for the bad guys – and buy time.
— Russians With Attitude (@RWApodcast) November 30, 2024
According to Larry Johnson at Sonar21, “Reports on Telegram indicate that Syria, with ample support from Russia, are responding effectively to defeat the HTS attack. “
As referenced above, Russia might want Türkiye’s cooperation on the Black Sea and economic fronts for now, but for how much longer is it deemed necessary? Put another way, at what point does the cost of catering to Erdogan outweigh the benefits?
Maybe Russia, armed with its actual wonder weapons (as opposed to the imaginary Western ones), decides it’ll deal with the consequences of the Turkish straits being opened to NATO warships. Maybe Moscow decides it has enough other oil and gas customers, and it’ll take the hit by forgoing the exports to Türkiye and southeastern Europe. And there are other nations willing to help Russia bypass sanctions — although not in the EU customs union like Turkey.
Russia likely doesn’t want an even worse Türkiye headache at this time, but once Ukraine is eventually wrapped up, it could be bad news for Erdogan and his inner circle. It could be bad news even sooner if the majority of Turks figure out he’s playing them with all his fiery rhetoric against Israel.
We recently wrote about the potential spread of the Middle East conflict to the Caucasus region. All the major players from the Middle East conflicts are heavily involved in geopolitical maneuvering in the Caucasus. With Türkiye’s dramatic step into the ring and the Georgia color revolution attempt in full swing, as well as ongoing Armenia-Azerbaijan tensions with a heavy American presence in the former, it unfortunately looks like we’re inching closer to the Caucasus becoming another theater of the increasingly global New Cold War conflict.
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I’ll leave just an initial comment here. Where it says in this post-
‘Past Syrian efforts to defeat HTS and retake Idlib were squashed by the Turks, including air and artillery support to target Syrian positions and protect ihadists.’
It was not just the Turks. The Syrians were on a roll and were getting ready to go into Idlib. Remember that at the beginning of the war this was a safe area of Syria but the Jihadists gravitated to this region and turned it into their stronghold. Anyhow, when they were getting ready to push the Jihadists back to Turkiye, it was at that point that the US, UK and France told Damascus that if they dare do so that all three powers would attack Syria. Unable to counter all those forces, the Syrians had to relent and Idlib was left as Jihadist Central. I will drop a link to Syrians interrogating captured Jihadists but cannot authentic it-
https://www.bitchute.com/video/gKgFdHiDjgml (1:18 mins)
Conor Gallagher. Thanks for this detailed report and your willingness to tie facts and trends together. An enlightening post. The news and analysis, though, give one pause.
Observations: In case one may think that the U S of A has only recently taken an interest in Syria, with the best of intentions, natch, history differs. The U.S. government has been actively destabilizing Syria since its independence:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_1949_Syrian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat
Also, a question for Syria, as we saw with the Taliban in Afghanistan, will be: What kinds of policies will they put into effect if the rebels take over? I’m not expecting multi-party elections…
I’m also seeing Westerners who hate Assad cheering on the fundis. Note: The enemy of your enemy is not your friend.
Finally, there’s the question of the Kurds, who are caught between the great powers, their own geography, and their mistaken reliance on the U.S. of A. We aren’t getting reports from Rojava, but I doubt that a bunch of Islamic fundamentalists has much use for the Kurds and their political / religious heterodox ways. [In Italy, the great expert on Rojava is the excellent graphic novelist Zerocalcare, as evidenced by his testimony in the graphic novel, Kobane Calling. I will await some kind of statement from him — I couldn’t find anything this morning.]
“I’m also seeing Westerners who hate Assad cheering on the fundis. Note: The enemy of your enemy is not your friend.”
You would think that the U.S. foreign policy braintrust would have learned that from the mess they made in Libya, and their other missteps, but alas, they never seem to learn anything from their failures, and are doomed to keep repeating them.
On the other hand, considering how Orwellian the world has become, maybe now they consider that ‘failure is success.’
Mess is what they wanted in Libya, so it’s not a misstep/failure. They have learned a lesson, that they can do whatever they want, and get away with it.
