“The Kurds… are not angels if you take a look.” It did not take long for US President Donald Trump to renounce Kurdish forces who had been fighting alongside American soldiers for nearly a decade in their largely successful battle against Islamic State. As Turkey kept pushing against the growing power and influence of the Kurdish militia on its border, Trump opted to cut and run, leaving the Kurds at the mercy of Turkish troops. As the Turks overran Kurdish defences in northeastern Syria, Trump shot off a bizarre letter to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in a language unheard of in the annals of global diplomacy. “Don’t be a tough guy. Don’t be a fool,” wrote Trump, warning Erdogan that history would think of him as the devil if he did not listen. Erdogan’s office later revealed that the Turkish president threw the letter “in the dustbin with the contempt it deserved”
Erdogan has been planning an incursion into northeastern Syria along the Turkish border for quite some time intending to cleanse the area of Kurdish fighters and create a 30km-deep buffer zone. He has been particularly wary about the Kurd-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces, a key American ally in its fight against Islamic State. Turkey wants YPG, a Kurdish unit within the SDF, to steer clear of the Turkish border and the buffer zone. The SDF has been the predominant force in the fight against the Islamic State and it had lost more than 10,000 men in the battle. A few months ago, under American instructions, it had dismantled fortifications along the Turkish border in deference to Turkish security concerns. Trump, however, chose to ignore the security guarantee it offered the Kurds and permitted Turkish invasion of the Kurdish enclave.
There has been widespread global opposition to Erdogan’s invasion. The US Congress passed a bipartisan resolution condemning Turkey. Republican senator Mitt Romney called Trump’s decision to abandon the Kurds as “a bloodstain in the annals of American history”. Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell and Senator Lindsey Graham, two staunch Trump allies from the Republican Party, also condemned the move. Graham called it the biggest mistake of the Trump presidency.
Other countries such as Russia, Iran, the European Union and India, too, have criticised the Turkish action and asked for an immediate ceasefire. Erdogan, who was initially reluctant to halt the invasion, instead of demanding the Kurdish fighters to lay down their arms, have has now agreed to a five-day ceasefire—calling it a pause in fighting—after a meeting with US Vice President Mike Pence in Ankara. Erdogan is expected to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in Sochi on October 22 to discuss the crisis.
