[foxdemon]

Turkey has not been an ally for about the past decade and has made it official by allying herself with Russia and buying Russian arms well knowing that it goes against the NATO Charter. Turkey is not an ally and does not wish to be ally conscientiously. I guess by "anybody" you mean anyone of the rogue dictators in some rogue state because noone in Europe would have done such a thing.

This should be obvious to all. Secular Turkey has been hammered with 1000’s now in jail. Erdogan is clearly a revanchist dictator. From a Western point of view, there isn’t much left to hope for.

Trump has destroyed America's reputation and reliability and has empowered Turkey, Iran, Israel, Russia and China to waive international rules, laws and act on their own whims with impunity. He is a liability to global security.

America’s reputation has been going down hill since Bush jr. He launched the Iraq invasion and failed to respond to Russian aggression in Georgia. Obama supported the ill conceived Libyan intervention, failed to stop China taking the South China Sea islands and failed to respond to Russian annexation of Crimea.

Revanchist powers have been flaunting international norms before Trump came to power. I would place the blame on Bush jr and Blair for setting a standard dictators could exploit.

Regardless, the fact that China is building a navy that can challenge US naval supremacy is enough to end the liberal world order. US naval dominance was the thing that made the international order possible. The reason why. China could do this is because the centre of economic power is shifting to Asia, so they can afford to build a huge navy.

As I see it, there have been three periods since WWII: Cold War until 1989, new world order until 2008, and now we are in a third period of great power competition. This new period is seeing the rise of Eastern powers and the decline of Western powers.

An interesting event recently was Erdogan offering to broker negotiations in Kashmir. That really ticked off the Indians. Erdogan really does think he is an Ottoman Sultan. @Atlantis might be right about the overreach. The link between Pakistan and Turkey does suggest China will step in to replace America in the Middle East. I expect the Saudis to join that axis too. India and Iran have good relations and look to be the opposing axis, along with Oman and Japan. When the West pulls out, it won’t take long for the East to step in.

Erdogan's posturing is only relevant to show the total lack of backbone by the EU and the US.

Exactly.

Putting sanctions on Turkey is the only realistic and correct option. Turkey has already gone to Russia and China and she is already attacking western interests in Syria and Cyprus. Pretending to keep Turkey as a "friend" while she is screaming out to the world in the most obvious way possible that she is your enemy is just more weakness on display that further emboldens all these aforementioned actors. Turkey has made her choice, it is high-time the rest of us make our own choices as well.

Turkey should be kicked out of the customs union, the OECD and NATO. As you say, they have made their choices and now it is time for there to be consequences for those choices.

[Stormsmith]

A contingent of U.S. Special Forces was caught up in Turkish shelling against U.S.-backed Kurdish positions in northern Syria, days after President Donald Trump told his Turkish counterpart he would withdraw U.S. troops from certain positions in the area. A senior Pentagon official said shelling by the Turkish forces was so heavy that the U.S. personnel considered firing back in self-defense.

Newsweek has learned through both an Iraqi Kurdish intelligence official and the senior Pentagon official that Special Forces operating on Mashtenour hill in the majority-Kurdish city of Kobani fell under artillery fire from Turkish forces conducting their so-called "Operation Peace Spring" against Kurdish fighters backed by the U.S. but considered terrorist organizations by Turkey. No injuries have been reported.

Instead of returning fire, the Special Forces withdrew once the shelling had ceased. Newsweek previously reported Wednesday that the current rules of engagement for U.S. forces continue to be centered around self-defense and that no order has been issued by the Pentagon for a complete withdrawal from Syria.

From Newsweek, https://www.newsweek.com/us-troops-syria-turkey-1464727

[Hindsite]

From Newsweek, https://www.newsweek.com/us-troops-syria-turkey-1464727

Fake News

[Atlantis]

I will be more specific. What is the point of Turkey suffering?(What is the benefit for Europe?) How are Turkeys actions affect the situation in Europe? How is Turkey threatening Europe economically or militarily? As you said yourself, Erdogan is harming his country more than enough to be any kind of threat to Europe and if you are of the opinion that he will collapse his country then what are you worrying about?

