Tag: Turkey

What Is Turkey’s Aspirations?

Now that ISIS has been handed their butts Turkey has expanded their use of force in Syria and Iraq….most of the violence is aimed squarely at the Kurds in the region.

Understandable since Turkey has had a hard on for the Kurds in the region for several decades…..but beneath the obvious I have seen some opinions that Turkey is trying to bring back their glory days of the Ottoman Empire and their attacks on the Kurds is to remove any opposition that might interfere with their plans.

A European think tank, Geopolitical Futures has issued a paper on Turkey’s Middle East aspirations…..

The central question in Turkey’s invasion of Afrin has been whether it is a limited operation that will stop in northwestern Syria, or the first stage of what will become deeper Turkish involvement in the Middle East. Given that Turkey is intent on clearing the threat from its border, and that Kurdish forces extend far beyond the northwestern enclave of Afrin, there’s little reason to think that Turkey will stop after subduing Afrin.

There is, however, another threat that is forcing Turkey to take foreign military action: Iran. One of Turkey’s greatest historical adversaries, Iran has emerged from the Syria conflict in a relatively powerful position. One aspect of its qualified success has been the ability of the Bashar Assad regime, with Iran’s backing, to hold onto power and reconquer much of the territory it had lost in the civil war. Turkey sees a pro-Iran, Assad-led Syria on its border as a direct threat, which is why it looked the other way earlier in the war when Islamic State recruits crossed the border from Turkey to fight Assad.

https://geopoliticalfutures.com/turkeys-middle-east-aspirations-beyond-afrin/

Keep in mind that Turkey is also attacking the Kurds in Iraq…..now this is a NATO country, Turkey, and their violence against another country is a violation that could force the rest of NATO into a conflict they may not want.

All this brings into being a new term….Neo-Ottomanism

Neo-Ottomanism has been used to describe Turkish foreign policy under the Justice and Development Party which took power in 2002 under Erdoğan, who subsequently became Prime Minister. Neo-Ottomanism is a dramatic shift from the traditional Turkish foreign policy of the Kemalist ideology, which emphasized looking westward towards Europe with the goal of avoiding the instability and sectarianism of the Middle East. The shift away from this concept in Turkish foreign policy under Turgut Özal‘s government has been described as the first step towards neo-Ottomanism

The Ottoman Empire was an influential global power which, at its peak, controlled the Balkans, most of the modern-day Middle East, most of coastal North Africa (at least nominally), and the Caucasus. Neo-Ottomanist foreign policy encourages increased engagement in these regions as part of Turkey’s growing regional influence.

(wikipedia)

With some analysis one can see the possibility that Turkey is trying to relive the glory days of the Ottomans……slowly but steady……this will not benefit the world.

Turkey Gets Cocky

I spend my days monitoring world events so much so that I see situations that do not make the nightly news.  I have been keeping an eye on Turkey because this country is doing some interesting things.

Since total breakdown of the caliphate Turkey has been flexing its muscle….first ir was the attack on the Kurds in Syria and Northern Iraq then tanks and men crossed the Syrian border to take the conflict to the Kurds directly.

Since Turkey is a NATO member and the USA needs them as an ally in the region we have stood around with our hands in our pockets letting Turkey run rampant.

But after about a month Turkey is getting cocky and pushing their luck……..they have warned the US not to get involved and now a warning has been sent to Damascus…….

A day after Kurdish officials announced a deal which would see the Syrian Army sending reinforcements into the Afrin District to help them resist a Turkish invasion, Kurdish YPG officials are now denying that any deal was made at all, while Turkey is threatening a “confrontation” if Syria dares to resist the invasion.

Turkish officials say they are fully prepared to fight the Syrian military fight alongside the war against the Kurds, with Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu warning that nothing can stop Turkish soldiers.

(antiwar.com)

Seriously?  Turkey invades another country and then warns them NOT to come to the aid and protection of its people…..damn let sound let taking lessons from Israel.

Turkey and Israel signed a deal on Tuesday to restore ties after a six-year rift, formalizing an agreement which U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said sent a “hopeful signal” for regional stability.

The accord was a rare rapprochement in the divided Middle East, driven by the prospect of lucrative Mediterranean gas deals as well as mutual fears over growing security risks

(NBC News)

Let’s step back in time for a minute……

In the past Greece and Turkey have fought a couple wars….most notably in 1897 and 1921 and they have been at odds over Cyprus for decades and a couple of wars have been fought there also….

