Syria - Another Turkish Invasion Is Imminent
After two years of relative quietness the situation in Syria is again escalating.
This follows a terror attack in Istanbul two weeks ago allegedly committed by a woman who had traveled there from the Kurdish controlled city of Kobani in northeast Syria. Turkey accused the U.S., which is occupying northeast Syria, of complicity in the attack.
A week after the Istanbul incident Turkey started to bomb Kurdish positions in east Syria. It has now threatened to (again) invade it.
bigger
I have not written about the conflict for quite a while and there are many new readers. So here is a list of names and abbreviations relevant to the story:
- PKK - Kurdistan Workers Party - fighting, often with terrorist methods, for a larger Kurdistan country to be formed from Kurdish areas in Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey
- YPG - People's Defense Units - Kurdish-Syrian part of the PKK, currently silently allied with the U.S. occupation force in eastern Syria
- YPJ - Female units of the YPG
- SDF - Syrian Democratic Forces - 'former' YPG currently openly allied with the U.S. occupation force in eastern Syria
- Mazlum - 'former' YPG head, current SDF head in Syria collaborating with the U.S.
- Rojava - self-administrating area in northeast Syria under SDF / U.S. control
- Barzani - head of government in the Kurdish ruled province in north Iraq - hostile to PKK/YPG, friend with U.S.
- SAA - Syrian Arab Army - Syria's regular military
- HTS - Hayat Tahir al-Sham - Al-Qaeda derivative, Turkish proxy which rules parts of northwest Syria
Stealing from the Turkish commentator Agitpapa here is, slightly edited, the latest news from the area.
agitpapa @agitpapa - 9:09 UTC · 26 Nov 2022It's the PKK's anniversary tomorrow and there are rumors that Turkey wants to kick off its land war against the Kurds in Rojava on that date.
Three days of Turkish airstrikes allegedly greenlit by Russia and the US - although the Turks claim they were all from inside Turkish airspace - have devastated the civilian and military infrastructure of Rojava. Power generation was knocked out, leaving 65K villages in the dark. Oil wells, the LNG bottling plant, and grain silos were destroyed and top SDF bases in Hasaka were bombed, including Mazlum's HQ.
The US only registered a weak protest against its main occupation base being bombed by a NATO member. Airstrikes also hit SAA and Russian positions in Tal Tamer, killing SAA soldiers. SDF sources claim the Russians evacuated shortly before the airstrike.
The Turks bombed over 40 targets in both US- and Russian-controlled areas, in N Syria as well as Jazeera, tracing a wide map of the many-sided blackmail and treachery that seems to be culminating now with the total cleansing of the Kurdish population:
The Ukraine blackmail of the Turks vs Russia, extracting Russian acquiescence in exchange for their economic/political support for Russia against the West, the treachery of the SDF, allying itself with the imperialist global hegemon against the Syrian people and Russia, and the treachery of the US, stabbing its colonial Kurdish army in the back yet again.
The pro-PKK former SDF spox Mustafa Bali made it very clear how he sees the betrayal of his people. He's from the PKK and knows that NATO has never meant anything but death for his people.
Source - bigger
Yes, the Yanks briefly helped the Kurds defeat ISIS, which they themselves created, but it turned out that it was only to turn the YPG/YPJ into their colonial army.
For Syrian Kurds, the great enemy is still Assad and his ally Russia but the PKK knows better.
As the PKK resists the Turkish invasion in the Iraqi Zap river area, Barzani stabs it in the back while NATO and the EU heap praises on Barzani and try to pressure the SDF into submitting to him. Even Mazlum couldn't betray the PKK that much but still remains in the service of the Yanks.
Today the Russians gave the YPG one last chance:
Balanche @FabriceBalanche - 10:43 UTC · 26 Nov 2022At the meeting held in Qamishli, Russia asked the YPG to withdraw all its military presence from the Turkish border to the M4 road (and leave the entire region to the government). Otherwise, Russia warned the #YPG that Turkey's military operation was inevitable. The YPG has rejected it.
If the Westerners don't stop Turkey, it's the end of the Kurdish autonomy in northeastern Syria. But can Europe and the United States oppose to Turkey in the context of the Ukrainian crisis?
In my view the 'westerner's' still need the wannabe Sultan Erdogan and can not a risk a further drift of Turkey towards Russia. If Erdogan wants to invade northeast Syria he can now do so. The Kurdish leaders, in their never ending obstinacy, will again sacrifice their people.
Posted by b on November 26, 2022 at 16:01 UTC | Permalink
next page »thanks b..
it is an interesting game of chess going on with regard to turkey being used accordingly.. my understanding is the idea of a kurdish homeland has always rubbed turkey the wrong way, given the number of kurdish in eastern turkey.. meanwhile the usa-israel has been very supportive of the kurdish idea of a homeland - the divide and conquer strategy usually never fails to reap rewards.. but in this instance, the usa needs turkey with regard to ukraine, so the usa allows for this.. it is quite fascinating.. i am not sure how russia navigates it, but they are a more clear player in all of this as they wish to support syria and assad - up to a point..
how is turkey doing economically at this point? i know the lira was taking a beating the past year.. i see it has sort of stabilized the past 2 months, but is way out of whack from the previous year..
Posted by: james | Nov 26 2022 16:16 utc | 2
Thanks for the posting about another circus ring in our civilization war.
Your reporting leads me to believe that there is much more coordination behind the scenes in our world than the public (us meatsacks) are being shown
Maybe the speculation on one of the past threads about a new Occupied portion of our planet for the special ones is not so crazy.
I agree that Erdogan is walking a very thin line between forces unless he knows that the boundaries are bigger than we are led to understand.
Thanks for your efforts b
Posted by: psychohistorian | Nov 26 2022 16:16 utc | 3
@ Arch Bungle | Nov 26 2022 16:06 utc | 1
that's true arch... it is too bad they can't see how they are being played, or they can and they choose to ignore it anyway..
Posted by: james | Nov 26 2022 16:17 utc | 4
I doubt if too much is going to happen. Erdogan just wants to give the Kurds a bloody nose, in revenge for the Istanbul attack. Simple anger. I doubt if the US would allow Rojava to be destroyed. The Turks might get away with occupying Kobani, not much more. Nothing is going to fundamentally change, unless the US is willing to abandon the Kurds, which it is not at present, as far as I understand it.
Posted by: laguerre | Nov 26 2022 16:17 utc | 5
"The Kurdish leaders, in their never ending obstinacy, will again sacrifice their people." One notes the the Kurds have a very high fertility rate, last I checked it was over double that of Turkey, maybe 4 or 5 kids per woman. Morality aside, the Kurdish leaders can afford to sacrifice their people, because they can be so easily replaced.
It is often said that bigger populations equal greater military power - that is often not true. Compare 1940 low-fertility moderate population United States with the very much larger populations of India and China, yet at the time the latter two countries had relatively negligible military power. A million malnourished peasants wallowing in the mud, or a billion, does not directly equate to power. And yet, within the borders of a country, it can certainly be the case that the group with the higher fertility rate can dominate. Whatever one feels about Erdogan or the Kurds, here's the bottom line: the Turks either wall off the Kurds, or within two generations Turkey will no longer be Turkish.
Posted by: TG | Nov 26 2022 16:21 utc | 6
The prevention of a new Ottoman Empire is always the goal here of the Empire of Chaos. As long as the ME entities are fighting among themselves, mission accomplished.
Posted by: Opport Knocks | Nov 26 2022 16:26 utc | 7
What would happen if the Russian soldiers in Syria get attacked? Would Russia have to divert resources from War in Ukraine to defend them, or would Russia pull the soldiers in Syria out all at once?
Posted by: Inkan1969 | Nov 26 2022 16:28 utc | 8
Posted by: james | Nov 26 2022 16:17 utc | 4
They are being played, or they can and they choose to ignore it anyway..
My understanding is that Kurdish liberation movement (leadership, active followers, popular supporters) operate on the basis of an ideological cult.
Just like all cults the movement relies a lot on ideological brainwashing and the myopia that engenders.
(Interesting note: All the old research I did some decades ago on the cult-like practices of YPG and PKK seem to have been filtered out of google, just as everything critical of the US and it's allies is gradually being scrubbed from the Internet)
Posted by: Arch Bungle | Nov 26 2022 16:33 utc | 9
"For Syrian Kurds, the great enemy is still Assad and his ally Russia but the PKK knows better."
agitpapa is pretty ignorant. The Rojavan Kurds were always ready to make a deal with Asad, but were prevented by the US, which wanted an independent Rojava (at the request of Israel), a policy as poorly thought out as the attempts to split Iraq into little fragments. But as long as the US troops are there ("we're keeping the oil!"), the Rojavan Kurds can't reach a permanent arrangement on their future.
Things could have evolved in the last few years, since the issue went out of the news, but I don't see why. The Rojavans have learnt from the mishaps that happened to their Iraqi cousins. Better theoretical autonomy within a Syrian state (but real practical freedom to do what they want, as the Iraqi Kurds have). It's the way to protect themselves from the Turks. But that's not what the US wants, as long as it stays.
Posted by: laguerre | Nov 26 2022 16:33 utc | 10
It pains me to see such disarray in the Kurdish leadership. I have many Kurdish friends, bright and brave people. Yet like in all third world nations, they get to be led by third-rate leaders.