The point is not to hurt Turkey's economy for the sake of hurting it. The point is to show Erdogan that actions have consequences. He will go on testing the limits of how far he can go. He pursued a German comedian for years for publishing an unkind text about him because he knew he could do it. When the now PM of the UK published a downright insulting limerick about the "goat fucker of Ankara" he warmly embraced the latter because he knew Boris wouldn't give a fuck about him protesting. The offensive limerick in itself was of no importance to him, his only concern was to what degree he could exploit it.

Erdogan needs to learn his limits.

And having positioned ourselves against Erdogan early on, we'll be on the right side of history once he is dumped. The same applies to the Trumpets and Brexocritters.

[Rich]

Are we to have the whole world under sanctions? Perhaps when the Brexit conflict really gets going the UK and the EU will be sanctioning each other. Who knows maybe England and Scotland will put each other under sanctions. My motto is put up or shut up. Either attack or do nothing. I've been long opposed to the sanctions against Cuba. I opposed the sanctions against Iraq, which were said to be tantamount to genocide by the UN's oil for food programme director. And I've of course opposed the sanctions against Russia and Syria. But the sanctions frenzie has reached new levels of absurdity. Turkey is still a member of NATO.

The Kurds betrayal of Putin, forced Putin to compromise with Turkey. The Kurdish plan was to make themselves the most grovelling lap dogs of the Jews. They would sieze the oil producing, Sunni Arab areas of Eastern Syria, creating a little Kurdish empire as @Atlantis would say that would block the Shia road from Iraq and Iran. Israel would have liked this, but it was totally unworkable long term. Israel had no land or air connection to the Kurds. All support would have to have been channelled through Turkey.

Turkey was never going to accept this situation in a month of Sundays. And why would Putin and Assad and Iran, not do their utmost to undermine it. This was western establishment thinking at its most delusional. It was like the idea that we could fight the Taliban through Pakistan. Pakistan, Turkey and Saudi Arabia are the enemy. The Taliban, Al Qaeda and ISIS are two bit players in this. Even Iran is a secondary concern. The twin towers would never have fallen without Pakistani and Saudi support.

If the Kurds could have established a permanent blocking territory between Iraq and Syria, that would have given them immense leverage with our Jewish Zionist masters. That would have made them immensely valuable to Israel. Can you not see that Turkey was never, never, never going to allow the Kurds to keep that position of power. Please wake up and smell the coffee.

[foxdemon]

Here is a link to an article about how India deals with Erdogan. Basically, India has made a point of raising the status of diplomatic support for Armenia, Greece and Cyprus.

Maybe Europe’s leading nations could learn something from India?

Pragmatism is Watchword of India's Foreign Policy: Enemy’s Friend is My Enemy

There is a pragmatism bordering on the Machiavellian that permeates the ‘enlightened self-interest’ that is guiding Indian foreign policy, by which, if an enemy’s enemy is a friend, then an enemy’s friend is an enemy. On the margins of the UN General Assembly, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar held a series of meetings expressly to send that message to some countries who have been what an Indian diplomat called “overzealous.”

Turkey’s President Recep Erdogan is among those who has recently scaled up the rhetoric, urging a resolution of Kashmir and even offering to “mediate” between India and Pakistan on the issue. During his address to the UNGA, Erdogan said the stability and prosperity of South Asia were inseparable from the Kashmir issue, and, “it is imperative to solve the problem through dialogue and on the basis of justice and equity, but not through collision.” While Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan welcomed ..


Read more at:
http://www.indiandefencereview.com/pragmatism-is-watchword-of-indias-foreign-policy-enemys-friend-is-my-enemy/

[JohnRawls]

The point is not to hurt Turkey's economy for the sake of hurting it. The point is to show Erdogan that actions have consequences. He will go on testing the limits of how far he can go. He pursued a German comedian for years for publishing an unkind text about him because he knew he could do it. When the now PM of the UK published a downright insulting limerick about the "goat fucker of Ankara" he warmly embraced the latter because he knew Boris wouldn't give a fuck about him protesting. The offensive limerick in itself was of no importance to him, his only concern was to what degree he could exploit it.

Erdogan needs to learn his limits.

