Malfunctioning Ankara Reasoning
"It is time to call to account the owner of the gun barrels pointing at Kobani. From now on, all major cities are our fields of action and all enemy forces are our primary targets. When Kobani is burning, Turkish cities will not be sleeping comfortably. TAK will transfer the conflagration at Kobani to enemy forces in big cities and take them to hell."
Teyrenbazen Azadiya Kurdistan (TAK), militant PKK faction
"We have to be realistic. The only forces on the ground
that have proven to be a reliable partner to the international coalition
are the Kurds, the Kurds in Iraq and in Syria. We have seen it now in
Kurdistan, where the Peshmerga forces are fighting IS and have proven to
be successful, and in Syria we are seeing it in Kobani and other
areas."
"We are ready to do whatever we can to support Kobani but we have to be
mindful of the fact that we have got a front line with IS which is 1,035
kilometers long.
"We have been fighting them since June,
when they came and took control [of] over one-third of Iraq's
territory, the western part, and since August we have been engaged in
fighting on a daily basis with them."
Falah Mustaf, foreign minister Kurdish regional government (KRG), Iraq
Smoke rises after a strike on the Kurdish town of Kobani as seen from the Turkish-Syrian border. (File photo)
Turkey, called upon repeatedly by the international community, by NATO, by the United States, and by Turkish Kurds, and now appealed to by Iraqi Kurds, to do more than mass its troops on the border between Turkey and Syria, and employ them to watch through binoculars as Islamic State fighters close Kobani in on three sides while Syrian Kurdish forces desperately attempt to restrain and push them back, still does nothing. Nor will it even commit to allowing humanitarian aid to cross the border into Syria.
Despite which, the United States and NATO do not appear to have adequately and accurately received Turkey's adamant message that nothing will move it to lift a finger, shoot a bullet, express a concern, much less permit PKK members to infiltrate the border and join their Syrian counterparts in defending Kobani. And so the U.S. Defence Department states that Turkey will permit U.S. and coalition troops to use its bases.
Only to have Ankara deny they agreed to any such thing. They will, however reluctantly, though, assent to training Syrian opposition forces struggling against the Islamic State terrorists. After first vetting any whom they permit to cross into Turkey to ensure they're not Syrian Kurds, the most efficient, well-organized and capable fighting groups in Syria committed to forestalling Islamic State ambitions.
The Incirlik air base in southern Turkey from which Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel stated Turkey has agreed could be used by the U.S.-led coalition is not, after all, available for their use in combating what NATO members have every reason to believe all its members regard as a violent threat. On the other hand, should the coalition agree to bomb the Syrian regime, perhaps Recep Tayyip Erdogan could be persuaded to change his mind.
Sounds like a good idea, actually, but not one that the U.S. and its allies appear too eager to embark upon for reasons known only to themselves. Which doesn't exonerate Mr. Erdogan from his pathological foibles in considering all Kurds, whether located in Turkey, Iraq, Iran or Syria, his mortal enemies, to be considered a greater threat than the Islamic State.
His detestation of Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad is somewhat of a mystery, given Erdogan's love of Hamas, and his clear affection for the Islamic Republic of Iran.
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| Turkish soldiers hold their position on a tank as they watch the town of Kobani on the Turkish-Syrian border in the town of Suric, October 13, 2014, AFP/Getty Images |
More recent reports of Syrian Kurds desperately trying to hold their own against the pincering three-sided Islamic State onslaught, some of which violent action takes place less than a kilometre from the Turkish border for easy entertainment viewing for the Turkish troops massed on the border, give indication that the Islamic State jihadi groups may be in possession of some of the Syrian regime's chemical arsenal.
Photographs published by the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) on Sunday appear to show bodies of three Kurdish fighters marked by burns and white areas with no visible wounds or external bleeding, the hallmarks of chemical weapons.
Labels: Conflict, Intervention, Islamic State, Kurds, Syria, Turkey, U.S.
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