Indeed, this the goal of U.S. empire’s scorched earth policy. The goal is to sow chaos and discord, create disruptions in trade routes and instability in the region. The reverberations of this affect China and Russia – for Russia it aims to put military pressure with a strategy of tension to spread Russia’s resources on all fronts (including the color revolution protests in Georgia); for China, it creates economic disruptions which aims to harm China’s economic activity as a direct challenger to the U.S. economic status.
American oligarchs had better take note of the fact that the Ottoman Empire died a hundred years ago and is still causing trouble in the region. Will America be causing similar troubles for Canada and Mexico in a hundred years?
Erdogan seems to be setting new world standards for being “agreement incapable.” I’m wondering if Erdogan and his clique consider what they are doing in Syria as irridentism? Look no further than Mussolini’s Italy for an example of the dire results of a previous case of irredentism.
At this stage, the Russians could do much worse than promoting a new version of the Young Turks. Perhaps “the Rest” could encourage the Kurds in their dream of a Peoples Kurdistan via Syria. All the borders in that region are vestiges of the colonial period. An international conference on new borders? Plebiscites for everyone? That would be a true Fifth International.
> the Ottoman Empire died a hundred years ago and is still causing trouble in the region
That rug really tied the room together.
A wonderful Dad joke about a toupee!
Much of Russia’s recent popularity in the global south is due to its reputation for NOT sponsoring color revolutions, so I would expect the Russians to be very careful about interfering in Turkish politics.
Good point there. Who could have imagined that just leaving people alone would be so popular?
I suspect there is [continues] support from Persian gulf gas/oil-royals for the Idlib vestiges of al Qaeda.
This may have the effect of bringing the resistance together including Kurds forming up against Erdogan’s drivers.
More regime changing that Obama started.
Apparently MBS has already said that the Saudis will have nothing to do with this regime change operation this time around as the region needs stability. Erdogan is on his own here.
There are several sets of royals in the Gulf area.
KSA relations wrt to Wahabbi are recondite, difficult to see and understand.
To me there is a CIA/Israel bent to evolved AQ.
As noted elsewhere US has always been at war with the Assad regimes.
None of these “royals” have any lineage or claims going back more than a few decades. They were all just regional tribal leaders that got elevated by Western powers for one reason or another. There’s no reason why the Gulf States couldn’t be a single republican (be it liberal democracy, theocracy, Communist, social democratic, Baathists) state, but then it would be harder for the West to control.
“They were all just regional tribal leaders that got elevated by Western powers for one reason or another.”
Not true of the Saud tribe, which had a 200+ year rivalry with the Al-Rashid tribe in the Nejd (central) region of Arabia. Abdul Aziz bin Saud, founder of the current nation state, conquered the Hejaz region (Mecca, Medina, Jeddah, Red Sea area) in the 1920s, driving the Brit-supported Hashemites into Jordan and Iraq. Abdul Aziz had an impressive combination of leadership skills. Three types of alliances cemented his rule: 1) inter-tribal marriages; 2) allowing the fundamentalist Wahabbis great latitude in religious matters; and 3) an eventual mutual benefits pact with the USA (formalized in 1945 on the USS Quincy with FDR).
Thank you, I was thinking of this but did not have the dates to hand. The Saud were a force for long time.
They were a force in the region but took over their current area of control pretty recently. And they only became kings by making a deal with the Americans. So I think you kind of made my point for me. There were no long established kingships that made sense as a successor to direct British control. The region could easily have gone another way like other states in West Asia and North Africa did.
Surely they know already. We’re not living in 1999 or even 2019 with regard to media and the internet and how people inform themselves. If telegram and/or tiktok are a presence in Turkiye as they are everywhere else, then restarting the Syrian Civil war could result in spectacular public blowback. I don’t claim to understand Turkish public option about Syria, but attempting to hide that it is fundamentally an Israel shoring-up exercise is doomed to failure.
