Over the weekend the US announced that they planned to help create a 30,000-man Kurdish border force in Syria:
REUTERS – The United States announced its support on Sunday for plans for a “border force” to defend territory held by U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led fighters in northern Syria.
“To prevent any attack… there must be a deterrent force that protects the border between our areas and the others,” Fawza Youssef, a senior Kurdish politician, told Reuters.
“Until a political settlement is reached in Syria, these areas need protection. Now, there aren’t any guarantees,” she said.
But Erdogan says the Kurds are terrorists and vows to keep it from ever happening:
Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan threatened on Monday to “strangle” a planned 30,000-strong U.S.-backed force in Syria “before it’s even born,” as Washington’s backing for Kurdish fighters drove a wedge into relations with one of its main Middle East allies.
The strongest denunciation came from Erdogan, who has presided as relations between the United States and its biggest Muslim ally within NATO have stretched to the breaking point.
“A country we call an ally is insisting on forming a terror army on our borders,” Erdogan said of the United States in a speech in Ankara. “What can that terror army target but Turkey?”
“Our mission is to strangle it before it’s even born.”
Erdogan said Turkey had completed preparations for an operation in Kurdish-held territory in northern Syria.
And it’s not just Erdogan. Assad also plans to ‘crush’ this border force and Russia doesn’t want it there either:
The Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad responded on Monday by vowing to crush the new force and drive U.S. troops from the country. Assad’s ally Russia called the plans a plot to dismember Syria and place part of it under U.S. control.
Erdogan has been on the warpath against the Kurds in Syria over the last two years. He’s invaded Syria and taken over Kurdish cities along the northern area west of the Euphrates. And he’s continuing his march to destroy the Kurds in Afrin with plans to go as far south as Idlib, at this point.
So I don’t think his words are just hyperbole. The fact that Assad is also against it and has Russia’s backing makes me wonder if the US will actually go through with this force. But if we don’t, who will stand with the Kurds in Syria? And if we do, are we willing to risk going to war?