Posted by: Steve | Nov 26 2022 16:38 utc | 11
but Rojava are the good kind of commies! the sexy kind!
google: CNN + Rojava.
ahhh, the long ago days when i thought it worthwhile to try to explain to an earnest young activist philosophy major why CNN was filling his screen w/images of those hot young gun-toting olive skinned commie babes...in Syria...he knew all about R2P and Samantha Power & the colonists and the Mayflower and veganism and hugged trees and strummed Bruce Cockburn and John Trudeau songs and all that but still:
"god, i hope we intervene, right there!"
Posted by: rjb1.5 | Nov 26 2022 16:39 utc | 12
Figured this would be the best place to ask but what are some books that cover this conflict for the past decade? Anything from the actual Syrian Civil War to Timber Sycamore would be appreciated.
Posted by: InquisitiveReader | Nov 26 2022 16:43 utc | 13
(Interesting note: All the old research I did some decades ago on the cult-like practices of YPG and PKK seem to have been filtered out of google, just as everything critical of the US and it's allies is gradually being scrubbed from the Internet)
Posted by: Arch Bungle | Nov 26 2022 16:33 utc | 9
Shade of Jim Jones !!!! Had no clue about this aspect of these people.
"Recent reports by Anadolu Agency described first-hand accounts by former PKK fighters of an organisation rife with rampant sexual abuse, harassment, not to mention the sexual abuse of minors, with little to no accountability."
https://www.trtworld.com/magazine/the-dark-ideology-behind-the-pkk-and-ypg-23184
Posted by: Tom_12 | Nov 26 2022 16:50 utc | 14
Posted by: james | Nov 26 2022 16:16 utc | 2
Turkish Economy!
The currency has stabilied over the past six months (relative to the Canadian dollar)
However, inflation is another story. For instance, the cheese I bought today was priced 50% higher than last week, and 200% higher over last year at this time. We would love the inflation difficulties of Europe and N. America.
Posted by: Blue Dotterel | Nov 26 2022 16:53 utc | 15
Posted by: Tom_12 | Nov 26 2022 16:50 utc | 14
"Recent reports by Anadolu Agency ... ">https://www.trtworld.com/magazine/the-dark-ideology-behind-the-pkk-and-ypg-23184"
There used to be easily accessible "Western" studies on this aspect, or at least studies from ostensibly neutral third cultures with no skin in the game. Of course Anadolu is a Turkish outfit ...
There used to be hard copy material in the hey days of printed magazine media - now that's all gone.
Posted by: Arch Bungle | Nov 26 2022 16:58 utc | 16
@Arch Bungle #1
I hear you! Feel very much the same. It's almost comical how the Kurds e.g. rushed to willingly help the Young Turks in killing the Armenians only to land on the very same kill list themselves decades later. Well, "Karma is a bitch" as they say.
Posted by: Arminius | Nov 26 2022 17:01 utc | 17
Interesting times.
It is a given. Both the Ottomans and the Attaturk faction have abused the Kurdish minority for 100's of years on religious/ethnic grounds. The so-called terrorist(?) attack is all too convenient one could say. Or, a conspiracy theorist's delight? A quick background history/ethnic origins of the actual list of victims? Could point the bone at the true perpetrators?
On the home front! The country is undergoing a very massive Hyper-stagflation "Weimar Republic Style". Turkiye is an energy-poor local resource economy. The current rate is greater than 75% pa.
Since both the Syrian and Iraqi Kurds are virtually sitting on the underdeveloped northern oil fields. A virtual gold mine for a country whose population was a mere 20 million in 1960 and has grown to exceed 85 million sixty years later. Approximately 14 million Kurds actually live in modern Turkiye. The total estimated regional Kurdish population is estimated to be 25 million. With well-documented murders and assaults registered daily by pro-Turkish government forces after 1922. On the various minorities residing in Turkiye!
One should really be asking "Who Benefits?". From stealing former Ottoman colonial empire countries' energy resources. Whilst venting grudges and past racist ethnic religious grievances! Many of these are actually enshrined in the Turkish Attaturk constitution and include strict unwritten laws!
Posted by: Bad Deal Motors On | Nov 26 2022 17:05 utc | 18
Interesting times.
It is a given. Both the Ottomans and the Attaturk faction have abused the Kurdish minority for 100's of years on religious/ethnic grounds. The so-called terrorist(?) attack is all too convenient one could say. Or, a conspiracy theorist's delight? A quick background history/ethnic origins of the actual list of victims? Could point the bone at the true perpetrators?
On the home front! The country is undergoing a very massive Hyper-stagflation "Weimar Republic Style". Turkiye is an energy-poor local resource economy. The current rate is greater than 75% pa.
Since both the Syrian and Iraqi Kurds are virtually sitting on the underdeveloped northern oil fields. A virtual gold mine for a country whose population was a mere 20 million in 1960 and has grown to exceed 85 million sixty years later. Approximately 14 million Kurds actually live in modern Turkiye. The total estimated regional Kurdish population is estimated to be 25 million. With well-documented murders and assaults registered daily by pro-Turkish government forces after 1922. On the various minorities residing in Turkiye!
One should really be asking "Who Benefits?". From stealing former Ottoman colonial empire countries' energy resources. Whilst venting grudges and past racist ethnic religious grievances! Many of these are actually enshrined in the Turkish Attaturk constitution and include strict unwritten laws!
Posted by: Bad Deal Motors On | Nov 26 2022 17:05 utc | 19
Posted by: Arch Bungle | Nov 26 2022 16:58 utc | 16
The women are pretty !!!!
Posted by: Tom_12 | Nov 26 2022 17:06 utc | 20
@ Arch Bungle | Nov 26 2022 16:33 utc | 9
the internet scrubbing is an interesting phenom... hopefully more people are hip to it..
@ laguerre - thanks for your posts on this topic... always informative..
@ rjb1.5 | Nov 26 2022 16:39 utc | 12 - lol!
@ Blue Dotterel | Nov 26 2022 16:53 utc | 15
thanks... sounds scary if you like cheese - which i do! is that turkish cheese, or european cheese? or just all cheese? they are still charging higher us$ rates for turkish cymbals here in north america! someone is making a lot of money in all this..
Posted by: james | Nov 26 2022 17:07 utc | 21
reply to 1
I recall Poland and Belarus being bothered by Kurd refugees running away from their homes. Apparently, they didn't like whatever passes for governance there.
Syria is a weird patchwork. I wonder if the US would like a way out.
Posted by: Eighthman | Nov 26 2022 17:09 utc | 22
For books on the syria conflict I can recommend Stephen gowans' book, though he seems to have kind of disowned it in recent years and is slipping from an anti imperialist to almost a leftcom "everyone is bad" position, which is sad.
Posted by: britone | Nov 26 2022 17:12 utc | 23
The Kurds are tragically misused by the Washington War Party. Shame that they don’t realize it. The War Party‘s Grand Strategy is to forment division and civil war everywhere.
Hati
Philippines
Italy
Vietnam
Chilé
Somalia
Yugoslavia
Iraq
Venezuela
Libya
Afghanistan
Georgia
Yemen
Ukraine
Etc. etc.
Hmmm….think there is a pattern here ?
Posted by: Exile | Nov 26 2022 17:15 utc | 24
Iran issues 10-day ultimatum to Iraqi Kurdistan, threatening large-scale military operation
Iran sends more troops to Kurdish region as new protest flares
It sounds like more Chaos brought to you by the sponsors of chaos.
“In reality, the demonstrations in Iran have many reasons and bring together Christians, Shias, Sunnis, Kurds” in a fight for freedom.
“Of course, we are used to war,” Father Samir noted. “I was born in 1975 and lived through the Iran-Iraq War, the Gulf invasion, the US invasion, and the Islamic State.
“We had become accustomed to Turkish attacks, but this escalation with Iran is harder to accept, psychologically, because it brings up to the surface the suffering of the past.”
Iran and Turkey united against the Kurds, says Fr Samir from Iraqi Kurdistan
Posted by: circumspect | Nov 26 2022 17:16 utc | 25
james @ 20
It is not just scrubbing. Websites disappear. I have a bunch of links to articles that now go nowhere. The internet archived crawled the sites but interestingly enough those articles are missing. I kick myself for not cutting stuff over to an alternate spot.
Posted by: circumspect | Nov 26 2022 17:24 utc | 26
A business needs a local partner to access foreign markets. And what is the local partner in one country may well be the competition in another.
In a similar way, our empire needs a local partner to topple foreign governments. And what is the local partner in one country may well be the enemy in another.
Posted by: Passerby | Nov 26 2022 17:27 utc | 27
I am sympathetic to the PKK Rojava Kurds, why should they be forced to submit to the corrupt Baath Arab government? To stay loyal to the birders the colonial powers drew up at the end of world war I. Also Barzani is scum, the less people and resources under his rule the better.
Syria and the Baath or the Jihadist are not found to take back the Golan heights ever. To make it seem like Kurdish independence benefits Israel is disengenous. What benefits Israel is the gulf ruling families including the Hashemites in Jordan and the division of the Arab people into separate states. And the United States.
Posted by: Ramon in Mx | Nov 26 2022 17:28 utc | 28
It's amazing to see how a leader of a country caught between the US and Russia and suffering from the world's highest inflation of over 80% (https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/turkeys-inflation-touches-new-24-year-high-802-2022-09-05/) can still make both Biden and Putin kiss his a$$... not to speak of the Europeans...
