The Kurdish Betrayal: Business As Usual

 Ask Any South Vietnamese

"Many of us English-speakers use the phrase "young Turks" without pondering the origin of the expression: The original "young Turks" were the youthful activists agitating for reform in the last decades of the Ottoman Empire. The phrase itself recognizes a connection between political energy and demography. As yesterday confirmed, today's young Turks are Islamist. The Kemalists are old Turks."--Mark Steyn

Packed courts, phony elections, banned opposition parties:

"Lt. Col. Ralph Peters told The O'Reilly Factor that Obama "should have just kept his mouth shut, because the people staging this coup are on our side."
"They're against the Islamists, fundamentalists and extremists. They're for democracy. They're for a secular constitution."
Peters said that President Obama "romanticizes Islam."
"He's somehow talked himself into believing that Erdogan is our ally and friend, where he has been insidious and pernicious, undercutting our interests."

He lamented what he called the dismantling of a great, fascinating country with a rich history by "an Islamist fundamentalist authoritarian president."
"And our president is taking his side," he added."................

John Zmirak at Restoring Liberty: "There was one policy, just one, that the U.S. had engaged in which seemed to be working out well: Our government’s backing of the Syrian Democratic Forces, Kurdish-led militias that are allied with local Christians (the Syriac Military Council and the Nineveh Plain Force), that with growing success are taking territory away from ISIS. In those liberated regions, the SDF has established enclaves where Christians have religious freedom and their own armed militias, and women take part in government (unlike in most of the Middle East). ...

What motivation does the Obama administration have for turning against its erstwhile allies, the best hope in a desolate region for establishing something like a free and pluralist government? ...[W]e are currying favor with Turkey — the former secular democracy which is morphing before our eyes into an Islamist dictatorship, in the wake of a failed coup that has proved a pretext for a massive purge of secular-minded dissidents.

This is the same Turkey that has gone from provoking Russia (by shooting down a plane that was fighting ISIS) to cozying up to Putin. Turkey is also blackmailing the European Union for huge cash payments and visa-free travel throughout the continent, with the threat that if these demands are not granted, Turkey will dump hundreds of thousands more Syrian migrants across the EU border into Greece and Bulgaria.

So concerned are U.S. generals over Turkey’s untrustworthiness that they have pulled U.S. nuclear weapons out of their longtime Turkish base of Incirlik.

Turkey has for decades savagely repressed its large and growing Kurdish minority, and its autocratic president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, would rather see ISIS prevail in Syria than the creation of a free, democratic Kurdish region that might serve as a magnet for armed Kurdish rebels in Turkey.

To patch up relations with that regime, the Obama administration has apparently decided to throw its Kurdish and Christian allies to the wolves — and embark on a campaign of flattery aimed at Erdoğan. ...Biden gushed that “the American people … stand in awe” of Erdoğan and his supporters for beating back the bungled coup. Biden did not mention the ugly crackdown that was taking place all around him as he spoke."...........

Reuters: "Turkish-backed forces pushed deeper into northern Syria on Monday and drew a rebuke from NATO ally the United States, which said it was concerned the battle for territory had shifted away from targeting Islamic State. .... "We want to make clear that we find these clashes - in areas where ISIL is not located - unacceptable and a source of deep concern," said Brett McGurk, U.S special envoy for the fight against Islamic State, using an acronym for the jihadists." [used only by weenies and hacks]

BBC: "Ankara wants to force the Kurds to withdraw to the east of the Euphrates River, stopping short of establishing a corridor to link two Kurdish-led areas in north-western Syria.

Turkey enjoys tacit support from Russia, the Assad government and Iran in acting to prevent further territorial gains by the Kurds and their allies. The US, on the other side, has said it will try to prevent Turkey coming into conflict with its allies in the region.

A possible Turkish campaign against the Kurds in Syria could also risk igniting further clashes with the Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK) militants inside Turkey. The PKK recently upped its attacks significantly in correlation with the Turkish operation inside Syria.

US Envoy Brett McGurk tweeted from a Defense Department briefing, saying the US "was not involved in these activities, they were not coordinated with US forces and we do not support them. Accordingly, we call on all armed actors to stand down and take  appropriate measures to deconflict and open channels of communication."" ..........

Do you "stand in awe" of Erdogan like Joe Biden does? I don't. On the other hand, Joe Biden stands in awe of the Chia Pet.

The Kurds aren't perfect, but they've been good allies, much better than Erdogan. And they never led a terrorist flotilla against Israel like Erdogan did, either.

Erdogan's also the one who let tens of thousands of ISIS recruits into Syria in the first place. And then facilitated the flood of millions of refugees and terror moles into Europe--and the USA. Of course, he had some help...

"Hmm...I wonder how much damage we can do before Trump takes office...?"