And having positioned ourselves against Erdogan early on, we'll be on the right side of history once he is dumped. The same applies to the Trumpets and Brexocritters.

We will be on right side of history as long as we let him do what he wants to do right now. After that we can dump him all we want. He doesn't need to know that for now. How dense can you be... Let him do what he wants, let him feel powerful, let him occupy the Kurdish territories and move the refugees there. I do not think that he is stupid enough to start full on ethnic cleansing but he thinks that he is showing power this way to his people. Well, spoiler alert, we are not his people.

After the fact we can find ways to get him removed or sanction Turkey to remove him for us. Before this operation the situation stand as if Erdogan is trying to solve an existential threat to Turkey. When it is done there will not be such an argument because it has been done. After the fact Erdogan will only be a liability of sorts for the Turkish people and the Turkish state. It is a similar situation for Russia/Putin actually. People praised him for "saving Russia" and analysts said that he mostly solved an existential threat to a degree. But later on people started to realise that his presence is a severely detrimental factor in reltations between Russia and Europe or Russia and US. So his ratings and popularity is pretty low now. Having said that Erdogan is no Putin. Putin is hanging on while I do not think that Erdogan will be able to hang on for as long as Putin did. The people of Turkey themselves will dump him if we put pressure after the fact when he won't have an argument that he was solving an existential threat. We should have done the same with Russia.

Although the Russia situation was much more severe. So i guess we had no option to just wait a bit. While in Turkey we definately have an option to wait a bit until he is done and once he starts celebrating his victory we slam sanctions both from the side of Europe and US.

[Atlantis]

@Rich, I really don't get it what it is with your hatred for the Kurds. They are by far the most secular and progressive people in the region. Is it that you support religious fundamentalism? It is unfortunate that they had to fight on the side of the Americans, but they didn't really have a choice. Without any supply of modern arms, they and the Yazidis would have been wiped out by ISIS which was awash in American arms and financial support from the Golf states.

The Kurds won't just disappear into thin air. Either Erdogan gives them enough autonomy in Turkey or they will break up Turkey sooner or later, which would be my preferred outcome.

I agree that the use of sanctions by Trump is abusive. It's inflationary use will make it useless. That doesn't means that we should never ever use sanctions. It's better than going to war. At this point, an arms embargo and gradually tightening the economic sanctions against Erdogan is the right thing to do.

That the Saudis are even worse than the Turks is neither here nor there. We have a border with Turkey but not with KSA. Anyways, the Saudi pariahs are so useless that they don't represent a danger to anybody but themselves. Turkey is a different kettle of fish. The caliph is fucking with Greece, he's fueling the Syrian civil war, he's fucking with Cyprus, he is interfering on the Balkans, he is building mosques in Manchester, Berlin and Brussels to undermine Western societies. He needs to be stopped.

@JohnRawls, if you want sanctions against Russia then you must want sanctions against Turkey ten times more. If Erdogan had Putin's weapon's arsenal we would be fighting the Ottomans at the gates of Vienna at this stage.

[Atlantis]

As the mass exodus of Kurdish refugees starts ahead of the Turkish invasion, the first ISIS fighters have escaped from their camps and there allegedly was one attack by ISIS fighters in a Kurdish-held town.

Following, Finland, Norway, Sweden, The Netherlands, both France and Germany have decided to suspend arms sales to Turkey:

France says suspends weapons sales to Turkey

Germany bans exports of arms to Turkey

"Against the backdrop of the Turkish military offensive in north-eastern Syria, the Federal Government will not issue any new permits for all military equipment that could be used by Turkey in Syria", Foreign Minister Heiko Maas told the paper.

Germany exported arms worth 243 million euros ($268 million) to Turkey in 2018, accounting for almost one third of all German weapons exports, according to the paper. ($1 = 0.9058 euros) (Reporting by Arno Schuetze Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)

Erdogan speaking in front of a map that identify several Greek island as Turkish territory. Let's have no illusions about Erdogan's intentions:

[Stormsmith]

From Newsweek, https://www.newsweek.com/us-troops-syria-turkey-1464727

Fake News

I cannot believe this is your response to your own soldiers being endangered.

[Drlee]

If you put 40,000 republicans in a stadium you would have a lot of noise and no patriots. Membership in my party today is a disgrace.