Germans, French, Italians... and Brits, do pay attention. This is how the game is played. Your current leadership would struggle to keep even its 2 cent candy if Erdogan was within reach of their playground... forget about your lunch.
Posted by: Et Tu | Nov 26 2022 17:39 utc | 29
I have many Turkish friends, and many Turkish small arms, here's what I've learned about the Turks, don't fuck with them.
Posted by: Zanons_Mom | Nov 26 2022 17:43 utc | 30
@ circumspect | Nov 26 2022 17:24 utc | 25
i am sorry to hear that.. i know websites do go away from time to time.. i have one to maintain and i often think of letting it go..
Posted by: james | Nov 26 2022 17:47 utc | 31
@ Ramon in Mx | Nov 26 2022 17:28 utc | 27
i am as well, but picking usa-israel as friends is a mistake...
Posted by: james | Nov 26 2022 17:49 utc | 32
@ circumspect | Nov 26 2022 17:24 utc | 25 who may not know about archive.com
I suggest you go there and see what you can find of what is "missing".....not to say the intertubes aren't being manipulated
Best to you
Posted by: psychohistorian | Nov 26 2022 17:51 utc | 33
Erdogan called Russia, on Turkiye's initiate,on 24th November. The anniversary of the day Turkiye shot the Russian fighter jet out of the sky.
It was returning from a bombing run on isil oil tankers smuggling oil to Turkiye.
Allegedly run by a close relative of Ergodan.
Turkiye sees great advantage in working with Russia.
Grain hub, gas hub. Turkish Black sea
gas being developed. Expanded pipeline to be Southern Europe. Transit fees.
Russian tourists.
Russian nuclear power plant.
Russia is locked out of swift, bank foreign reserves. Turkiye could be next. Russia is locking in new bilateral trade mechanisms of and payment systems.
Russia is recreating the Arab India Iran China Coastal South East Asia trade flow.
Opening Central Asia trade with aid of China's money.
Turkiye will balance west and Russia.
Syria, sadly, has no in power until it and Iran cram it full of drones and missiles.
Then, everything changes - except for the natural devastion of drought and water poverty in the levant, an overpopulated region.
Posted by: Powerandpeople | Nov 26 2022 17:51 utc | 34
Anarchists allied with American Caesar? You ain't no anarchists bruv.
Posted by: Squeeth | Nov 26 2022 17:57 utc | 35
Tom_12 @ 16
That would be one of the famous anarcho-feminist Amazon disciples of Murray Bookchin. That old Murray is even part of the story tells you how every particle of this farce is manipulated and massaged.
She looks good because she is a photo model and the shot was staged.
Posted by: oldhippie | Nov 26 2022 17:58 utc | 36
psychohistorian @ 32
I did. The site was crawled, the site is in the archive, the content is missing. I have the dates the material was posted. Nothing.
Posted by: circumspect | Nov 26 2022 18:02 utc | 37
There used to be hard copy material in the hey days of printed magazine media - now that's all gone. Posted by: Arch Bungle | Nov 26 2022 16:58 utc | 16
archive.org = better than nothing. You still have to know where to look.
Posted by: Opport Knocks | Nov 26 2022 18:03 utc | 38
oldhippie @ 35
She had time to put here makeup on in between firing volleys at the enemy.
Posted by: circumspect | Nov 26 2022 18:07 utc | 39
Arch Bungle @ 16
Some of that old printed material is in the archive as well. Of course, there is so much it cannot all be there but I have found some interesting items here and there.
Posted by: circumspect | Nov 26 2022 18:08 utc | 40
What I think was missing from this piece is that right after the terrorist (does that word still carry any meaning nowadays?) attacks occurred, the Turkish Minister for Interior affairs accused the US of being complicit.
https://t.me/azmilitary11/28398
Turkish Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu about the terrorist attack in Istanbul: "We know how this event was coordinated. We know where this is coordinated from. We know the message given to us.We do not accept the condolences of the American ambassador,we reject them"
Also, Turkey bombed the Al Omar fields a couple of days ago. The Al Omar field the US empire uses to fund both it's expeditionary army as well as it's colonial proxy army over there, the YPG. Stolen oil in fact belonging to the Syrian authorities.
https://t.me/azmilitary11/29367?single
A huge fire in the Al-Omar oilfield in Syria (north of Deir ez-Zor) after the attacks of the Turkish army. Turkey is actually directly destroying the oil infrastructure of the "Kurdish autonomy", which was exploited by the United States exporting oil through border crossings to the border with Iraq in Iraqi Kurdistan. In fact, Turkey is striking not only at the Kurds, but also at American interests in Syria related to the robbery of Syrian oil.SDF General Mazloum Abdi say they have suspended all anti-ISIS operations due to ongoing Turkish aggression against northeast Syria...US led Coalition said they are conducting Drills using Artillery rounds...Few hours later 🇹🇷✈️💥🇺🇸 "Airstrikes in Syria have jeopardized the safety of U.S. personnel"-Pentagon
Posted by: xor | Nov 26 2022 18:16 utc | 41
" The US only registered a weak protest against its main occupation base being bombed by a NATO member. Airstrikes also hit SAA and Russian positions in Tal Tamer, killing SAA soldiers. SDF sources claim the Russians evacuated shortly before the airstrike. "
Doesnt this quote imply that Turkey suspects Russia of protecting some elements of those responsible for the bombing in Turkey ? Also, it seems Russia evacuated its personnel but failed to inform its Syrian allies of the impending attack. Not cool Russia.
Posted by: Deplorable Commissar | Nov 26 2022 18:20 utc | 42
Ah the Turks, being nicely setup for a big war, strangely again with Russia and US setting the stage.
The Russians are trying to get the sdf to yield to the Syrian Arab army, but they're refusing and begging their us/Israeli sponsors to do something.
About time for the saa and itan with Russia assistance to attack us bases.
Posted by: Neofeudalfuture | Nov 26 2022 18:21 utc | 43
" Better theoretical autonomy within a Syrian state (but real practical freedom to do what they want, as the Iraqi Kurds have). It's the way to protect themselves from the Turks. But that's not what the US wants, as long as it stays. "
I disagree. The Kurds in Syria are refugees who were allowed in by the good graces of the Syrian people. For them to demand any kind of autonomy on Syrian lands is absurd. They either become fully " Syrian " or they can get the hell out.
Posted by: Deplorable Commissar | Nov 26 2022 18:23 utc | 44
(Can't modify my existing post so here an addendum)
Also Turkey gave a stern warning some days ago to it's NATO partner the US:
https://t.me/azmilitary11/29266
🇹🇷Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar:"The S-400 air defense system is on duty and ready for use. If there is a threat,we will use it."
The YPG has no air force the S-400 would be used against and those make shift drones are not targeted by S-400.
Posted by: xor | Nov 26 2022 18:24 utc | 45
All this while it looks like an Erdogan-Assad meeting is in the making. Turkey has also opened up its airspace for Syrian airplanes, if turkey invades the Americans looters will just flee over to Iraq like they did the last time and Syria can retake its oilfields and farmlands to the east (and finish off the isis enclave US is keeping there).
And the Turds? These backstabbing nomads will lose everything they gambled for and then some
Posted by: Mikhas | Nov 26 2022 18:25 utc | 46
Israel, ISIS And U.S. Efforts To Destabilize Iran
https://www.voltairenet.org/article197439.html
Posted by: MG | Nov 26 2022 18:40 utc | 47
Syria like Palestine remains a problem that must be solved. IMO, the Kurds are much like the Zionists, a people who've always been a minority living within a much larger majority and loathing that fact, but until they allied themselves with Big Plunderers had no chance of becoming independent within "their" lands. The situation within Iran offers an excellent example of how the Kurds have been used by Brits and Yanks for the last 100 years--yes, it's been ongoing that long. The Machiavellian tool used by the Anglos for the past 200+ years is to exploit ethnic/tribal/religious/ and any other differences between peoples so they can be controlled and their resources plundered. The Turks abetted the Plunderers because they too were plunderers until their empire was defeated and partitioned. They abetted by using the same Machiavellian means to divide and rule. The Armenians were lucky to be able to consolidate a resource poor territory for themselves and protect themselves by allying with Russia/USSR; otherwise, we'd have another ethnic group involved in this regional battle.
Back to Iran. It's long been a heterogeneous nation mostly at peace with itself over the centuries. That trait is shared today with Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Turkey. (Indeed, most nations consist of a mixture of peoples, homogeneousness being rare.) The Outlaw US Empire took over the use of the Kurds to undermine Iran from the Brits, who also used them against the Ottomans. The Yanks also used the Kurds against Saddam and Iraq--Iraqis don't want to cede territory to Kurds for their own nation but are willing to allow some autonomy, which is close to Syria's longtime policy. If left to their own devices and not interfered with by Imperialist, plundering nations, IMO these peoples would have solved their issues long ago. But it ought to be very clear plundering nations have never wanted to allow that to occur since that would end or at least greatly curtail their ability to plunder. Yes, one could say the hydrocarbon resources sitting under their ground are a curse; but, they are only a curse because of the nature of Plundering Nations who are clearly the bane of humanity.