I recall how when ISIS/ISIL was active Erdogan was supporting them via oil convoys. This always told me his true political orientation. He’s a fundie.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34982951
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/P-8-2015-015318_EN.html
https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/middleeast/100000004069708/russia-on-smuggled-oil-from-isis.html
The Kurds are anarchists, with both YPG and SDF embracing an Ocalan-style democratic confederalism and direct democracy, religious secularism, feminism, egalitarianism and anti-capitalism, they are his enemy, these are the opposite of all that would be an Islamic fundamentalism.
(I hate to use the phrase ‘Islamic fundamentalism’ because the prophet Mohammed supported egalitarianism, secularism and women’s rights, so that should be Islamic fundamentalism proper, but unfortunately nowadays we understand it to mean something else entirely…)
Syria under Assad was always secular, notable for trying to limit the influence of religion and religous groups on the state, and Assad was always defender of Christian minorities. If Erdogan is an Islamist fundie, supports groups like ISIS, this naturally makes Syria and Assad his enemy.
So Erdogan supporting HTS, offspring of Al Nusra and Al Qaeda, which is about Islamic fundamentalism, Islamic law, state religion and suppression of women’s rights, does not surprise me in the least, makes perfect sense.
I am not an expert on Turkish politics, but my impression is that Erdogan has roughly the same relationship to religious fundies as Donald Trump.
Muhammad supporting “egalitarianism, secularism and women’s rights” is dubious. (We know very little about the historical Muhammad, one way or the other.)
In any case, that’s irrelevant. Islam is as Muslims do. And among Muslims who like to support their political views by claiming that they are following Muhammad’s directions, only a tiny minority promote “egalitarianism, secularism and women’s rights.” In Turkey, you will find the occasional theologian arguing that Muhammad supported current PMC political fashions; you even have small groups of “anticapitalist Muslims” and so forth. But while such figures and groups are good at attracting Turkish media attention due to the controversy they generate, they have very little political heft.
I haven’t made a close study of the Kurds but my impression is that they have good PR as supposed free love leftists, but they’re actually very very dirty.
They’re claiming a lot of oil rich territory where they’ve always been the minority and are not necessarily part of their historic homeland. They cooperated with the Salafist headchoppers in ceding Alawite occupied territory that they had promised to defend. Their leadership are basically mafioso types smuggling stolen oil, arms, and human traffic in the area. They were given numerous opportunities to work with the Syrian and Iraqi governments and they always blow them up.
I can try to dig up some specific reporting on this if there’s interest. Above is just what I remember by listening to Syria sympathetic aligned lefties and people like Kevork Almassian and Aaron Good on the topic
I would be interested in any links you could provide, Emma. Over the years I’ve seen a lot of what I would call “street leftists” or maybe street feminists (young people who put in work in the streets) strongly supporting the Kurds because of the Ocalan connection, because of that connection some also viewed the zionists in a positive light with women prominently displayed in the IDF, battling what they saw as fundamentalist patriarchy.
I haven’t seen much of that opinion in a few years but bracing for a resurgence so a tool would be appreciated.
Thanks for the interest!
The feminism washing of the IDF and various US stooges is so gross. Israel has one of the highest incidence of rape and sexual harassment in the world and something like half of the female IDF soldiers report being sexually harassed during their service. A majority of the Israeli Jewish population think that raping imprisoned Palestinian men, women, and children, in some cases to death, is justified and should be celebrated.
The sort of people who would prioritize some abstract concept of female empowerment (which more often than not are just some thirst trap photo shoots of attractive IDF females in suggestive poses) over the actual suffering of entire populations. They’re ghouls for empire.
The British empire was very skilled at talking about the horrors of widow burning (which is indeed horrifying – pretty hard for anyone to defend that barbaric practice) to justify their rule, which de-developed the Indian subcontinent for two centuries and directly results in the death by famine and war of hundreds of millions, surely including many widows and orphans. The current generation of such “do gooders” seem intent on starting WWIII because they think Russia must accept their maximalist definition of LGBTQ+ liberation. Meanwhile our (and BRICS+ adjacent) Saudi allies and “Syrian rebels” stone women to death for adultery, including at least one case where a woman was gang raped and then stoned for the rape.