So many chickenhawks and excuse makers.

They are destroying the country and would rather see that happen than admit they backed the wrong horse.

[annatar1914]

If you put 40,000 republicans in a stadium you would have a lot of noise and no patriots. Membership in my party today is a disgrace.

So many chickenhawks and excuse makers.

They are destroying the country and would rather see that happen than admit they backed the wrong horse.

So I can put this into context, you're talking about the Israel-Firster ''Neoconservative'' types and Godless Evangelicals who want endless wars and interventions to make the world safe for US global Hegemony (although we're not meant to be an Empire or global policeman), the Oil Sheiks, and Israel (not necessarily in that order)?

[Istanbuller]

I cannot believe this is your response to your own soldiers being endangered.

Apparently some fractions of Pentagon do not obey to President's order. Us President ordered them to withdraw from the region. If they don't refuse to obey, then they should face consequences. I hope that Turkish Army kill all those remnants.

[Drlee]

Apparently some fractions of Pentagon do not obey to President's order. Us President ordered them to withdraw from the region. If they don't refuse to obey, then they should face consequences. I hope that Turkish Army kill all those remnants.

If the Turkish army kills an American soldier you had better hope to all you hold holy that Trump stays in office. If it happens on the democrat's watch the US will roll through Turkey like it was butter. The best you could hope for are sanctions that leave you eating your own shoes.

Turkey is a pariah state. It is governed by a despot. Its people are weak and and its men effeminate in the face of a bully.

The days of Turkey getting any help from the US are over. Hopefully once Trump leaves office Turkish soldiers and diplomats will be expelled from the US at the very least.

[Stormsmith]

Apparently some fractions of Pentagon do not obey to President's order. Us President ordered them to withdraw from the region. If they don't refuse to obey, then they should face consequences. I hope that Turkish Army kill all those remnants.

I heard on the news yesterday America left 1,000 troops behind. Not too surprising. They still have troops in England, 75 years after WWII.

[Hindsite]

Why is Turkey expanding its military operations in northern Syria?

Turkey considers the YGP Kurdish forces a "terrorist organisation" linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a decades-long armed campaign for autonomy in Turkey. Turkey says the military incursion is meant to create a safe zone and peace corridor on the Syrian and Turkish border.

[skinster]

I like how Donald has proven that you should never, ever, trust America under any circumstances. Do not ally with us, do not make deals with us, because we will fuck you.

Selling out the Kurds was predicted because of US history with regards to deals and not abiding by them. Before Trump came strutting along in this war on Syria that the Democrats started.

Way to defend one of the most dangerous regimes of the century.

You mean the one that destroyed Libya and brought slavery to it? An achievement by the "first Black president" of the American empire, which is actually the most dangerous regime of our current century.

[Istanbuller]

I heard on the news yesterday America left 1,000 troops behind. Not too surprising. They still have troops in England, 75 years after WWII.

No. There are incoming reports that indicate they are still trying to patrol there.

Turkey considers the YGP Kurdish forces a "terrorist organisation" linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a decades-long armed campaign for autonomy in Turkey. Turkey says the military incursion is meant to create a safe zone and peace corridor on the Syrian and Turkish border.

Turkey plans to make all refugees and migrants returning to their homes. There will be new cities built in those areas. It will solve migration problem. I find this a good thing.

Maybe US shall follow the example. What do you think? You can do something with Mexico.

[Hindsite]

Heavy fighting as Turkey steps up push against Kurdish forces
Oct 10, 2019

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says the offensive - which began with air raids on Wednesday – aims to remove Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters from the border area to create a "safe zone" so millions of Syrian refugees can be returned.

Trump Insists US Must Get Out of Syria

Syrian refugees are tired of being in Turkey and want to go home as soon as Erdogan makes it safe.

[Rich]

@Rich, I really don't get it what it is with your hatred for the Kurds.

I don't hate the Kurds, I jut think its cretinous to ask the Turks for a supply route through Turkey to help the Kurds resist the Turks. Kick Turkey out of NATO, kick it out of the EU customs Union, end the Turkish EU accession process and I'll happily support sanctions against Turkey in return.