How to solve this particular regional crisis? Removal of all influence by plundering nations is the #1 priority--Turks, Yanks, Brits, French, Zionists. A tall order to be sure, but the problem will never be solved until they're completely out of the picture. Having lost their plundering backers, the Kurds would be faced with the need to negotiate with those nations they reside within. The Astana Process was an attempt to start something like that but includes the Turks, which IMO is a mistake. (Erdogan might not like the fact that the Turks are a Plundering nation, but their history proves that fact as does his own behavior.)
Reality suggests that if Iran and Turkey can force the removal of the Outlaw US Empire and their Brit allies from the mix that it might then be possible for Russia to remove the Turks while also removing the Idlib infestation. And those moves would be done in concert with the establishment of a Persian Gulf Security Pact that further forces the removal of NATO from the region. Yes, all this is a big combined issue that also involves the fate of Palestine, which is one reason why it's so intractable since the Zionists provide a model and justification for the Kurds. Ukraine by comparison is simpler.
they get to be led by third-rate leaders.
Perhaps, but they are very rich and have extensive foreign assets ...........available for hire if the price is right
Posted by: Paul Greenwood | Nov 26 2022 18:48 utc | 49
james | Nov 26 2022 17:07 utc | 20
CNN got his zeal fired up w/those Playboy-centerfold ready desert bunnies of Rojava, but he took these modern Amazons as more of a sign of imminent communist revolution or what have you, not a call to join the USM. i don't think most of the CNN audience looked at it that way. (mostly, for us, the targets in a rich environment, it's just pleasant to have sentiments about things happening elsewhere and to look at the bright lights.)
the system has made a fine art of crudely manipulating the rebellious instincts of healthy youth, when such instincts occasionally get off their meds, that is. Assad is bad, so being against Assad is good. no matter where the weapons and funding come from.
i can't imagine why young people "struggle" "to interpret" "their" "feelings". or why running off to a foreign land to fight for a cause has some inherent appeal. when you are living in a hell hole, as Spinal Tap said.
Posted by: rjb1.5 | Nov 26 2022 18:56 utc | 50
Bloody hell. Even with the table of belligerents it’s a bit hard to follow - but a lot better than anything from the mass media. Thanks b.
I guess I was right about the meeting of the top spies in Turkey - it was to ‘green light’ this op.
I guessed also that this is the end of the US presence- surrender in the ME.
Matters appear to being settled now the mess of various headchoppers needs clearing - another migrant crises on its way to Europe!
Next step the Yankees must evacuate their occupation forces in Europe after 75 years finally.
Sanctions must be raised from all that the dumb unipilarists used as WMD.
Will it all be over by Xmas?
Fingers crossed. Us civilians are being battered all through the continent, we have had enough. And we are also going to get the crisis of the economic fallout in the West.
Looking forward to Putin offering us the cheap gas and see if the propaganda has stuck. I’m personally will be queuing to buy it as is my right in a free market 😂
Posted by: DunGroanin | Nov 26 2022 19:04 utc | 51
Below are quotes from a ZH piece titled
US-Backed Kurds Say White House Has "Moral Duty" To Shut Down Erdogan Offensive
Quotes
The commander of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), Gen. Mazloum Kobane Abdi, has said Ankara is using it as a pretext to launch an offensive against the Kurds along the Syrian border, further warning that Turkey is pursing a policy of ethnic cleansing. He explained to Axios on Wednesday that "Turkish warplanes struck a military base that the U.S. military shares with these Kurdish fighters outside Qamishli about 30 miles from Turkey's border."That's why Gen. Abdi is saying the US has a "moral duty" to intervene with Erdogan and in defense of Kurdish allies. He's urging Washington and his Pentagon backers to do more to halt the potential ground invasion and aerial offensive.
Further according to his statements to Axios:
Mazloum says Turkey's strategy has been to announce an operation, conduct some preparations, then test the reactions of the U.S. and Russia.
"I believe once they [Turkey] see there is no strong opposition from the main players they will go ahead," Mazloum says. "We believe the reactions are not enough yet to stop the Turks from launching this operation."
Posted by: psychohistorian | Nov 26 2022 19:05 utc | 52
@ Arch Bungle | Nov 26 2022 16:33 utc | 9
Find in many cases sites & data/articles still extant, merely the algorithms censor the search results. A not so subtle 'filter'. Hence do not 'rely' upon or trust Google search ...
"Turkey is pursing a policy of ethnic cleansing."
psychohistorian | Nov 26 2022 19:05 utc | 51
Gen. Abdi needs to wait until Turkey becomes an official enemy. that's when the West starts to condemn someone else's "ethnic cleansing". otherwise, Abdi is just another voice clamoring for a crust of recognition from the evergrowing pie of worldwide victimhood.
in other words: get in line.
make your issues useful and beneficial to the capitalist state, if you want recognition (money, drugs, advisors, guns, intel, financial reform, gmo crops, USAID, etc. all the things a healthy bouncing "it's alive" baby Baptista regime or Kosovo or Haiti needs, for a 'head start' in life. they'll even help you make your own internally displaced peoples, so you too can be just like Israel.)
Posted by: rjb1.5 | Nov 26 2022 19:35 utc | 54
Edited repost from 14 Nov:
Turkey refused to accept condolences from the U.S. after the terrorist attack on Istiklal Street in Istanbul, the republic's Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said, RIA Novosti reported.the minister was quoted as saying by CNN Turk."We know where the attack was coordinated. We received the message given to us and we know what the message was. We do not accept the condolences of the American embassy. We are not treacherous to anyone, but we no longer have tolerance for these treacherous acts. Istiklal Street is our child. If we had not caught the attacker, he would have fled to Greece today,"
The key portions of the above was within 30min(14Nov) excised/censored when I access youtube & use CC with auto-translate ...
Some key relevant quotes re Turkey-US relations post attempted 2016 coup(short clips). Note the actual host site 'Nordic Monitor'(skip it's disinfo) is clearly a covert NGO source reference site in support of influence ops against Turkey, all the same ...
Recommend viewing each of these embedded short clips from below linked article, even more remarkable than the earlier Turk CNN, longest is only 90s. Fascinating:
Footage from TV interview during which Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu accused the US of being behind terrorism around the world and the 2016 failed coup in TurkeyOn September 3, 2022 Soylu said Turkey does not need the US or Europe and wants to eliminate the US from Turkey’s neighborhood
On September 20, 2022 in Bosnia, the Turkish interior minister accused the US of being behind al-Qaeda and ISIS terrorism
Posted by: james | Nov 26 2022 17:07 utc | 20
Beyaz peynir (white cheese) is a common cheese eaten with breakfast or with raki and mezzes.In its harder form, it is similar to feta cheese, but it can be softer than feta ,as well.
Posted by: karlof1 | Nov 26 2022 18:44 utc | 47
There is a presidential election in June 2023. Erdoğan's potential reconcilliation with Assad may be partly to check the opposition party's calls to make peace with Syria and return the Syrian refuggees.
The occupation of Idlib and NE Syria is being presented as temporary these days, until the terrorist threat ends. No doubt Erdoğan would like to extricate himself from this situation as the Turkish people are not enamoured with these refuggees while going through a multi-year economic crisis which they tend to attribute to the Syrian invasion.
Strange that you seem to have missed that the Armenians have been and are "another ethnic group involved in this regional battle". Perhaps, it depends on what you call "regional". Pashinyan is a little like Erdoğan in that he is "allied" with the US as much as the Russians.
Posted by: Blue Dotterel | Nov 26 2022 19:48 utc | 56
Inquisitive Reader @ 13:
Try reading Tim Anderson's "The Dirty War on Syria: Washington, Regime Change and Resistance", published by Global Research in 2016. It covers recent Syrian history including Bashar al Assad's early attempts at political reform in his first decade as President. There is a chapter on the rise of Wahhabism and the Muslim Brotherhood as tools used by the British and American govts to dominate the Middle East and stifle Arab nationalism and other political movements there. Another chapter covers the role of humanitarian organisations and watch-dogs as willing propaganda tools to demonise the Syrian govt and other govts in the region targeted for overthrow.
All chapters carry numerous references but in paperback format the book is not long.
At the time he wrote the book, Anderson was an academic at the University of Sydney but the University later terminated his employment because of his opinions and support for the Syrian govt.
Posted by: Jen | Nov 26 2022 20:09 utc | 57
" I guessed also that this is the end of the US presence- surrender in the ME.
Next step the Yankees must evacuate their occupation forces in Europe after 75 years finally.
Posted by: DunGroanin | Nov 26 2022 19:04 utc | 50 "
If this is true it also means the end of Israel, making the events in the Ukraine even more suspect. Putin says he considers many Israelis as Russian, is he willing to take them back into the fold or give them space in a freshly de-populated land ?
Posted by: Deplorable Commissar | Nov 26 2022 20:11 utc | 58
I would like to know more about the oil wells and gas in SDF areas.
Who is producing and with what means? LNG bottling doesn't sound like your average cottage industry. Who has invested and who is operating? And how is all this fuel transported and where is it exported to? I very much doubt the home market can justify an LNG bottling plant, so who's buying?
I always figured the stolen Syrian oil ended up in Ceyhan, Turkey. What isn't clear is the transport route.
Given the hostility between Turkey and YPG, and the alleged joint government / SDF bases along the way, it seems unlikely that fuel is shipped out through Turkish held norther Syria.