It’s not just the IDF, Emma. There was a recent study in Israel which found that ‘Most Israeli men say forced sex with acquaintance is not r***.’ Actually it was 61% to be exact which is kinda skyhigh-
https://www.theguardian.com/world/view-from-jerusalem-with-harriet-sherwood/2011/jan/21/israel-palestinian-territories
Thank you! And amazingly from 13 years ago, when Israel was not quite as openly rabid dog crazy as it is now.
Please do.
Yes, this is new to me, I’ve not seen a negative word about the Kurds or the YPG or SDF, so would appreciate what you have and thank you!
I’ll have to do more substantive digging around this, there really isn’t much even in alternative media sources like the Grayzone or Breakthrough News. I haven’t gone through these yet but their very likely to contain information supporting my claims above. I’ll try to pull together something more substantive this weekend.
The big one for me is the Kurdish complicity in the Yezidi genocide. The other piece that comes to mind was a recent killing of a rich Kurdish businessmen who was heavily involved in smuggling. Now these reports do have to be read with the understanding that the Kurds are hated by anti-imperialist leftists as American stooges and perpetrators of the Armenian genocide, so there’s a bias in that direction. Still, I think there’s enough evidence for me to conclude that they’re very dirty and in cahoots with Americans to destabilize the region.
https://therealnews.com/the-complex-history-and-relations-of-the-kurdish-ypg-syria-and-us
https://thecradle.co/search?filter=Kurds+&date_value=all&keyword=&sort_by=newest
https://youtu.be/-MrEPd3jFfg?si=Qkj5174lxlCEZVcd
https://youtu.be/DQCEfVwBrd4?si=-Nr4x3OJFJ6LidPV
https://youtu.be/58oyzxou_uw?si=XZ349MWuY2z45zsd
Also relinking to this massive history of the Syrian conflict until now with receipts by Kit Klarenberg and Alex Rubenstein.
https://www.youtube.com/live/D233Js9RN8Y?si=nhRlLh6WIKf0c_SV
appreciate you
TrueAnon has a Syria episode that should be pretty interesting, since Brace ran off to fight with the Kurds for a bit and came back pretty disillusioned.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=p-BUbSqIV9c
American Exception talked to the Cradle correspondent about ISIS included a lot about the Kurds. This might be the best source to start from actually.
https://www.patreon.com/posts/is-isus-us-ae184-111827972
Aaron Good also thinks of Gary Vogler’s recent book as a sort of skeleton key to the Iraq war oil business.
https://www.patreon.com/posts/neocons-iraq-war-112433173
BTW, the current AE series on Zionism-mob-US deep state connectivity is fantastic, though I do sometimes with about Aaron’s personal safety.
On short-sighted calculations: Yes and Bachar el Assad’s Syria had already returned to the Arab League which was seen as departure from Western interests by the League. None of these countries will see the new de-stabilization push in Syria with keen eyes.
Again with the black Toyota pick-up trucks. How did Toyota get a 30-year contract to be the exclusive supplier for Sunni jihadis? Why not F-150s?
On a more serious note, if Russia can deploy drone operators to Syria, those trucks seem like sitting ducks for drone warfare. Also, Jake Sullivan was on one of the morning talk shows yesterday and Syria did come up, but the questioner didn’t ask him why the US isn’t bombing Al Qaeda affiliates operating in broad daylight in Aleppo, nor did they ask him about his 2012 email to HRC noting that the US is on the side of Al Qaeda in Syria.
Erdogan has really done it here. He has turned his back on joining the BRICS and going with the Rules Based Order instead and trust western promises. Good luck with that one. Certainly the Chinese will black-ball any chance that he has of joining BRICS as they know that Erdogan is likely to unleash Jihadist Uyghurs on China down the track. He can probably kiss goodby a lot of development projects as well and the Chinese may be wary of investing in the country. It seems that the Russian and Syrian air forces are getting on top of this Jihadist attack and soon they will be rolling them back. And of course they will be careful about any Turkish planes in the region in case they try something funny.
