Turkey Catches Fire as ISIS Burns Kobani

[Comrade Grumpy]

Source: Time

Tension over a peace process that has yet to deliver results, fear of a possible bloodbath in a besieged Kurdish enclave in Syria’s north, and frustration with the government’s unwillingness to confront Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) jihadists came to a boil in Turkey on Tuesday night, as clashes erupted across the country between Kurdish protesters, Islamist groups and police. What followed were scenes that reminded many here of the 1990s, when war between the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the Turkish army engulfed much of the country’s Kurdish-majority southeast. At least 21 people were reported dead, with many more wounded.

In Diyarbakir, about 60 miles north of the border with Syria, members of Hizbullah, a local Islamist group allegedly sympathetic to ISIS, traded gunfire with Kurdish protesters, including PKK militants. Ten people were found dead by the morning. More clashes have been reported in a number of other cities across the southeast, as well as in Kurdish neighborhoods in Ankara, Izmir and Istanbul, with security forces firing tear gas and rubber bullets against protesters armed with rocks and Molotov cocktails. A curfew was imposed in six provinces, with soldiers patrolling the streets of several cities on Wednesday.

The unrest is largely due to allegations that Turkey’s government is turning a blind eye to, or even supporting, ISIS’s onslaught against Kurdish militants holed up in Kobani, a city in Syria’s north, lie at the heart of the crisis. On Wednesday, ISIS militants defied U.S.-led air strikes by pounding Kobani with artillery fire from the east, west and south, all in plain sight of Turkish tanks deployed on the other side of the border. Leaders of the People’s Protection Units (YPG), the Kurdish militia protecting the city, warned of a looming bloodbath. Desperately outgunned, they also continued to ask Turkey to open a corridor to deliver heavy arms — particularly antitank weapons — to Kobani.

Such requests have been falling on deaf ears, says Salih Muslim, head of the YPG’s political wing. Earlier this week, Muslim personally pleaded with officials in Ankara to allow Kurdish fighters from other areas of Syria — cut off from Kobani by swaths of ISIS-controlled land — to enter the city via Turkey. “They promised some things,” he told TIME. “But they have done nothing.”

Since late September, Turkey has opened its doors to 160,000 Syrian Kurds fleeing ISIS. It has also begun delivering humanitarian aid to the city, but has provided nothing, at least not officially, in the way of military assistance. The reason for Turkey’s inaction, analysts say, is its fear of empowering the YPG, widely believed to be the PKK’s Syrian affiliate. Although the Ankara government and the PKK have been holding peace talks for nearly two years — talks that have yielded a tenuous cease-fire, but little more — the bad blood between them runs deep. “What ISIS is to us, the PKK is the same,” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Oct. 4. The PKK, in turn, accused Erdogan of supporting ISIS to fight the Kurds inside Syria, warning that its negotiations with Ankara were on the verge of collapse. “If this massacre attempt [in Kobani] achieves its goal, it will end the process,” the PKK’s jailed leader, Abdullah Ocalan, said in a statement released on Oct 1.

<snip>

Read more: http://time.com/3482714/isis-battle-kurds-kobani-turkey/

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21 dead in street fighting in Turkey, the Kurds enraged, the PKK saying no more peace negotiations if Kobani falls...Turkey won't do anything because they're trying to suck us into a war with Syria and they hate the Kurds.

Man, this shit in the Middle East is so fucked up and convoluted and complicated. I feel sorry for Obama.

[AgingAmerican]

5. So you are siding with ISIS?

Lovely...

[flamingdem]

19. What did they write? Is that the Turkish person

who posts here?

[geek tragedy]

7. People like you said the same thing about the Armenians 100 years ago.

Before the Turks committed genocide against them.

[still_one]

9. It should be noted that Turkey still refuses to acknowledge that event.

[geek tragedy]

10. yep. and here they are helping history repeat itself nt

[geek tragedy]

8. 'Allegations' that Turkey is tacitly aiding ISIL? How can anyone deny it? nt

[Threedifferentones]

11. I understand there is nothing we can do to take the Turks to task for this but...

don't they at least need to be called out? Can't the EU bring some pressure? At a time when all the talk is about an international coalition to stop ISIS, the Turks literally have ISIS fighters and heavy weaponry in the sights of their tanks and will not fire? The Turks literally have let ISIS fighters cross into Syria and Iraq, but will not let Kurdish reinforcements through? Infuriating...

[karynnj]

17. I suspect that the closest we could get was Biden's completely honest statement

That he had to "apologize" just called attention to a Harvard talk that otherwise would have been read by few. It is really clear that the US can NOT afford to be seen as folding to their blackmail - even if their position is that of the neo-cons, including most Republicans and the right wing of the Democrats.

I like that Obama and others in his administration have made the point that beyond everything the area has to want this to end. The US doing more will not lead to a stable end solution. Not to mention, in this case, we would knowingly be sending Americans into a guerrilla war, where the guerrillas already have won vast areas - far worse than the situation in Vietnam. How would American troops even distinguish between ISIS rebels and Sunnis too scared to oppose them? Not to mention that there is a whole scale there ranging from ISIS foreign fighter to ISIS Iraqi citizen to opportunist Baathist Sunni willing to back (or even lead) a local ISIS government because they hate Shiites, the Iraqi government and the US that threw them out of power when Saddam was removed, to a nonpolitical Sunni just wanting to live his life.

