US refuses Erdogan's demand to remove forces from Syria

I have removed the editorial comments from this article.

Turkey Tells U.S. To Remove Forces from Manbij, Syria - U.S. Says No

Hal Turner,

28 November, 2014

Last Sunday, Turkey began an armed incursion into northern Syria to oust Kurdish enclaves in that area, setting their sights on the city of Afrin, first.  Turkey claims the Kurds are connected to a PKK "terrorists" who have been plaguing Ankara for years. The Kurds say they simply want to resume living in peace in Syria as they have for centuries now that they've fought-off ISIS.  But Turkey won't tolerate that.

On Saturday, Turkish Foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu made clear his county's forces were now setting their sites on another town in northern Syria, the town of Manbij.  Trouble is, there are US forces there.  The Turks have told the US to get our forces out.  The US says "no."

Cavusoglu said on Saturday that it was "necessary for them [US] to immediately withdraw from Manbij" as well as take "more concrete steps rather than words" to end its support for the Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) armed group.

"The US must cut ties with the terrorist organisation," he told reporters in Turkey's Mediterranean province, Antalya, the Turkish daily Hurriyet reported.

The remarks came a day after, according to the Turkish presidency, US National Security Advisor HR McMaster assured Ankara in a phone call on Friday that Washington would no longer give weapons to YPG, Hurriyet reported.

Turkey considers YPG, the military wing of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) as an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which is outlawed in Turkey. Ankara says pushing Syrian Kurdish fighters away from northern Syria is essential for Turkey's national security.

Military operation

On January 20, Turkey launched a military operation along with the Free Syrian Army (FSA) - a Syrian rebel group - to drive YPG from Syria's northwestern district of Afrin.

On Friday, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkish troops could push YPG all the way east to the frontier with Iraq, including Manbij, Hurriyet reported.

According to a statement published by the Turkish armed forces on Saturday, about 394 fighters were "neutralised" since the start of the Afrin operation.

"340 targets of the PKK [outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party], KCK [Kurdistan Communities Union], PYD/YPG [Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party/People's protection Units], and ISIL [Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant] terror organisations have been destroyed," the army said.

It also said that three Turkish soldiers and 13 members of the allied FSA were killed in the operation.

Also on Saturday, a rocket was fired from Afrin hit Turkey's border province of Kilis, injuring two people after hitting a five-storey building in the neighbourhood of 7 Aralik, according to Turkey's state-run news agency, Anadolu Agency.

U.S. Says "No"

Joseph L. Votel is a four-star general in the United States Army who has been commander of United States Central Command since March 2016. Before that, he served as commander of the United States Special Operations Command. 

When asked by reporters whether the US is going to flee Manbij, the General politely replied "That's not something we're looking at right now."  In other words, "no."

The US has already seen a possible military conflict coming with Turkey.  In a readout from the White House of a telephone conversation between President Trump and Turkey President Recypt Erdogan, the US President made clear Turkey should ". . . exercise caution and avoid any action that may risk conflict with US forces."   Here is that White House readout:

 

Put simply, if Turkish forces attack an area where US Forces are located, the US forces can attack back.....

The Saker on the failed coup in Turkey

Failed coup in Turkey – a few initial thoughts

The Saker

Vineyard of the Saker,

17 July, 2016

When I first heard that a coup was in progress in Turkey my first thought was that it was the USA’s way to punish Erdogan for his sudden apology to Russia.  Yes, sure, I realized that there were many other possible explanations, but that was the one I was hoping for.  I even  told my family that if this was a US-backed coup and if Erdogan or his supporters said so, there would be hell to pay for the USA.  Less than 24 hour later my hopes were fulfilled:

Turkish Minister Blames US Authorities for Organizing Coup Attempt

Kerry Blasts Turkey for Insinuating that Washington Plotted Coup of Erdogan

Erdogan was undeterred and he went on to publicly declare ““Dear President Obama, I told you this before, arrest Fethullah Gulen or return him to Turkey. You didn’t listen. I call you on you again, after the coup attempt – extradite this man from Pennsylvania to Turkey. If we are strategic partners, do what is necessary,” Erdogan said. He also explicitly called any nation supporting Gulen “an open enemy of Turkey.”