Shipping via Iraq seems possible. This brings another question about a key crossing. I'll assume that the US is guarding the Syrian side of Fish Kabur, but who sits on the other side? This has never been clear. Is it Iraq government forces or is this area contiguous with Iraqi Kurdistan? Or have the Turks seized this area? If that were so, then the US supply route for occupied SDF areas would pass through this Turkish held zone.
Posted by: robin | Nov 26 2022 20:14 utc | 59
Brief recap re a few immediate past incidents/actions, - concurrent - relevant, re US/Israeli Kurd proxies
Dated Nov2322
Intel Slava Z🇮🇷🇮🇶⚡The Iranian ambassador in Baghdad said he gave the government of Iraqi Kurdistan 10 days to disarm all paramilitaries that Tehran considers terrorist, under the threat of a large-scale operation.
Today, the command of the IRGC announced that air strikes on objects of the Kurdish forces will continue.
IRGC Ground Force cmdr. urges civilians to stay away from terror bases in Iraqi Kurdistan
Also covers report Re Iranian ambassador to Iraq.
... Earlier, Iranian Ambassador to Baghdad Mohammad Kazem Alesadeq said the Islamic Republic had told officials from Iraq’s central government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) that it was serious about its national security after a number of sensitive Iranian military centers had been targeted from the Kurdistan soil.“Some of our vital military centers have been attacked from the Iraqi Kurdistan region’s soil and we have informed the Iraqi side, both the authorities of the Iraqi Kurdistan region and the central government in Iraq, of this issue. We [provided them] with maps and documents, and they understood this reality,” Alesadeq said in an exclusive interview with Iran’s Arabic-language television news network al-Alam TV." ...
IRGC: Iranian military advisor assassinated in bombing tied to Israel in Syria
A senior member of Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Aerospace Division has lost his life in a terrorist bombing using an explosive device near the Syrian capital city of Damascus.The IRGC said in a statement that Colonel Davoud Ja’fari, who served as a military advisor in the war-ravaged Arab country, was killed on Tuesday when a bomb planted by Israeli agents on the side of a road near Damascus went off.
Nov2622 - PressTV.ir
US Syria bases under attackThe US military says one of its bases in northeast Syria has come under a rocket attack, the third such attack in nine days. Two rockets reportedly targeted a patrol base in Al-Shaddadi late Friday. We(US) don't know who fired the rockets, but we know they caused no injuries or damage to the base.
Hundreds of American troops are still in Syria as part of what the US calls the fight against remnants of the Daesh terrorist group. American troops in the region support Kurdish militants.
Over a week ago, rockets targeted America’s green village base, which is in Syria’s largest oil field, al-Omar.
According to the US military, a Turkish drone strike this week killed two Kurdish militants and posed a risk to US troops in northeast Syria.
Attacks on US military bases in the region, mainly in Iraq, have increased over the past several years as anti-American sentiments run high.
There is a clear level of co-ordination/co-operation between Turkey:, RF/SAA & Iran re Kurdish regions including partial opening of restricted/controlled airspace for Turkish AF strikes & ground incursions. Hm ...
US/Israeli covert/overt elements ? Not.
Posted by: Outraged | Nov 26 2022 20:15 utc | 59
Yeah, I think they are in cahoots. Seems like a good time too. Time to clean Syria up perhaps, while everybody is busy elsewhere.
Posted by: Bemildred | Nov 26 2022 20:21 utc | 61
Posted by: Bemildred | Nov 26 2022 20:21 utc | 60
Yeah, I think they are in cahoots. Seems like a good time too. Time to clean Syria up perhaps, while everybody is busy elsewhere.
Couldn't it be seen the other way?
Maybe Turkey figured it could close the Kobane gap and occupy the full stretch while Russia has its hands full in Ukraine.
I don't see why the US would object much. From its perspective, what matters most is keeping Syria down and broken. That job can be outsourced to Turkey.
Posted by: robin | Nov 26 2022 20:30 utc | 62
Karlof1 @ 47:
I have to say that Iran has not always been at peace with itself over the past several centuries. Shi'a Islam was originally imposed on Iran by its Safavid rulers (1500s - 1730s, I think) to distinguish their empire from the Sunni Ottomans. My understanding is that this imposition was severe. Both empires fought over the Mesopotamian region in an odd re-enactment of the centuries-long wars over the same area fought by Greeks/Romans/Byzantines on one side and by Achaemenids/Parthians/Sassanids on the other. The current Iraq-Iran border more or less represents the ceasefire the Ottomans and Safavids eventually agreed to some time in the early 1500s. The peace of Mesopotamia (current Iraq) from then on more or less relied on those two empires and their successors keeping to the Ottoman-Safavid agreement.
The Armenians (and Georgians as well) came to rely on Russia as a protector some time in the mid-1700s, probably about the time Russia took control of Crimea; before then, they had allied more or less with Iran.
Posted by: Jen | Nov 26 2022 20:33 utc | 63
Why didn't the Russians warn the Syrians?
Economies of scale. A rat is cheap to buy when they're living on $100 a month. Double agents. Infiltration. Lack of trust.
If you see the Russians pulling out, it's time to pull out.
Posted by: Chaka Khagan | Nov 26 2022 20:42 utc | 64
@ karlof1 | Nov 26 2022 18:44 utc | 47
excellent commentary, especially with @ Blue Dotterel | Nov 26 2022 19:48 utc | 55 additional commentary.. thank you both...i have had that cheese before when in turkey as memory serves.. thanks...
@ rjb1.5 | Nov 26 2022 18:56 utc | 49
it is always interesting how the western msm manipulates the circumstances to spin a particular narrative... i am so out of touch with it since working to avoid this river of disinfo... i have come to associate so much of the popular msm in its various forms - tv, newspaper and online - as a complete distraction not worthy of any attention, or only in so far as i'd like to understand how an ordinary person on the st. might see it.. even then, i give people more credit and like to think they are bright enough to not fall for crap - only to be regularly disappointed!
Posted by: james | Nov 26 2022 20:42 utc | 65
Further to my comment @ 62, after the Safavid empire ended in Iran in the early 1700s, the country was ruled by a series of short-lived "dynasties", for want of a better term (the dynasties didn't last beyond one or two generations), and steadily became weaker politically, economically and militarily. Much of that weakness was likely due to British disruption of trade among the Islamic empires (Ottoman, Persian, Indian Moghul) and British monopolisatiob of Indian trade under the English/British East India Company. If Iran appears "peaceful" over the last few centuries, this peace was not necessarily of its own choosing.
Posted by: Jen | Nov 26 2022 20:44 utc | 66
Nothing is going to fundamentally change, unless the US is willing to abandon the Kurds, which it is not at present, as far as I understand it.
Posted by: laguerre | Nov 26 2022 16:17 utc | 5
The US has already stabbed the Kurds in the back many times since the end of WWII. The following is a cut and paste and edit from a 2019 INTERCEPT article attacking President Donald Trump for betraying the Kurds in Syria. Now they can, and should, review that article to include President Joe Biden's betrayal. But the point here is about the long history between the Kurds as a people and the United States.
1). The 1920 Treaty of Sèvres completely dismembered the Ottoman Empire, including most of what’s now Turkey, and allocated a section for a possible Kurdistan. But the Turks fought back, making enough trouble that the U.S. supported a new treaty in 1923, the Treaty of Lausanne. The Treaty of Lausanne allowed the British and French to carve off present-day Iraq and Syria, respectively, for themselves. But it made no provision for the Kurds.
2). After World War II, the U.S. gradually assumed the British role as main colonial power in the Mideast. We armed Iraqi Kurds during the rule of Abdel Karim Kassem, who governed Iraq from 1958 to 1963, because Kassem was failing to follow orders.
We then supported a 1963 military coup — which included a small supporting role by a young Saddam Hussein — that removed Kassem from power. We immediately cut off our aid to the Kurds and, in fact, provided the new Iraqi government with napalm to use against them.
3). By the 1970s, the Iraqi government had drifted into the orbit of the Soviet Union. The Nixon administration, led by Henry Kissinger, hatched a plan with Iran (then our ally, ruled by the Shah) to arm Iraqi Kurds.
The plan wasn’t for the Kurds in Iraq to win, since that might encourage the Kurds in Iran to rise up themselves. It was just to bleed the Iraqi government. But as a congressional report later put it, “This policy was not imparted to our clients, who were encouraged to continue fighting. Even in the context of covert action ours was a cynical enterprise.”
Then the U.S. signed off on agreements between the Shah and Saddam that included severing aid to the Kurds. The Iraqi military moved north and slaughtered thousands, as the U.S. ignored heart-rending pleas from our erstwhile Kurdish allies. When questioned, a blasé Kissinger explained that “covert action should not be confused with missionary work.”
4). During the 1980s, the Iraqi government moved on to actual genocide against the Kurds, including the use of chemical weapons. The Reagan administration was well aware of Saddam’s use of nerve gas, but because they liked the damage Saddam was doing to Iran, it opposed congressional efforts to impose sanctions on Iraq. The U.S. media also faithfully played its role. When a Washington Post reporter tried to get the paper to publish a photograph of a Kurd killed by chemical weapons, his editor responded, “Who will care?”
5). As the U.S. bombed Iraq during the Gulf War in 1991, George H.W. Bush famously called on “the Iraqi military and Iraqi people to take matters into their own hands, to force Saddam Hussein, the dictator, to step aside.” Both Iraqi Shias in southern Iraq and Iraqi Kurds in northern Iraq heard this and tried to do exactly that. [But] the U.S. military stood down as Iraq massacred the rebels across the country.