It is a bit short sighted for Erdogan to trust Israel here. Surely he must know that it is an Israeli aim to wreck Turkiye as they cannot tolerate any strong Muslim nation in the region that might challenge them. The Israelis will probably use the Kurds to create a civil war and if Israel can use eastern Mediterranean energy sources to make unnecessary energy transiting Turkiye, that that is when it will happen.
Russia and Syria will have to make a lesson for Erdogan here so I would expect attacks across the board on Idlib from where these attacks were launched. But the Russians will be disgusted how Erdogan did a Minsk 2 on them and will ensure that they will slaughter as many of his Jihadists as they can ans it seems that many of them are Turkish. I suppose that Syria may have to call up active reservists to give a bit of depth to their counter-offensive but when this is all over, I reckon that Syria is going to get a major upgrade of it’s military.
It seems that the Russian and Syrian air forces are getting on top of this Jihadist attack and soon they will be rolling them back. And of course they will be careful about any Turkish planes in the region in case they try something funny.
Airplanes from Israel and the USA have been operating for years over Syria, and the Syrians have not been able to deter them. If, and only if Russia engages with its menagerie of advanced anti-aircraft weaponry will these other powers be prevented from destroying the Syrian air force and from bombing Syrian ground troops at the most convenient moments (remember Deir el Zoor).
I suppose that Syria may have to call up active reservists to give a bit of depth to their counter-offensive but when this is all over, I reckon that Syria is going to get a major upgrade of it’s military.
That is also what was being said about 6 years ago. What the success of the sudden jihadist offensive reveals is that the Syrian armed forces were actually exhausted by years of continual fighting and relentless attacks by the Israelis, that the Syrian security forces had become numbed by the apparent immobility of the “frozen conflict” around Idlib (jihadist territory) and the North-East (Kurdish territory), and that the society at large, ground down after years of merciless sanctions, was distracted by the struggle for economic survival.
I am afraid that if Iran and Russia do not go in force, with no holds barred, Syria will end up in several more years of debilitating conflict — which is exactly what Israel needs to complete its genocide of the Palestinians.
It was weird that the Syrians pulled out the Iranian troops around Idlib right before and evidently replaced them with green recruits. It could be a terrible mistake by the Syrian army but it feels too much of a dumb mistake for a government that survived 13 years of relentless Western backed attacks.
I may be too optimistic here in seeing 5th dimensional chess game to draw in a fire bag for the Idlib Jihadis and lance the wound once and for all. We shall see how the situation develops in the next weeks and months.
That is what I was thinking also. Time to shave-the-beards from time to time. It also gives pretext for the Iranians to send in soldiers and advisors and for the Russians to provide full air cover to the Iran Syria Hezbollah soldiers (and their supply chain!). If the fighting lasts longer than 6 months, then perhaps this really was a planned assault, and Erdogan did stab his neighbours in the back… conversely if the fight is over in a month with a high number of jihadis casualties and a high jihadi-to-syrian loss ratio… then other conclusion could be made.
If the Jihadi actually advanced with armoured column, vulnerable to Drone ISR and much worse.. this would be remarkably stupid on their part.
US airplanes do clear it with Russian AD before coming even close to the Syrian airspace ever since that S-400 battery appeared in Kheimim.
Israeli air force, being the real macho boys, tend to stay over Mediterranean, lob their missiles from behind the Mount Lebanon and be on the approach to Ramat David airbase before their missiles have even entered the Syrian airspace.
And don’t forget about the courageous tactic of hiding behind civilian aircraft:
https://www.avweb.com/aviation-news/israel-accused-hiding-behind-airliners-in-missile-strikes/
I remember a civilian pilot talking about the same courageous tactic being used in Libya back in the day.
The Chinese and Russians could inflict a lot of pain on Turkey by just cutting off the tourist traffic.
They can, and they may, but Russia benefits in many ways from the current relationship and also does not want to make an enemy out of Turkey.
From a long-term perspective, this current issue is an annoyance, but it is not worth destroying an entire relationship over.