Okay why would I bring this up in this post?

Someone is chest thumping……

In an incident that took place less than two weeks after the Greek Defense Ministry announced that Turkey had violated Greek airspace 138 times in a single day, a Turkish coast guard patrol boat on February 13 rammed a Greek coast guard vessel off the shore of Imia, one of many Greek islands over which Turkey claims sovereignty.

Most of the areas within modern Greece’s current borders were under the occupation of the Ottoman Empire from the mid-15th century until the Greek War of Independence in 1821 and the establishment of the modern Greek state in 1832. The islands, however, like the rest of Greece, are legally and historically Greek, as their names indicate.

Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), however, and even much of the opposition seem intent on, if not obsessed with, invading and conquering these Greek islands, on the grounds that they are actually Turkish territory.

In December, for instance, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the leader of the main Turkish opposition CHP party, stated that when he wins the election in 2019, he will “invade and take over 18 Greek islands in the Aegean Sea, just as former Turkish PM Bulent Ecevit invaded Cyprus in 1974.” He said that there is “no document” proving that those islands belong to Greece.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-02-19/turkey-threatens-invade-greece

Hence the title of this post….”Turkey Gets Cocky”

Turkey may be overplaying their hand….the US is not helping diffuse this situation simply because we have NO one capable of diplomacy in the government anymore.

This situation could get ugly….and who will asked to clean up this mess militarily?

Gas ‘Em, Dan-o

Since the Civil War began in Syria there have been report after report of gas attacks by the Syrian forces……reports and accusations but not one of the alleged attacks could be verified…..but Hell that never stopped the propaganda machine from accusing…..

After over 7 years of warfare not much has changed….the gas attack reports just keep flying off the printed page……just the other day….

 U.S. National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster said on Saturday that public reports showed Syria was using chemical weapons and added that it was time for the international community to hold the Syrian government to account.

“Public accounts and photos clearly show that Assad’s chemical weapons use is continuing,” McMaster said at the annual Munich Security Conference.

“It is time for all nations to hold the Syrian regime and its sponsors accountable for their actions and support the efforts of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons,” he said, without specifying which public accounts or pictures he was referring to.

The US has repeatedly accused the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad of using chemical weapons in its long-running civil war. Earlier this month, US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said the Syrian government had repeatedly used chlorine gas, but stressed that the U.S. did not have evidence of sarin gas use.

So far they are accusations with no proof…..

There was another alleged gas attack but this time the accusation is leveled at Turkey……

 Multiple reports emerged on Friday claiming that Turkish troops used shells containing poisonous gas in their attacks in Afrin, hitting the town of Aranda with such shells, and hospitalizing six civilians with breathing problems.

Details are still scant, and there are no details on what chemical they were exposed to, but similar accounts have been made by the Kurdish YPG, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, and the Syrian state media.

Such an incident is a potentially major deal, as Turkey isn’t known to have ever had chemical weapons in the first place, let alone to have any now. It’s possible, however, that certain chemicals they do have were deployed in a way inconsistent with international law.

Interesting not a word in the MSM about the Turkish accusation……we will ignore the possibility for they are an ally……

What makes Syrian newsworthy and Turkish not?

Easy answer…..propaganda.

Time To Pick a Side

2003 the US invaded then occupied Iraq and this lead us down the long road to the formation of ISIS and the prolonged war to eradicate the vermin…..in all that time we could depend on the Kurds to have our back in this fight.

Now that ISIS is all but defeated they are no longer the military presence they one were Turkey, a NATO ally, has taken it upon themselves to eliminate a bane of theirs, the Kurds.

They began in Northern Syria and have moved into Northern Iraq…..

Turkey’s invasion of Syria is focused on Afrin, for now, but officials have promised to extend it to Manbij, and ultimately across the entire Syrian border. Apparently that’s not enough, as Turkey is also attacking Iraq again.

Turkish media is reporting that warplanes carried out at least eight different airstrikes across northern Iraq on Tuesday, destroying several shelters across the far north of Iraqi Kurdistan.

Officials have yet to confirm why these targets were attacked, or who they think they killed, but generally speaking strikes made by Turkey are aimed at the Kurds, and in northernmost Iraq, that generally means the PKK.

(antiwar.com)

And what is the US doing about this attack on a reliable ally?  So far not much….but it is time to pick a side and stick with it.  We turned our backs on the Kurds in the past will we do it again?