6). During the Clinton administration in the 1990s, the Iraqi Kurds, were considered the good Kurds, because they were persecuted by Iraq, our enemy, they were worthy of U.S. sympathy. But the Kurds a few miles north in Turkey started getting uppity too, and since they were annoying our ally, they were the bad Kurds. The U.S. sent Turkey huge amounts of weaponry, which it used — with U.S. knowledge — to murder tens of thousands of Kurds and destroy thousands of villages.
7). Before the Iraq War in 2003, pundits such as Christopher Hitchens and Bill Chritol said we had to do it [go to war with Iraq] to help the Kurds. Daniel Ellsberg had this exchange with neoconservative William Kristol on C-SPAN just as the war started:
Ellsberg: The Kurds have every reason to believe they will be betrayed again by the United States, as so often in the past. The spectacle of our inviting Turks into this war … could not have been reassuring to the Kurds …
Kristol: I’m against betraying the Kurds. Surely your point isn’t that because we betrayed them in the past, we should betray them this time?
Ellsberg: Not that we should, just that we will.
Kristol: We will not. We will not.
In 2007, the U.S. allowed Turkey to carry out a heavy bombing campaign against Iraqi Kurds inside Iraq. By this point, Kristol’s magazine the Weekly Standard was declaring that this betrayal was exactly what America should be doing.
https://Eight Times the U.S. Has Betrayed the Kurds (theintercept.com)
8). RT. Nov. 22, 2022: US endorses Turkish operation in Syria.
The White House conceded that the process could negatively impact America’s Kurdish partners.
Posted by: Ed Nelson | Nov 26 2022 21:16 utc | 67
The sentence in #66 should read:
The US has already stabbed the Kurds in the back many times since the end of WWI, not WWII.
Posted by: Ed Nelson | Nov 26 2022 21:19 utc | 68
In response to Chaka [email protected],
That statement is speculative. The Russians may well have warned the Syrians, but they don't dictate their response. They have a hard enough time to organize DNR&LNR militias, Wagner & Rosgvardia into a cohesive unit with their regular forces, despite the much deeper effort at integration, and these formations still conduct independent missions with varying degrees of success and occasionally refuse to follow instructions.
Posted by: Skiffer | Nov 26 2022 21:19 utc | 69
@ robin | Nov 26 2022 20:30 utc | 61
There are military incursions in:
Iranian Kurdistan by Turkey: & Iran, with Iran's permission.
Turkey: in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Turkey: in Northern Syria. Syria/RF/Iran are not complaining ...
In 3 days, Iran has declared it will formally militarily intervene in Northern Kurdistan, alongside Turkey:.
Iran IRGC & Hezbollah already operate in Syria in Support of Syrian SAA & RF.
Significance of Erdogan meeting personally with Syrian President Assad ?
US is verry, verry quiet ...
@ Outraged | Nov 26 2022 21:23 utc | 69
Correction: In 3 days, Iran has declared it will formally militarily intervene in Iraqi Northern Kurdistan, alongside Turkey:.
Also, would it be fair to say that this is part of Putin's promised asymmetrical response to weapon shipments?
Posted by: Skiffer | Nov 26 2022 21:30 utc | 72
@ Ed Nelson | Nov 26 2022 21:16 utc | 66
Indeed.
Kurds. We've got your back!
Ukrainian proxies. We've got your back!
Afghani proxies & puppet government. We've got your back!
Georgia proxies. We've got your back!
...
Philippine 'allies' vs Spanish in 1898 Spanish-American War. We've got your back!
Immediately stabbed in the back by US-Phillipine War & subsequent conquest/occupation
...
Of course the US supports a "homeland" for the Kurds, carved out of their enemy's countries.
That gives them another Israel.
The Kurds were willing participants in the slaughter of the Armenians and were rewarded with Armenian houses and lands.
They are repeating that in Syria, kicking Syrian Arabs out of their houses, backed by the Americans, who use them as cut-outs to cover for the US occupation and theft of Syrian oil and wheat.
Maybe if the Kurdish birthrate wasn't so high, they could stick to land they already have.
Posted by: wagelaborer | Nov 26 2022 22:20 utc | 74
Syria 2 Days ago
Turkish drone hits base housing US troops, SDF militants in NE Syria
A Turkish unmanned aerial vehicle has targeted a military base housing US occupation troops and their allied SDF militants in northeastern Syria, killing two Kurdish fighters ...
Syria 4 Days ago
Kurdish commander warns of ‘major catastrophe’ as Turkey launches deadly air raids in Syria
At least 12 members of US-sponsored Kurdish-led militants and their affiliates as well as Syrian government forces have been killed in the latest Turkish airstrikes against Syria.
---
Syria 4 Days ago
Turkish airstrikes hit several towns in northern Syria, Iraq; casualties reported
Turkey strikes several towns across northern Syria, killing a number of Syrian soldiers and Kurdish militants.
Syria 5 Days ago
Syrian troops expel US forces from village in oil-rich Hasakah
Syrian government forces block a US military convoy in the country’s northeastern province of Hasakah, forcing it to retreat.
Um, ... Turkey: is a NATO ally. In fact the largest military in NATO besides US. US ? No comment ...
Iranian 'Kurdistan' 4 Days ago
IRGC strikes bases of separatist terrorists in N Iraq with missiles, drones
Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC)’s Ground Force has conducted a new round of drone and missile strikes against strongholds of hostile separatist terror groups based in Iraq’s semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan.
Iranian 'Kurdistan' 6 Days ago
IRGC says bolstering forces in northwest Iran to deal firmly with terrorists
The IRGC says it is bolstering its forces in Iran’s northwestern region to combat separatist groups and firmly confront terrorist outfits in the restive area.
@ InquisitiveReader | Nov 26 2022 16:43 utc | 13
I can very much recommend this website to understand more about syria (and the world really) :
https://www.voltairenet.org/spip.php?page=recherche&recherche=syria&lang=en
Posted by: swiss | Nov 26 2022 23:46 utc | 76
I don't see why the US would object much. From its perspective, what matters most is keeping Syria down and broken. That job can be outsourced to Turkey.
Posted by: robin | Nov 26 2022 20:30 utc | 61
Possible. Depends on how you see the relationship between Putin & Erdogan, I think they are in cahoots too, have been at least since 2016, but that is an opinion. One of the things Russia & Turkiye Etc. all agree is no independent Kurdistan.
I sympathize with the Kurds, but that will not fix anything. Cozying up to Uncle Sugar over and over seems a bit obsessive to me. Agree with others they need better leaders. Armenia does too, I think. It's a considerable problem in th Caucasus, crappy leaders.
Thank you for your comment.
Posted by: Bemildred | Nov 26 2022 23:49 utc | 77
Posted by: Ed Nelson | Nov 26 2022 21:16 utc | 66
thanks for your extensive discourse on Kurdish history, supposedly criticising my 5. I don't think anyone imagines what the US is doing in Rojava is really helping the Kurds. it is a failed policy to divide and conquer another Arab power on behalf of Israel. But the US is indeed controlling what the Rojavans do, for the moment. Only when the US withdraws, can the Rojavans settle their future. Rojava will lose half its current territory, but the Turks will no longer be a threat.
Posted by: Laguerre | Nov 26 2022 23:57 utc | 78
“”Erdogan/ Turkey make great powers “kiss their ass”.””
Turkey is blessed/cursed by its geographical location.
It always was, and ..until the continental plates shift ( and probably even after that) .. will be the gateway | chokepoint | for West>East< ^ North ~ South.
The saying is “all roads lead to Rome”…. But that was yet another appropriation. All roads lead to Constantinople | Turkey.
The bar’s current favourite antagonist, Zanon, regales us with dispatches for Putin’s stooopidity.
Putin the martial arts supremo took the Sultan’s impetus shooting down of a Russian military plane, and retaliated in the most painful way… he took away the Russian tourists and the Russian vegetable and fruit market.
Ten million Turks whose living depended on Russian tourist trade, and millions more who could no longer sell tomatoes and dates, forced the Sultan to make a supplicant’s pilgrimage to Moscow.
When the U$ saw this and decided the Sultan’s shelf life had reached its “use by” date, Putin saved the Sultan’s life.
No-one, least of all Putin (who is not stupid) believes that magnanimous act would win the Sultan’s loyalty.
Putin didn’t cry and threaten when Erdogan’s family sold Bayraktar drones to Ukraine.
Nope. First, he allowed his military to show how ineffective they were. Next he elevated Erdogan to the centre of the “resolution” to the conflict.
Istanbul usurped Geneva as the centre for diplomacy. Turkey was designated the senior NATO representative to negotiate the “grain” deal and then, after NS2 was destroyed, Putin offered Erdogan the Europe/North Africa gas hub.
And, in the midst of all this…. Putin sold Erdogan the S-400.
There is no doubt for me…MHO… that Erdogan acting against the Kurds(U$) now is *directly* related to the delivery and activation of the S-400s.
b writes:
The US only registered a weak protest against its main occupation base being bombed by a NATO member.
U$ weapons are failing in Ukraine. It’s like when guests politely agree not to notice who just dropped a large smelly fart at the dinner table.
The U$ cannot, absolutely cannot, allow the S-400 to engage it’s superior planes and other sophisticated and comically overpriced war toys.