There’s only so many times that Russia can tolerate getting stabbed in the back by Erdogan, before it has to do something just to make sure that other countries don’t get the same idea. Turkey does provide a mediator and sanction escape route for Russia, but they’ve proven to be completely untrustworthy on the first point and Russia has plenty of trading options now.
There’s a difference between trying to balance between two sides for advantage in an honest and consistent way, as India and Saudi Arabia have done, and the sort of constant double dealing and backstabbing that Erdogan is now famous for. Nobody trusts him now on anything.
Sultan wannabe is acting like sultan would, from the position of strength (which is also Blinken’s catchphrase).
Russia is next to Turkey. It will tolerate a lot but forever forgiving betrayal is a character weakness that will be ruthlessly exploited. Turkey needs to be put down enough to really hurt as a disciplinary action.
“It is a bit short sighted for Erdogan to trust Israel here. Surely he must know that it is an Israeli aim to wreck Turkiye as they cannot tolerate any strong Muslim nation in the region that might challenge them.”
What are Erdogan’s plans for Erdogan (not Turkiye or some suspected “neo-Ottoman Empire” ambitions)? That is the question.
I see reports that Iraqi Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba fighters are crossing into Syria to aid Assad. Here is the standardized headline (this one from the Guardian), “Iran-backed Iraqi militias join fight in Syria after militants seize Aleppo”. “Iran-backed” (or some other hyphenated version) is omnipresent headline phraseology in the content of my search returns. Just in case you missed who’s backing those militants, the Guardian helpfully opens the first para with “Iranian-backed Iraqi militias crossed into eastern Syria overnight…”
So, about At the same time the US and Israel are bombing the Al Bukamal border crossing with Iraq to try to close the land bridge between Iran, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. (from Beeley’s conclusion)
Expecting consistency from Turkish diplomatic and security calculations seems to me to be quixotic in the extreme given its geographic and geopolitical position.
As with the English, I brace for perfidy where the Turks are concerned …
The end-times evangelicals in the US government/military (and there are many) are salivating at the thought of fighting a nuclear war with Russia while engaged anywhere near Meggido.
Things are going to get very tense as the SAA pushes back the rebels. Israel forced an Iranian cargo plane to turn back from Damascus. Will they try this with a Russian cargo plane? The current Washington administration keeps creating one big mess after another. Could Trump possibly be worse?
Could Trump possibly be different?
Mr Gallagher has an unpleasant habit of ad hominem attacks on Ukrainians — here those allied with Israel and fighting the Syrian government are Neo-Nazis, no evidence or explanation given.
If you walk to a negotiating table and on the other side sit 11 people in business attire and one in a natsee uniform, you are negotiating with 12 natsees.
Readers like you have the unpleasant habit of defending Ukraine Nazis and smearing our writers on bogus grounds. The onus is on you to debunk him and not make unsubstantiated attacks.
See these few of many:
This post, if you click through, has the photo showing that the HUR, the Directorate of Intelligence, is indeed staging photo-ops with Nazi paraphernalia in the shot:
https://mossrobeson.medium.com/junger-steiner-and-terror-7b6dd0eb0bfd
I suggest you become better informed about these Ukrainians that you are defending.
You must be joking, right?
Banderites are not Neo-Nazis, but the oldschool ones. They have been working for The Free Democratic Western World since 1945 (and they are not unique in that). I don’t know what rock you have been living under, but it must have been a rather big one.
I don’t know if I really agree with the emphasis of this post.
I think a more useful interpretation is that Turkey has–by far–the largest and most capable army outside of Russia in that part of the world, and that it is strongly in the US and Europe’s interests (as they see it) to ensure that this military is not too friendly with (and ideally enemies) with Russia’s.
As such, these countries will make just about every promise they can do develop or maintain a schism between Russia and Turkey. It seems like they are succeeding–or, at least, have won this round. However, Erdogan likely extracted a very high price for this, even if we do not know what that price is. I don’t think a few F35s would have swayed him, and whatever his many flaws, he seems astute enough to know that the West cannot be trusted, so he likely ensured some firm guarantees for those promises.