Now we need to remember that Erdogan has a history of zigs followed by zags, so I would not put it past him to warmly embrace Obama in the near future, but I find that unlikely.  Why?  Simply because there is a lot of indirect evidence that the USA was, indeed, behind this coup.  Consider this:

The coup involved a very large number of people.  We can get a sense of the magnitude of this coup by looking at the huge purge now taking place in Turkey.  According to various sources it includes no less than 6’000 people, many senior officers (including 5 generals and 29 colonels), 2’745 judges and prosecutors.  So the first thing we need to ask ourselves is how likely is it that the USA did not know what was being prepared by the coup plotters?  I submit that in a country essentially at war, where US forces which are involved in combat operations in nearby Syria and Iraq are deployed and where the US reportedly keeps 50 tactical nuclear weapons, the notion that the USA did not see this coming is far fetched.  Turkey is a NATO member state, which in practical terms means that the US has full control over the Turkish military, and we know thanks to Sibel Edmonds that the Turkish deep state has very close ties to the US deep state – and we are to believe that nobody in the USA saw this coming?

Furthermore, when Erdogan says that the USA did not hurry to condemn the coup, he is absolutely correct.  In fact, it was rather amusing for me to see that all the western media was indicating that the coup had succeeded, while the Iranians and Russians reported that the coup had failed.  If that was case of wishful thinking on both sides, what does it tell us about the wishes?

Now let’s look at the cui bono angle.

Some, including Fethullah Gulen, have suggested that this coup was an a false flag operation by Erdogan himself.  And it is true that he declared that this coup was a “”gift from God… because this will be a reason to cleanse our army“.  But the reality is that this coup is a huge embarrassment for Erdogan who had already purged the Turkish armed forces many times over and who could not take the risk of having a planned “false flag” turn into the real thing: even General Bekir Ercan Van, the commander of Turkey’s Incirlik airbase, has been detained by Turkish authorities accused of complicity in the attempted coup.  So not only did this coup show that Erdogan was hated at the very top level of the Turkish armed forces, but the failure of the coup has now resulted in a huge purge which will tremendously weaken the Turkish armed forces who are involved not only in Syria but also in a bloody civil war against the Kurds.  So the notion that Erdogan triggered this coup himself appears very far fetched to me.

Then, of course, there is Russia.  And while I wholeheartedly agree that Russia will immensely benefit from this failed coup, I also am convinced that the Russians never had anywhere near the means needed to trigger a coup in Turkey.  Neither the Kemalists nor the supporters of Gulen are pro-Russian and Russia simply does not have the kind of access in this major NATO country to trigger military coups.

As for the USA, had the coup succeeded, they could have placed a compliant, and probably far more reliable, military leader at the helm of power in Turkey.  Now that the coup failed and now that Erdogan appears to be furious at the USA, the USA is the big loser in this outcome.  But had the coup succeeded?

Keep in mind that the war in 08.08.08 and the case of the US “multiple personality disorder” over Syria have shown that there is no unified US foreign policy.  There is a White House foreign policy, there is a CIA foreign policy, then there is a Foggy Bottom foreign policy and a Pentagon foreign policy.  We even know that there is a separate Neocon foreign policy.  Any one of them coup have pushed the coup plotters to take action just like the Neocons pushed Saakashvili to attacked South Ossetia.

Now that the coup has failed, however, the situation has the potential to strongly turned in Russia’s favor and even though the Russians will never trust Erdogan, they are also fully aware of the objective advantages Russian can reap from the current situation.  The ultimate success would be to trigger a withdrawal of Turkey from NATO, but I personally doubt that this is possible.  A more realistic goal could be to accept that Turkey will nominally remain in NATO, but that at least in Syria Erdogan will accept the Russian-created reality on the ground.  The fact that Lavrov and Kerry have agreed to a joint long-term ceasefire whose exact terms are to remain secret indicates to me that the Russians forced the US into concessions which the latter don’t want to be made public (and not the other way around because Moscow holds all the cards now and Kerry has therefore no means to put pressure on Russia).  In other words, now that even the USA has basically caved in, at least temporarily, the Turks have no reasons left to try to impose anything on Syria.

The current situation holds a tremendous potential for developments favorable to Russia.  I hope that the Russians will apply some creative thinking and make maximal use of this new situation to create a fait accompli on the ground in Syria.  The best option for Russia would be to have a reliable and predictable partner in Turkey.  Alas, this is not going to happen.  The next best option is to have a weak Turkey wasting most of its resources and energy dealing with internal crises.  This seems to be what will happen in the foreseeable future.  By any measure, this is a good thing for Russia, Syria and, really, the entire region.

The Saker