What Turkey wants in Syria
Turkey has conducted an airstrike against Kurds in Irak and northern Syria in February and announced in June that it will conduct an operation against forces in Kobane.
According to the Minister of Defense, the goal was to protect the Turkish people from extremists and terrorists. One can wonder whether this was the only reason or if there is more behind.
Do Syrian Kurds represent a danger for Turkey?
In part, but Turkey probably instrumentalizes the confrontation with Kurds abroad in order to pursue other objectives. The Kurdish worker’s party PKK is forbidden in Turkey and is also recognized as a terrorist group in the US and the EU. Still, the Turkish State and the PKK have clashed repeatedly since 1984 – and it would be incorrect to reduce this confrontation to terrorism. In Syria and Iraq also, there are Kurds who try to acquire independence or autonomy. In Syria, the Kurds are represented by the YPG militia and their territory protected by this organization. In Iraq, the autonomous region Kurdistan has its own branch of the army: The Peshmerga. The official position of the YPG as well as that of the Peshmerga is completely clear: They are only responsible for the Kurds in their own country and they are not concerned by what happens in Turkey. The YPG regards itself as completely separated from the PKK and independent. They say they only protect the rights and interests of Kurds in Syria and not those of the Turkish Kurds.
As such, the argument, according to which Kurds in foreign countries would be a danger for Turkey seems entirely artificial. Yes, the PKK uses terrorist methods. Indeed, there surely are contacts between Kurds in Turkey and in foreign countries. But they still are two different groups with cultural differences that thus have different interests and expectations for the future.
If in the future the YPG and the PYD, the party close to this militia, succeed in establishing a state which has a high degree of autonomy, would this represent a danger for Turkey? It is conceivable that such a state would support the PKK to a certain extent. However, it can rather be expected that a Kurdish State in Syria would foster good relations with its powerful Turkish neighbor, as the Kurdish autonomous region in Iraq also does. There is no reason why a Kurdish region in Syria would be different from the Kurdish region in Iraq and not have good relations with Turkey.
Does Turkey have other objectives in Syria?
Yes, definitely. One could also say that Kurds are only a pretext for Turkey to act militarily in the region. With the operation “Source of Peace”, Turkey established a so-called “safe zone” on the Syrian territory. This means a 30km large stripe of land, along the Turkish border, that is controlled by Turkey. This Zone would be used to send millions of Syrian immigrants back and forcefully settle them there. Turkey massively infringes on the rights of refugees and there are even a high number of reports about torture.
The actual issue is political: Erdogan needs a scapegoat and chose the Kurds as such. His economic policy harmed Turkey much and his party lost popularity. A simple solution is to say migrants are the culprits and are responsible for the high level of unemployment. The operation in Syria represents an opportunity to show that Erdogan fights for his people, against terrorists and against migrants.