Posted by: Melaleuca | Nov 27 2022 0:02 utc | 79
Outraged | @ various
“Iran has declared it will formally militarily intervene in Iraqi Northern Kurdistan, alongside Turkey”………
I see Putin’s hand.
He’s formed a functional alliance with the Sultan. He’s (§*allegedly*§) buying Iranian drones(or drone tech) from Iran.
He’s found the very sweet spot in a Venn where everyone’s interests intersect. And mostly that sweet spot involves removing U$ presence from the region. The US presence being shielded by the Kurds.
And. Don’t forget JCPOA. The U$ kept dangling that piece of bait…. But Iran is increasingly less interested in that.
It was, of course, Israel that killed JCPOA. I guess another “be careful what you wish for”. No longer bound by JCPOA Iran is able to pursue its interests unencumbered.
“……the US is verrry quiet”…. Well the shifting desert sands have… shifted.
Saudi is openly belligerent…. no OPEC increased production…
It’s Iraqi policy to have the U$ remove its bases from the country.
Iran is resurgent
Turkey is openly defiant… vetoing Sweden and Finland into NATO .
Mali just openly kicked France from the country.
African Union is supportive of Russia…
Indonesia wouldn’t allow the G20 to be hijacked
Every other week another country applies for BRICS membership.
The “Grand Chessboard” is more 3D every day.
And who is at the head (officially) of U$ statecraft??????
Blinken-idiot? FukdaEU Nuland? The U$ bench is as shallow as a puddle of Lavrov’s piss.
Posted by: Melaleuca | Nov 27 2022 0:33 utc | 80
Who cares? As long as the majority populations in an area establish states with control over and discrimination against minority populations, such pointless conflicts will arise. It's human nature. Let them kill each other off. No great loss.
As someone said once, "Who do you know over there?" Concern yourself with personal threats. A war between the US and Russia or China is a personal threat (if you live in the US, Russia, China or areas that might be directly affected such as Europe). Turks killing Kurds? Iranians killing Kurds? Not worth this post.
Posted by: Richard Steven Hack | Nov 27 2022 0:43 utc | 81
This tweet has a map attached…. Showing where the hydrocarbons are located and how that aligns - or not - with political alliances.
https://mobile.twitter.com/FabriceBalanche/status/1596436198750158848
Posted by: Melaleuca | Nov 27 2022 0:47 utc | 82
Twitter has a # hashtag #Kurds.
Lots of interesting and divergent tweets are agglomerated there…
https://mobile.twitter.com/hashtag/kurds
Posted by: Melaleuca | Nov 27 2022 0:51 utc | 83
Regarding the 900 or so US military in Syria, last I heard (not recently) was that the hundreds in northeast Syria were National Guard weekend-warriors out of North and South Carolina. Some deaths there would have a larger impact on US citizens since these are not regular army troops, who are needed at their expensive garrisons in Korea, Germany and Italy (just kidding).
Posted by: Don Bacon | Nov 27 2022 0:53 utc | 84
Thank you b.
I have my doubts the Syrian Kurds are actively against the Asad government (and here I deliberately avoid the overused and sensational word “regime”). They prefer to be part of Syrian federation, and clearly they have in mind the agricultural and oil rich region of the northeast. Coming from a land rich with religions and ethnic groups who have colived for centuries, I am firmly against a Syrian federation — such a model has worked for Switzerland but Syria doesn’t need it. Any attempt to redraw the Syria map can only be part of a Sykes-Picot like recipe. The colonialist west just won’t give up, not to mention the wet dreams of Sultan Erdogan.
Posted by: Ugarit | Nov 27 2022 1:26 utc | 85
@ Melaleuca | Nov 27 2022 0:33 utc | 79
Oh Indeed. Along with your points ... Empire cannot win a 'conventional' War against even Iran, let alone RF or China, Against 2 or 3 combined, ha!
See 'scratch' recall of timeline of events re Turkey v USA relationship since Attempted coup & Erdogan Assassination 2016, subsequent discussion. The MoA Week In Review - (Not Ukraine) OT 2022-203
Anyone who cannot see what is happening before their eyes ... well ... they need to step back from the individual trees & observe the forests 'move' ... Birnam Wood is coming to Dunsinane ... for Empire.
Japan dumping ~1T$USD(IIRC) over last two months, US Treasury Notes & bonds for two months now, China same for as much physical gold & precious metals can get it's hands on, rest in alternate currencies, India trading bilaterally with non-west in Rupees. Japan has NOT sanctioned Russia, still buying Gas via Sakhalin Pipeline, still in partnership.
Ghana is going to buy oil in gold instead of USD$ ...
Then there is Algiers re CSTO/SCO, Egypt buying oil/gas in Yuan, buying Chinese Yuan bonds, ceased purchasing monthly USD$/notes/bonds.
Global foreign trade @ 3rd week this month(IIRC) now transacted in ~30% Yuan(climbing) ~40% USD$(and dropping), all those USD$, notes & Treasury flooding home to USA ...
KSA on behalf of OPEC+ says to Biden, "Oh, Prez Biden. You don't like 1M/Barrel per day oil production cut come start Nov ? Okay, now it's 2M/Barrel per day cut! Click!".
China being sold oil/gas from OPEC+ in Yuan, not USD$. US has tissy fit, stomping feet, unilaterally withdraws US junk Patriots & other useless AD systems from KSA. KSA says "Pfft!".
UK, Germany & France withdrawing post colonial, colonial troops from Mali. Mali previously requesting RF Counter-terrorism support. Group W African countries developing Economic & Security group, along with African Union, etc
It is all happening at an accelerating rate ...
UK situ ?
Is EU/NATO united ? How much longer ...
OTTOMH
Followup re @ Melaleuca | Nov 27 2022 0:33 utc | 79
Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Argentina, Indonesia - have either applied to join the BRICS, or are openly considering doing so ... (IIRC) ... SCO, CSTO, Belt & Road win/win ?
India dumps on the farcical Quad, no communique, turns its back & walks away. Will host next G20. Serious rapprochement behind the scenes re India & China. Pakistan paying lip service to Empire even post the Imran Khan US coup.
In ~12 months China's joint projects in Africa means it can at anytime dump trade purchases re resources with AU, instant 14% GDP crash. Simultaneously refuse to export to AU in other than Yuan ? Same with NZ ? Oops.
US desperately developing Ports & Bases, logistics infrastructure in AU 'cause it knows Pearl, Diego Garcia & Guam will be flattened in a moment if any shooting starts.
Turkey: will not consent to Sweden/Finland accession to NATO & is now a NATO member in name only. Oops.
What's going on in Sth Korea ? 'Cause they will NOT commit suicide for US.
@InquisitiveReader | Nov 26 2022 16:43 utc | 13
Books, articles, youtube, books etc. anything by Joshua Landis eg
https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/bigideas/syria3a-what27s-next3f/4547812
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNI_5fGR-a0
Anything by Seymour Hersh
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v36/n08/seymour-m.-hersh/the-red-line-and-the-rat-line
or anything Aaron Mate
https://scheerpost.com/2022/08/02/nato-backed-network-of-syria-dirty-war-propagandists-identified/
And anything by Putin on the subject
Posted by: SeanAU | Nov 27 2022 2:49 utc | 88
Not worth this post.
Richard Steven Hack | Nov 27 2022 0:43 utc | 80
Ouch. Maybe best kept to yourself then?
Posted by: SeanAU | Nov 27 2022 2:53 utc | 89
Blue Dotterel @55--
Thanks for your reply. On Armenia, I didn't want to make the situation anymore complex than it already is and omitted Azerbaijan too. Same with domestic situation within Turkey where you are.
Posted by: Richard Steven Hack | Nov 27 2022 0:43 utc | 80
Any ever tell you, you are a sick fuck.
Posted by: Ed | Nov 27 2022 3:01 utc | 91
Jen @62 & 65--
Thanks for your replies and corrections. Clearly, non-contemporary Iranian history isn't my strong suit. The suggestion of Anderson's book @56 is most welcome!
@47 "the Kurds are much like the Zionists"
Is an unfortunately comparison imo, while I do get the similarities mentioned the greater differences are too profound. Because the Kurdish people had been there in the same places for centuries whereas the zionists left their "claimed" original "homeland" but didn't return in far greater numbers 2000 years later.
imv the Kurds are more like the analogy to indigenous peoples (but who never formed a singular national/group independence of their own) endlessly under the yolk of several colonizing powers ... from the assyrians, armenians, then arabs / ottoman / muslim kings/warlords, the russians, british, french, persians, then soviets, plus iranians, iraqis, syrians and turkish ruling regimes who all came and went over hundreds of years.
Now the fucking American colonizers are doing the exact same thing lording it over the indigenous people there.
I believe a better 'framing' to get a handle on the Kurdish history leading up to now - is to start looking at Kurdistan from the pov of the stability over hundreds of years under Ottoman rule until WW1 .. being mindful of the border changes between Persia before that it was broken up.
Post-WW1 led to the interference by Britain/France which carved up the Ottoman territory proper into new "states", as well as the interference by Russia/Britain, then the Soviets too in Persia/Iran out to the post-WW2 period at which time the US began seriously sticking it's nose into Iran and the Arab world as well.
Remembering that almost all of Persia was held by Arabs for hundreds of years (eg Safavid dynasty) at the same time the Kurds were thereabouts and large parts were also taken by Russia in the 19th century too.
