Threatening military operations against the Kurds, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan got a stern warning from 72-year-old President Donald Trump that he would “devastate Turkey economically.” Since Trump announced Dec. 18 his intention to pull 2,000 U.S. advisers out of Syria, Turkey has been threatening military operations against the Kurd’s YPG militia in Syria. Used by the U.S. as it boots-on-the-ground battling the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria [ISIS], Erdogan sees the pro-U.S. militia as part of Turkey’s mortal enemy, the Kurdistan Workers Party [PKK]. Erdogan and his 50-year-old Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu know that the YPG doesn’t threaten one inch of Turkish territory, confining itself to the ungoverned lands occupied by the Kurds in Syria. Threatening to go after the YPG prompted several prominent foreign policy experts in Congress and Pentagon to urge Trump to delay his Syria withdrawal.
Unlike like other Mideast groups, the Kurds were passed over after WW I, when the 1916 Sykes-Picot Agreement, designed to allocate Ottoman lands to several Arab groups. Unlike the Jordanians, Syrians and Lebanese, the Kurds got no sovereign land, after the breakup of the Ottoman Empire. Forced to live in the hinterlands of Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria, the Kurds have sought a homeland for over 100 years, but no country in the region has been willing to cede one inch of land. When 72-year-old Syrian Kurdish Leader Massoud Barzani held a Sept. 24, 2017 referendum on Kurdish independence, former U.S. Special Envoy Brett McGurk called the decision “premature.” One month later Barzani resigned in disgrace after the Iraq military seized Kirkuk, the oil-rich Iraqi region from Iraq’s Kurds. Trump wanted to help Barzani but couldn’t go against Baghdad.
Barzani defied former Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abidi, holding the independence vote, then ordering the Iraqi military to seize Kurdish-controlled Iraqi territory. When Trump announced his intent to pull U.S. forces from Syria, it opened up a can of worms, especially about how to protect the Kurds, especially from a Turkish attack. Turkey considers the U.S.-friendly YPG military as tied to the PKK, a mortal enemy of the Turkish state. Erdogan and his Foreign Minister know that there’s no link between the YPG and PKK but use the occasion to threaten a U.S. ally. Trump’s decision to delay the U.S. withdrawal from Syria directly relates to protecting the Kurds from a possible Turkish assault. Even though Turkey is a NATO ally, you’d never guess it with Erdogan threatening to attack the YPG miliita, the main U.S. fighting force battling ISIS in Syria.
Trump warned of “economic devastation” to put Ankara on notice that the U.S. won’t tolerate an attack on their main Kurdish ally. YPG officials were so concerned about an imminent Turkish attack, they asked Dec. 28, 2018 Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for military assistance to thwart a possible Turkish attack. Sen. Lindsey Graham, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, pleaded with Trump to delay any decision to withdraw U.S. forces from Syria. While a token contingent of only 2,000 non-combatant advisers, Graham believes the U.S. presences serves to deter Turkey and Iran in Syria. Graham worries that without a U.S. presence in Syria, Turkey and Iran would be emboldened to seize more Syrian land. Erdogan worries that the YPG threatens the Turkish state, when there’s little connection between the PKK and YPG’s major objective in Syria.
Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. advisers from Syria has to do with his campaign promise to bring U.S. troops back from Mideast deployments. Trump opposed the Iraq War, believing the long U.S. deployment has done little to stop terrorism in the Mideast. Most Mideast experts think Iraq under Saddam Hussein or Syria under Bashar al-Assad had minimal problems with Saudi-funded terrorists. Once Saddam was ousted from Baghdad April 10, 2003, Sunni and Shiite terrorists flooded Iraq. ISIS emerged from the ashes of the Iraq War, where Saddam’s former Baathist officials formed the military nucleus of ISIS. When al-Assad was besieged by heavily Saudi-funded proxy war to topple Damasus, Shiite and Sunni terrorists flooded Syria, especially ISIS and al-Qaeda, Bin Laden’s global terror group. Trump agreed that the Saudi proxy war in Syria only spread more death and destruction.
Arab states have begun reconciling with al-Assad, now that they know Syria has beat-back the Saudi-funded proxy war. Former President Barack Obama spent millions, committing arms-and-cash to Syrian rebels to topple al-Assad. When Russian President Vladimir Putin joined the fight to save al-Assad Sept. 30, 2015, it was only a matter of time before the proxy war was defeated. Trump agreed with Putin that toppling al-Assad would turn Syria into another Iraq. “Starting the long overdue pullout from Syria while hitting the little remaining ISIS territorial caliphate hard, and from many directions,” Trump tweeted today. “Will attack again from existing nearby base if it reforms. Will devastate Turkey economically if they hit the Kurds,” warning Erdogan to walk back his plans to attack the YPG. Trump’s Syrian policy underscores that there’s little the U.S. can gain keeping troops in Syria.
