Posted on 05/29/2016 11:50:28 PM PDT by Eleutheria5
Turkey is offering to "join forces" with Washington for a special operation inside Syria on condition it doesn't include a Syrian Kurdish militia blacklisted by Ankara but seen as an ally by the US, the foreign minister said.
Washington's support of Kurdish fighters in Syria in the fight against Islamic State (ISIS) jihadists has angered Ankara, especially after AFP pictures last week revealed US commandos wearing patches of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) outlawed by Turkey.
"If we join forces, they (the US) have their own special forces and we have our special forces," Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told a small group of journalists.
"The subject we are discussing with the Americans is the closure of the Manbij pocket as soon as possible... and the opening of a second front," he said, referring to a backdoor border route favored by ISIS for smuggling jihadists into and out of Syria.
"We say okay, a second front should be opened but not with the PYD," he said, referring to the Democratic Union Party (PYD), the YPG's political wing.
Cavusoglu said Syrian Arab opposition forces opposing the regime of President Bashar al-Assad could be backed up with special forces from Turkey and NATO ally Washington as well as from France, Britain and Germany.
Such a "second front" could "easily" head to the Islamic State's self-declared capital in Raqa to the south.
"Unfortunately, both Russia and the United States see a terrorist organization as a partner and support it," he said of the YPG.
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(Excerpt) Read more at israelnationalnews.com ...
This does not make sense — across the border from Turkey you have (from east to west): Kurds in a long wave, then the Islamic state, then the Syrian government and then a small enclave of non-IS Syrian jihadis (I refuse to call them “moderates”). There is no way for these non-IS jihadis to fight the IS directly
Turkey would just shelter the jihadis if they got US topcover to invade Syria. They would rename, rearm and relaunch the jihadis, while slaughtering Kurds.
ISIS was always a bastard child of Turkey and Saudi Arabia/Qatar.
If it’s a choice between Turkey and the Kurds, I’d pick the Kurds. Erdogan is a two-faced, lying sack of @#$&.
Thanks Eleutheria5.
The Kurds are the only group over there worth helping.
The Turks have been aiding ISIS and Al Queda jihadis.
The Turks only interest is killing Kurds.
They’re still looking for any excuse to invade Syria.
Damn straight.
Meanwhile in Kurdistan
The story of three ISIS militants inside a tunnel
Colonel Younis Muhammad of the Peshmerga said to me, “An ISIS militant was killed and as I was inspecting his corpse his cell phone rang. It was his wife calling. When I answered she said, ‘Where is Abu Musab?’ I said he is dead. And she said, ‘no, he is in paradise,’ and I said, ‘No, he is actually lying there dead in front of me.”
http://rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/310520163
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