The Kurds were thus spread by the winds of these several new nation states and global power rivalries. Each of those nations had their own internal issues to confront and the Kurds were dealt with as seen fit by whatever govt was in control from time to time ... while Coups and wars raged on and off for the next 100 years to today.
Ottomans
In 1914 the total population of the Ottoman Empire was approximately 25 million, of which about 10 million were Turks, 6 million Arabs, 1.5 million Kurds, 1.5 million Greeks, and 2.5 million Armenians. [...] and in 1914 the population was increasingly homogeneous in religion and language, though a variety of languages continued to be spoken. [...](summarizing) The Russian withdrawal in 1917 and postwar bargaining led to some modifications of those agreements, and the Allied terms were not finally presented until 1920. By the Treaty of Sèvres (August 10, 1920), the Ottomans retained Istanbul and part of Thrace but lost the Arab provinces, ceded a large area of Asia Minor to a newly created Armenian state with access to the sea, surrendered Gökçeada and Bozcaada to Greece, and accepted arrangements that implied the eventual loss of İzmir to Greece. The straits were internationalized, and strict European control of Ottoman finances was established. An accompanying tripartite agreement between Britain, France, and Italy defined extensive spheres of influence for the latter two powers. The treaty was ratified only by Greece and was abrogated by the Treaty of Lausanne (July 24, 1923) as the result of a determined struggle for independence waged under the leadership of the outstanding Ottoman wartime general Mustafa Kemal, later known as Atatürk.
https://www.britannica.com/place/Ottoman-Empire/Dissolution-of-the-empire
What the British then did arming instigating a Greek revolution/civil war inside the new Turkey leading to various pogroms / genocidal responses then culminating to the holocaust/catastrophe of Smyrna was far worse imo, (the British abandoning the Greeks entirely) than what the Turks did as a result. An eternal argument still raging in Greece and Turkey (and Armenia) to this day. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burning_of_Smyrna
If anyone wants a sense of how unstable Syria had been before the Assads have a look at this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_presidents_of_Syria
This region has the worse complex most argued history in the world imo. And it is still a quagmire. But everyone already knows that, kind of a redundant comment.
It is no surprise almost everyone is confused and there's always something knew to learn. It's tough going meant for masochists.
Posted by: SeanAU | Nov 27 2022 4:32 utc | 93
Posted by: Jen | Nov 26 2022 20:44 utc | 65
The Safavids also gifted Iran with the mullahs and some say the mullahs had a hand in the demise of Safavids as they insisted (as they do today) that only the clerics can rule.
Your correct observation, about Iran's non involvement in wars since getting mauled by Russian Empire and losing the Caucus, is equally applicable to all (surrounding) nations.
IR is shaken, and desperately wishes to stir a deflecting crisis to take the wind out of the Revolution currently gathering force in Iran. However it is possible that like the rude shock of discovering Iranians in Tehran celebrating the defeat of the footbal team, this adventure too will fail to benefit them by their role playing* as defenders of Iran's territorial integrity and protectors of her interests.
*Because when this regime is finally overthrown and the books are opened and an accounting is required of Aghayoon regarding the national treasure and its distribution and expenditure, just on that matter alone it will be shown that in the past 43 years the regime has pissed away the substantial portion of Iranian people's national treasure on misadventure and outright theft pocketed by Aghayoon, their 'guardians' the IRGC, and their spawn (who very much prefer living in the West rather than in IR occupied Iran).
karl0f1 and fellow travelers, ideologues who in the heat of their hatred for the world order du jour mindlessly support a criminal mafia regime like IR, can fantasize all they want.
Islamic Republic is finished. It no longer has legitimacy in Iran or abroad. These thoughtless morons are finally realizing that their little ideological project is actually endangering Islam in Iran. The things one hears these days, from even inside Iran, completely unimaginable a few years ago, and certainly not before the revolution. They shat on Iran and they shat on Islam, these arrogant deluded criminals.
Clinging to the skirt of frenemies like Russia, or shooting missiles into Iraq, is not going to save IR. What replaces IR may not necessarily be pro-Western, hopefully it can do same dance that China and India are permitted to perform, striking critical poses while fully hooked in to the God of Mammon's Loot Train. Iran can do the same thing.
Of course, that would not satisfy the Russian muppets here.
Right now, the focus is on forcing the regime to conduct a referendum, as required by the constitution btw, minimally regarding the fitness of Khamenei to be leader. Once he goes, his muscle in IRGC will go with him. New leadership for IRGC will defuse the threat of civil war in Iran. After that, anything is possible, but optimally we'll have a national discussion regarding republic, monarchy, or continuing the error of theocracy. tbd.
And Russia can sleep in that soiled bed by itself. After all, Russia made that bed.
Posted by: from-the-area | Nov 27 2022 4:39 utc | 94
HTS us NOT Turkish proxy. Releat NOT. It iis a remnant of Nusra Front, fully equipped, funded and politically supported by US and UK. Special ops are there. Many were caught after Nusra lost Aleppo. Try to remember propaganda about good guys fighting bad Syrian government and Russians. White Helmets were stationed with Nusra, later renamed HtS. Their Al-Qaeda days were just a front in order to recruit as many ifnirant and angry people frim Syria and abroad, Today, US and Uzk are foghting for UN control of food and aid to be INDEPENDENT fron Syria, using Turkish territory without Turkey controlling actual cargo.
Here is the reality. Turkey suceeded in peeling of many independent militants from Idlib to abandon HTS. Without Syrian groups HRS is nothing. This is why HTS ciintrols food and gives it to lloyal groups. HTS has an ace up their sleeve. They are capable of stirring mayham in Idlib and sentd few million people as refugees to Turkey. Turkey blicked thrir supply route in Afrin (Kurdish area), supplies coming from UK/US via PKK kurds in Turkey., accross Afrin into Idlub,
HTS is boxed in at present, but losing groups. HRS tried to break Turkish blockade in Afrin by attacking Turkish forces.
Turkey cannot solve problems piecemeal. A larger and more comorehensive plan is needed to end Western attempts in formung Kurdish toll booth preventing Kevant and Turkey from having access to Iraq and Gulf,
Posted by: Bianca | Nov 27 2022 4:41 utc | 95
Another thing of interest is the settling of southern modern day Ukraine by the Greeks of the Byzantine era from across Black Sea before the Ottomans took control of this region for hundreds of years after ... which included more ethnic Greeks (who were Ottoman approved business and givt bureaucrats) going there as well including after WW1 when the Ottoman empire was broken up and most of the ethnic Greeks fled the new nation of Turkey to all points.
These are the reasons that Kherson, Odessa, Sevastopol, Mariopul etc are not genuine Rus/Russian/Ukrainian names but Greek.
Some areas showing Greek settlements to the 5th century BC ... a real melting pot over +2500 years iow. But that's another story.
Posted by: SeanAU | Nov 27 2022 4:44 utc | 96
@93 Nothing would surprise me, including that some or all you might be true and possible.
"*Because when this regime is finally overthrown and the books are opened and an accounting is required .... "
But the thing is, this notion/truism applies to every country, every govt every "regime" and long-term established social system or the accepted international order.
And it is not only what that might be, but also who does the overthrowing.
Every single time someone has done a "inquiry" here to pull back the curtain, to look under the carpet, be it a church a sports group a business/industry or a government there is always a steaming pile of shit to hoopla about.
and that barely being the tip of an iceberg ... the whole truth is always hidden from view.
Iran isn't on a desert island in this regard. It applies to all. It is the nature of Institutions themselves. It's integral to human psychology, our very nature where "power" is concerned.
I suspect the worst of the worse is the USA by far. Can you imagine the CIA/FBI/WH/Congressional secret archives being totally opened up to full scrutiny LOL that would be fun.
Posted by: SeanAU | Nov 27 2022 5:23 utc | 97
Kurds are animals. May God bless the Turks to wipe them out for good.
Posted by: FVK | Nov 27 2022 6:20 utc | 98
I learned long ago -- from a French satirical weekly in 1972 -- that whenever peace seems to be given a chance in West Asia, then the solution is always to drop a mother lode of weaponry to the Kurds (often to several competing factions) so as to stimulate strife all over again. Those Kurds are famous for appreciating friendly help, But in reality it' only friendly fire. No wander the word for Joghurt is in many lases "Kurd".
Posted by: Tollef Ås/秋涛乐/טלפ וש | Nov 27 2022 7:13 utc | 99
The irony of Turkish nationalists being so obsessed with holding onto Kurdish lands despite all it does is drive mass migration from Kurdish areas into Turkey and may soon drive a situation where the majority of the population is Kurdish is continuously astounding. But then having grown up a country where nationalism was based on a left wing concept of defending against another country's right wing supremacist nationalism, right wing nationalism rarely makes sense.
The number of conflicts that are occurring because of the loss of Pax Russia is eye-opening.
The US might be using the Kurds as proxies but he Turks are ultimately the unreasonable ones who could have peace for almost nothing for a long time, Erdogan is a clown.
Posted by: Altai | Nov 27 2022 9:42 utc | 100
The comments to this entry are closed.
I have no sympathy for the Kurdish leadership.
They've betrayed everyone who might have helped their cause
Except their colonial Anglo American masters.
They have whored themselves out to anyone who'd would pay.
And now they will collect the whore's reward.
Posted by: Arch Bungle | Nov 26 2022 16:06 utc | 1