This is a tremendous mess and it almost has to be the local Sunnis gradually rejecting ISIS because they are destroying their country. The precedent is the Sunni awakening in 2006 when the Sunni warlords turned against AQ - and accepted payment from the US for doing so. This time, there is supposed to be a better way to compensate them. The Iraqi government has spoken of developing Sunni (equivalents to National guards) that would police and protect Sunni areas - getting Iraqi salaries, pensions etc.

To me, what Obama and his team faced early this year was a very very complicated puzzle that - unlike real puzzles - may not even have a solution. It does seem that some of the very first steps, themselves not easy, such as getting Iraq to form a government from the election results that was inclusive and to actually get Arab countries to join the coalition against ISIS. From where we are now, it still seems that this is still going to be a very difficult situation to correct at all.

As to Turkey's request, I can see why it would be a disaster for the US to do what they want. It immediately would make this a war between the US and Syria. This means the strange tacit approval the US and the coalition have from Syria for striking ISIS would immediately end. Not to mention, who fills the vacuum if we did this and destroyed Assad? I would bet that the end game that Obama is hoping to achieve is to reduce the area and power of ISIS - and hope the more inclusive Iraq government can fill the vacuum on that side. On the Syrian side, Obama has always said a political solution is needed. Maybe the hope is that with both ISIS and AQ degraded, there could be a unity government that includes Assad people (maybe without Assad) and some moderate Sunnis. If they could get to that point, then as Iraq and Syria move to normalization, they could eventually eliminate any area ISIS controls.

I can'e think of any good end game if we let Turkey dictate our policy. Not to mention how weak that makes the US look. Ultimately, you would think that Turkey should be concermed that ISIS is on THEIR border.

[blackspade]

12. What a nightmare.

And exceedingly short sighted on the part of the Turkish government.

[mainer]

13. I have to go to Istanbul in a few weeks on business

Am watching the situation closely.

[WilliamPitt]

14. BUT AIR STRIKES ARE TOTALLY GOING TO WORK YOU GUYS

The Pleasant Fiction of "No Boots on the Ground"
http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/26188-the-pleasant-fiction-of-no-boots-on-the-ground

[Baclava]

15. Why did the US help the Kurds in Iraq but leave Isis to massacre them in Syria?

A key difference between the new US war strategy in Kurdish-majority parts of the region was Washington’s decision to bolster its Kurdish partners on the ground in Iraq but not in Syria.

In Iraq, the US not only carried out air strikes but also armed the Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga and sent military “advisors”. As a result, the peshmerga were able to provide ground intelligence to guide US air strikes, and, in conjunction with Kurdish fighters from Turkey and Syria, they followed up on the ground to retake important territories lost to Isis.

In Syria, the US has been more hesitant to develop such a bold Kurdish partnership. At first glance, the Kurdish fighting force in Syria – the People’s Defence Units (YPG), linked to the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK), which the US designates as a terrorist group due to its decades-long war with Turkey – is a less natural partner than the widely recognized Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq. Yet it was YPG and PKK forces that provided the decisive support on the ground to the Iraqi Kurds, allowing KRG peshmerga to regain territory lost to Isis in Iraq. The US in great part owes the limited success of its airstrikes in north Iraq to the PKK and YPG.

The lesson the US should learn from its experience in north Iraq is that you can’t win a war in the air alone. Iraq showed that air strikes against Isis can work – but only when combined with efforts to arm and advise a reliable local force capable of following up to actually retake and hold territory on the ground. The YPG is that force in Syria, and any air strikes without the kind of support sent to the Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga will be futile. US collaboration with the YPG will be tricky, as tensions between the PKK and Turkey, a US ally, have recently intensified. The PKK, angered by what it perceives to be Turkey’s efforts to back Isis, threatened to end a fledgling peace process if Isis takes Kobani (also known as Ayn al-Arab). The existing peace process is not only Turkey’s best chance at peace, but also the Obama administration’s best cover for collaboration with the YPG. The US should urgently act to save both Kobani and the peace process, by offering extensive support to the YPG in Syria on the condition that the PKK reaffirms its commitment to the peace process with Turkey.

The repercussions of the fall of Kobani – and it is falling – will be felt far beyond Syrian borders. The genocidal group will have free rein to carry out a staggering massacre within walking distance of Turkish military positions. Kurds across the region will lose faith in Turkey and the Western powers that desperately need them to step in.

It was an avoidable tragedy: Kurds in both countries represent the only secular local forces backed by strong community support with the capability and willingness to take on Isis. Strikes that successfully prevent Isis from gaining more territory in Iraq combined with strikes that do not do the same in Syria will not incapacitate the group. That bifurcated strategy will only push the curse of Isis curse further into Syria – and onto the Syrian people, one nightmare scene at a time

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/07/us-kurds-iraq-isis-massacre-syria-kobani

[QuestionAlways]

16. Turkey is acting in its own self interest as it perceives it

They have been fighting the Kurds who want independence from Turkey for many years. They do not want to make the PPK stronger, nor make an active enemy of ISIS

[QuestionAlways]

18. By the way

If ISIL attacked Turkey, which is a member o NATO, we would have to defend Turkey including boots on the ground.

[cheapdate]

20. The disconnect is incredible in those who are harsh critics of both action and inaction.

Turkey refused to allow its territory to be used for staging men and materials for the invasion of Iraq. It caused US military logistical planners great headaches. It caused no small amount tension in US-Turkey relations. But Turkey stood by their decision to severly limit their participation in the invasion of Iraq.

Fast-forward to today. Turkey has made it clear that they would rather NOT engage in military hostilities in Syria.

Cue the critics. The only thing worse than U.S. action is Turkey's inaction.

[roamer65]

21. I'd say 1 year or less to a full-blown regional ME war.

We are already 3/4 there.