Watching this is like playing that old game of Clue
Did you read the post with any care??? It appears not.
Turkiye’s army is not involved in the jihadist attacks. Its Foreign Ministry is falling all over itself to deny any Turkiye role.
It is MIT the Turkish glowies in cahoots with MI6
Wheat Belts,
I think the fact that the West doesn’t want Turkey to be friendly with Russia is so obvious it’s not all that useful to spell it out in blinking lights (the West doesn’t want anyone to be friendly with Russia). Nonetheless, it is mentioned in the article.
An yes Turkiye has a large military, it also has its geographic position which connects Europe to the Caucasus, control of the Turkish Straits which Turkey has kept closed to NATO warships, and Incirlik with its proximity to Syria, Iran, etc.
Pressure (through sanctions, arming of Cyprus and Greece, support for Kurds, etc.) has been on Turkey for years to scale back its economic relationship Moscow. About that military you speak of: it has been seriously hampered by sanctions.
So don’t underestimate the recent news that Germany agreed to sell weaponry to Turkiye. We dealt with that issues in a recent piece linked to in the article above. Here’s a relevant segment:
That’s likely more important to Ankara than F-35s, which Turkey apparently still wants despite all their issues, as is other sanction relief. There’s also the fact that the US has at least partial control of the fate of the Zangezur Corridor in southern Armenia long coveted by Turkiye.
A lot of potential carrots and sticks. There’s also Erdogan and Turkiye’s own motivations for launching their extremist proxies at this time.
A closer reading of the piece above might deliver what you’re looking for as this is all mentioned above.
My apologies.
The day following Connor’s post, Alexander Mercouris gives it a ‘shout out’ during Mercouris’ daily podcast. He extols Connor’s insight.
I think you overrate the Turkish Army and no doubt you do the US Army too. An Army is only as good as its combat record. US was beaten in Afghanistan and only succeeded in Iraq by bribing Iraqi generals to throw the fight. General Giap beat the US in Vietnam.
Turkey has used its army in forays into Iraq and Syria. It has had a bloody nose. I recall sitting with a former Turkish Special Forces soldier telling me about a foray into Kurdish Iraq when they were ambushed by what turned out to be US Special Forces who eviscerated them.
The Turkish Army has seen no real combat since Korea where it fielded a brigade attached to US Army.
If the Turkish military were as effective as you imagine Turkey would not be in NATO. Noone joins NATO because they are militarily strong – they join to save money and have USA provide full insurance cover by having full-spectrum weaponry
The Turkiye Army is not a combatant here. It is Turkiye-backed jihadists. Entirely different beast.
There may be a formal distinction between the two, but they appear to be entirely Turkish trained, Turkish equipped, and supported by Turkish intelligence and likely Turkish military liaison assistance. They are largely drawn from Turkic peoples in Russia, China, and Central Asia. They are also motivated by Erdogan’s pan-Turkic vision for West Asia. So the relationship is quite a bit closer (I would say proxies, agents, or irregulars) than when one speaks of Iranian backed Hezbollah.
Obviously unbloodied armies can’t compare to ones that endured years of hard fighting, as SAA, Hezbollah, and units of IRGC have. But Turkish joining of NATO has a lot more to do with US control of the Turkish deep state. There was no way that such an important state could be allowed to be neutral like Austria or Finland, nevermind actually independent like Nassar’s Egypt or Libya. Joining NATO is not about the individual countries’ advantage, since truly independent countries benefit trading and establishing security relationships with both sides. It’s because the US made Turkey its pawn.
Sunni Arabs are killed by hundreds every day in Gaza and West Bank but the Jihadis decide that that is not enough, they have to add to the tally. There is no excuse.
They care less about Gaza than people on the Internet. Of couse there is an excuse. It’s God’s will.
Christians were destroyed in Iraq after Saddam was overthrown. They are fleeing Syria. Both Baatjist regimes protected Christians. Assad is Alewite. Alewites celebrate Christmas.