The Syrian Kurds have called the US to task……

The US has struggled to figure out exactly what their position on the Turkish invasion of Syrian Kurdistan is. Kurdish officials know what they expected the US to do, defend them as an ally, and the fact that they aren’t is causing a lot of disquiet.

Key Kurdish politician Aldar Khalil said the US needs to meet its “obligations” toward the Kurdish forces who fought along side them against ISIS, and do something to repel the Turkish invasion.

(antiwar.com)

Turkey, of course, insists that as a fellow NATO member, the US owes them support, and should withdraw from all Kurdish territory. So far the US isn’t doing either, but playing this middle ground isn’t satisfying anyone, and has both the Kurds and Turks believing the US is siding against them, at least somewhat.

Time to buck up and pick a side or go home and let the events control the outcome.

Fighters To The Right, Fighters To The Left

If you are a foreign policy wonk then you already know about the Turkey-US mash up….if not then maybe I should try to catch you up a bit….https://lobotero.com/2018/01/26/time-for-turkey-to-go/

The Turks have had a hard on for the Kurds for decades…..they have gone to great lengths to kill all Kurds possible…..and so far Turkey has made little progress in ridding themselves of their Kurd problem…..so now that Syria is pretty much rid of the ISIS blight they have once again given the Kurds their full attention.

Turkey has warned the US and the US has warned Turkey…..this little war will be good for no one involved….a report by a group known as the International Crisis Group has issued a paper……

The battle is likely to prove indecisive and costly for both sides. It is already a tremendous headache for Washington, their mutual ally, and putting huge strain on North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO)-member Turkey’s relations with the U.S. Unless all involved adjust their strategies, including a return to a broader peace process in the PKK’s decades-old insurgency in Turkey, it may also prove a sign of worse to come.

https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/eastern-mediterranean/syria/no-winners-turkeys-new-offensive-syria

There is one aspect of this little war that few have considered, at least those that are reporting on this war……

A new video emerged online showing a number of international “volunteers” who have recently arrived in northwestern Syria. While Syria has been attracting foreign fighters for some time, the new arrivals have shown up with an eye toward joining the Kurds in their fight against invading Turkey.

The men talk of fighting the “Turkish fascist state,” and it’s unsurprising that this is the case. Turkey and the Kurds are, after all, both massively polarizing issues internationally, particularly across Europe.

Turkey’s Erdogan government has long styled the Kurdish YPG as terrorists on par with ISIS, but has also run afoul of most of the governments in Europe, picking diplomatic fights on a regular basis using excessively hostile rhetoric.

This new Turkish War against the Kurds could rapidly expand across 25% of Syria, and with it, there is the potential to attract another massive influx of foreign fighters, whether Turkish nationalists keen to fight the Kurds, or those who sympathize with Kurdish ambitions for autonomy and see Turkey as a major regional aggressor.

(antiwar.com)

Making the world safe…..one war at a time.

Time For Turkey To Go

The country of Turkey has been in the news lately….from the supposed coup to the battle against ISIS to confronting the US over the Kurds in Syria…..in other words they are being a major pain in the butt of the US.

They have even threatened the US on Syria……

US-Turkey tensions mounting surrounding the Turkish invasion of the Syrian Kurdish Afrin District look to be getting much worse, with Turkey’s deputy premier Bekir Bozdag warning that the US is the one risking confrontation by supporting the Kurds.

Bozdag warned the US needs to “review its soldiers and elements giving support to terrorists on the ground,” and that US forces who continue to support the Kurdish YPG, which Turkey considers terrorists “will become a target in this battle.”

(antiwar.com)

How will Trump handle this threat coming from his “bromance”?

Turkey has been a member of NATO since 1952….they became a member during the Cold War as a blocking country for Soviet expansionism….but with the election of Erdagon Turkey has been becoming a “freneny” more so than an ally on the world stage.

Maybe now would be a good time to give Turkey the boot from NATO……

The case for evicting Turkey from NATO got stronger this week.

First, the United States announced the backing of a border security force drawn mainly from the People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Rojava, the quasi-independent Kurdish region in northeastern Syria along the Turkish border. Then Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says he will “strangle” that American-backed force “before it’s even born.” Russia, Iran and Syria’s Assad regime are standing with Erdogan.