Christians are being murdered in Gaza. Bethlehem is having a strange Christmas as the New Herod comes to slaughter the children !
Where are the „Christians“ in the West ?
Why is Trump obsessed about „hostages“ in Gaza but could not care less about Christians destroyed by US policy to eradicate Christianity in its birthplace ?
When you meet Assyrians who have fled from Iraq to Syria for refuge only to flee to Lebanon snd then to anywhere else you question why the Anti-Christ rules in Western capitals
Why do Russian soldiers have a battle pennant with the Orthodox flag from Battle of Kulikovo yet Western armies are obsessed with gender and diversity as if they are ideological enemies of Christians ?
At least Saddam and Assad let Muslims and Christians thrive and women study and dress in Western attire until USA decided to impose ISIS and Sharia
„Christians“ in the West (aka. Judeo-Christians) are too busy destroying Orthodox Christianity in Eastern Europe. That’s why they had to outsource Middle East and North Africa to Halal & Kosher enthusiasts.
Modern day crusaders. Kill em all and let God sort it out.
Found it instructive, though of course several points are covered by the post & comments.
(gosh why post a link in the first place!? We will already know it!)
Danny Haiphong
w/ Andrei Martyanov + Scott Ritter
Syria War IGNITES, Aleppo OVERRUN by Turkey & Israel-Backed Forces
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J26jf1gj_vQ
Martyanov leaves the show at TC 47:00
The rest only with Ritter and Danny covers other territories too, like the Kurds or the history of the INF Treaty and the origins of Oreshnik, whose predecessor by strategic concept was intended against Pershing II sites and then with the advent of some “Dark Eagle” re-configured ending up what it is today.
p.s. “Fun fact”: When Danny asks them what they consider as the event of 2024:
Martyanov says, Kursk
Ritter says, updated RU nuclear doctrine
This analysis (article and comments) of Turkey’s position seems to be on personal (Erdo) or tactical level. That which shall not be names is the National Pact, a long standing Turkish foreign policy goal of regaining core territory for (what they see as) Turkish strategic autonomy. Specifically, Thrace from Greece & Bulgaria to gain depth around the straights, the Aegean islands to “break their encirclement”, full takeover of Cyprus to control the East Med, Allepo & Mosul “villayets” (Northern Syria& Iraq) to expand agro production and gain energy independence, and bits of Georgia, Armenia and Iran to have overland access to Central Asia.The Turkish deep state ensures this agenda progresses at every opportunity. They have been salami slicing in the Aegean and Cyprus for decades, with the rest of NATO ” dynamically balancing” in their favor, and now they view this WW3 era as a chance to achieve this grandiose goal. They offer themselves as a tool for others to progress this agenda.
Erdogan is suicidal. He has already had a visit from the Iranian FM who indicated $30 billion in trade is at risk. Russia is a primary export market for Turkish agriculture and Turkish construction companies have contracts inside Russia. In addition, Putin’s spokesman, Peskov speaks Turkish from his time as Russian Ambassador there.
He is terrified the US intends to break up Turkey and slice off a Kurdistan.
He has now rotated too often and too far. Germany like rest of EU was sounding out Assad about returning Syrian refugees from 2015- to alleviate serious problems domestically – Turkey has blown that up.
Alistair Crooke opines the Syrian Army was in the South to fend off an Israeli invasion and conscripts were located in the “quiet” zone up north – they have fallen back which is not unusual. Russia will clearly expunge these Turkish/US/Israeli forces aided by Ukrainian mercenaries fresh from slaughtering in Gaza with IDF……..and no doubt Taliban and Pakistani elements will aid Syria as the Muslim world lights up.
Turkey is the colonial power as loathed as Britain or France or USA. The Christian province of Hatay on the border was traded by the French PM Leon Blum to Muslim Turkey in 1936 which did him few favours as a Jew in France and increased fascist tendencies in France.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2193522
This whole mess goes back to British and French policy in 1920s.
US and Israel simply ignite kerosene wherever they can find it. This time it may be the endgame for both as Iran and Russia and China decide to fight in West Asia to weaken USA in East Asia