The YPG, along with the multiethnic Syrian Democratic Forces which the YPG dominates, are the only armed groups indigenous to Syria that are willing and able to take on ISIS and win, and they’re the only significant armed faction in Syria’s dizzying civil war that isn’t ideologically hostile to the West. In October of last year, they finally liberated Raqqa, the “capital” of the ISIS “caliphate,” while the Russian and Syrian militaries were busy pounding rebels instead in the west.

http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/blog/michael-j-totten/time-kick-turkey-out-nato

Question should be would retaining Turkey in NATO be more beneficial than giving them the boot?

Syria: The Invasion Begins

ISIS is all but completely wiped out…..the US has said it will remain in Syria until Assad is gone…..the Kurds are still a thorn in Turkey’s ass and this is where this post picks up….since the US media has been silent on this situation…..I feel  I must step up and be the voice that the public needs.

Following up on a flurry of Friday artillery strikes against Kurdish forces in the Afrin District on northern Syria, Turkish warplanes carried out a large number of airstrikes against the small district, with at least 108 strikes reported, leaving the towns’ streets empty, and locals panicking.

Syria’s government complained Turkey hadn’t informed them of the attacks, adding that they “strongly condemn” Turkish aggression. Syria had threatened to target Turkish warplanes raiding their airspace, however, and there’s so far no sign of this happening.

Instead the US-backed Kurds are getting hammered from the air, and Turkey is now not only massing their own troops at the Afrin border, but has bused in thousands of Free Syrian Army (FSA) rebels to attack the Kurds as well.

Afrin District is relatively low-value, except that Turkey has long maintained Syrian Kurds aren’t allowed west of the Euphrates, and this is the westernmost district under Kurdish control. Turkish officials have said after Afrin, the city of Manbij will be attacks, then Kurdish border territories east of the Euphrates.

(antiwar.com)

This could draw the US into an expanding role in Syria…..could draw the US into conflict with Russia and even Turkey , an ally……none of this bodes well for the US or its troops.

The US State Department has issued a statement Friday warning that reports of Turkey attacking the Kurdish YPG in northern Syria are a significant destabilizing event, and would not help Turkey with its concerns about border security.

The statement made it clear the US, at the time, was unclear if Turkey’s attack was true, though Turkey’s Defense Ministry has since clarified the invasion is underway, and that there is no stopping it.

So from Turkey’s perspective, they’ve already waited out ISIS, and see it as time for their long-anticipated attack on the Kurds. With the US having heavily backed the Kurds against ISIS, this is going to be a major source of tensions between the US and Turkey.

(antiwar.com)

A new year and a new war, the expansion of an older conflict,  the US military will have to pay the price.

The Armenian Genocide

During the Great War (World War One) there was an incident that many want to forget and others choose to ignore….that incident became known as the Armenian Genocide.

I bring this up because for too long it has been ignored….and incident that killed about a million people and some want to pretend that it never happened.

But thanks to the film industry a couple of films have been made that should bring this event to the forefront and let the debate once again begin……

But for those that are not sure of what I write…….

In 1915, leaders of the Turkish government set in motion a plan to expel and massacre Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire. Though reports vary, most sources agree that there were about 2 million Armenians in the Ottoman Empire at the time of the massacre. By the early 1920s, when the massacres and deportations finally ended, some 1.5 million of Turkey’s Armenians were dead, with many more forcibly removed from the country. Today, most historians call this event a genocide–a premeditated and systematic campaign to exterminate an entire people. However, the Turkish government does not acknowledge the enormity or scope of these events. Despite pressure from Armenians and social justice advocates throughout the world, it is still illegal in Turkey to talk about what happened to Armenians during this era.

Source: Armenian Genocide – Facts & Summary – HISTORY.com

Asa I have said…thanks to the film industry the controversy has once again opened up to the world……

This piece originally appeared on BillMoyers.com.

Here’s a different kind of story about media and politics.

It demonstrates how the monstrosity of a crime a century old still divides and scorches the world. And it’s one more example of how digital technology is changing geopolitics at every level, from interfering with other nation’s elections to the current wave of ransomware cyberattacks and even the release of motion pictures.

Source: The internet won’t let Armenia go away – Salon.com

The internet is proving a valuable source for the history of this genocide…..

Return Of The Ottomans?

There is no one left alive that can give much first hand knowledge about the Ottoman Empire…..unless one is a history major or buff.  It has been about 93 years since the Ottoman Empire collapsed.

The Ottoman Empire was an imperial state that was founded in 1299 after growing out of the break-down of several Turkish tribes. The empire then grew to include many areas in what is now present-day Europe to and it eventually became one of the largest, most powerful and longest-lasting empires in the history of the world. At its peak, the Ottoman Empire included the areas of Turkey, Egypt, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Macedonia, Hungary, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and parts of the Arabian Peninsula and North Africa.

In the 1700s the Ottoman Empire began to rapidly deteriorate following the Russo-Turkish Wars and a series of treaties during that time caused the empire to lose some of its economic independence. The Crimean War, which lasted from 1853-1856, further exhausted the struggling empire. In 1856 the independence of the Ottoman Empire was recognized by the Congress of Paris but it was still losing its strength as a European power.

In the late 1800s, there were several rebellions and the Ottoman Empire continued to lose territory and political and social instability in the 1890s created international negativity toward the empire. The Balkan Wars of 1912-1913 and uprisings by Turkish nationalists further reduced the empire’s territory and increased instability. Following the end of World War One, the Ottoman Empire officially came to an end with the Treaty of Sevres.

I bring up this simplistic history about Turkey because of the situation today in the Middle East.

Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan called last year for the “conquest” of Europe by Islam “through emigration” into Europe and announced that the “conquest is to have the courage, tenacity, and sagacity to defy the entire world even at the hardest times.”

The speech, delivered in Istanbul on May 30, 2015, at a public meeting celebrating the 562nd anniversary of the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire’s Muslim armies, has just been translated into English for the first time.

Source: Erdogan and the Return of the Ottoman Empire – The New Observer

Turkey’s interest in northern Syria and northern Iraq is not an abstraction triggered by a group of religious fanatics calling themselves the Islamic State; it is the bypass, intersection and reinforcement of multiple geopolitical wavelengths creating an invisible force behind Ankara to re-extend Turkey’s formal and informal boundaries beyond Anatolia.

They, Turkey, has already started making in roads in the empire business…..they have ground troops in Syria and Iraq and they have little intention of leaving…..

Turkey insisted on Thursday that its troops will remain in Iraq despite Baghdad’s growing anger ahead of a planned operation to retake the Iraqi city of Mosul from ISIS.

Baghdad has accused Ankara of risking a regional war by keeping its forces inside Iraq, with the dispute complicating plans for the ambitious American-backed Mosul operation.

“No matter what the Iraqi government in Baghdad says, a Turkish presence will remain there to fight against Daesh (ISIS), and to avoid any forceful change of the demographic composition in the region,” Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said in televised comments.

Turkey has an estimated 2,000 troops in Iraq — around 500 of them in the Bashiqa camp in northern Iraq training Iraqi fighters who hope to participate in the battle to recapture Mosul, according to Turkish media.

The Turkish parliament on Saturday extended a government mandate by one year, allowing its troops to remain on both Iraqi and Syrian soil.

The Iraqi parliament labelled the Turkish troops an “occupying force” while Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi raised fears that Turkey’s move could lead to “regional war”.

Turkey is fighting the Kurds in Syria and some factions that it does not like…..ground troops are there to stay also…..

Since the supposed coup, Erdogan has been consolidating his power base….the Ottomans are making a slow return…….a new sultan in the making.

Just a thought……

 

Turkey and Iran Reach Agreement on Conditions for Syria Peace

Yes sports fans Turkey and Iran have come top an agreement on the Syrian civil war…..

I know that countries and pundits alike have been looking for a way to end the death and destruction in Syria….among other countries….and it appears that Turkey and Iran have come to some sort of agreement on how to proceed…..

In a stunning diplomatic surprise, Turkey and Iran have announced a preliminary agreement on fundamental principles for a settlement of the Syrian conflict.

The dramatic turn in the diplomacy of the Syria War was revealed in Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim’s regular weekly speech to the ruling AKP Party in the parliament and confirmed by a senior Iranian foreign ministry official Tuesday.

Both Yildirim’s speech and the Iranian corroboration were reported Tuesday by Al-Araby Al-Jadeed and Al-Hayat, Arabic-language newspapers published in London, but the potentially pivotal development has been unreported thus far in Western news media.

Source: Turkey and Iran Reach Agreement on Conditions for Syria Peace – Antiwar.com Original by — Antiwar.com

This is all well and good…..just I have one problem with this idea……

Where is the input of the Syrian people?  After all it is their country…..well at least for now…..I believe they should have a voice in any solution offered.

They had NO input in 1918 and look where that eventually came to…..maybe they should have the lead voice on any solution that involves their country…..just a thought.

Whatcha think?

But I guess since that plan is not what everyone wanted…….bullets are always easier then words……