BEIRUT // Turkey reacted angrily on Wednesday to Washington’s decision to arm Syrian Kurdish fighters, saying the move would help bolster terrorists who pose a threat to the Turkish state.
The United States said the plan to arm the Kurdish YPG militia, approved by president Donald Trump on Tuesday, would “ensure a clear victory” over ISIL in the Syrian city of Raqqa – the extremists’ last remaining major stronghold.
But the move will also greatly empower the YPG, vastly increasing the likelihood of an independent Kurdish state or autonomous region after the war and further souring relations with Nato ally Turkey, which considers the Kurdish militia a terrorist organisation.
On Wednesday, the Syrian Democratic Forces, an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters dominated by the YPG, said it had fully captured the town of Tabqa and the adjacent dam – the largest in Syria – from ISIL.
That victory, only 40 kilometres from Raqqa and achieved with support from US air strikes and special forces, can only strengthen Washington’s argument that the YPG has been its most effective ally on the ground against ISIL.
But to Turkey, the group is an arm of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been at war with the Turkish state on and off since the 1980s.
Turkish officials, who have long pushed for the US to rely more heavily on Turkey and its Syrian Arab rebel proxies in the battle for Raqqa, were united in their condemnation of Washington’s announcement.
“I hope very much that this mistake will be reversed immediately,” said Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s president.
“I will personally express our worries in a detailed way when we talk with president Trump on May 16.”
The issue would also be discussed at the Nato summit in Brussels on May 25, he said.
“We want to believe that our allies would prefer to be side by side with ourselves rather than with the terror groups.”
Prime minister Binali Yildirim said: “Any initiative to support the PKK directly or indirectly is unacceptable for us.”
Turkey’s foreign minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu, said every weapon that ended up in YPG hands was a threat to Turkey, while deputy prime minister Nurettin Canikli told the US that it was “in the same sack as terrorist organisations”.
Washington’s backing of the YPG began in 2014, and has constantly agitated Turkey and driven a wedge between the two allies.
Ankara was publicly optimistic at first when Mr Trump was elected, hoping that his campaign promise of a revamped strategy to combat ISIL would include abandoning Washington’s reliance on Kurdish forces.
But under Mr Trump, the US has instead consolidated its support for the Kurds while trying – as did the previous Obama administration – to reassure Ankara of its intentions.
Although the Tuesday announcement was the first time Washington had stated an intention to give weapons to the YPG, Kurdish fighters in Syria have previously been spotted with American equipment. They also host and fight alongside 900 US soldiers – troops that have recently had to act as human shields along the Syria-Turkey border after Turkish air strikes targeted YPG positions last month.
While the US considers the PKK a terrorist organisation, it has maintained that the YPG is a separate, independent entity. The groups are closely affiliated, however, sharing an ideology – and often combatants.
On Tuesday, the Pentagon said the Syrian Democratic Forces, a YPG-dominated rebel alliance, was “the only force on the ground that can successfully seize Raqqa in the near future”. This was an explicit signal to Turkey that the US was not considering Ankara’s proposal for Turkish forces and rebel proxies – who are, at best, months away from the city – to launch an offensive. Instead, the US was siding with the Kurds.
“We have to be completely real here. The Turkish plan that they proposed, the alternative, was never feasible,” said Aaron Stein, a Turkey expert at the Washington-based Atlantic Council. What delayed America’s decision, he deduced, was “a self-imposed debate in Washington about how to break the news to Turkey, not so much about seriously considering the Turkish plan”.
Despite Turkey’s anger and the apparent impasse over the role of the YPG, US secretary of defence, Gen Jim Mattis, remained optimistic yesterday that Washington could calm Turkey’s nerves.
“We’ll work out any of the concerns,” he said during a visit to Lithuania. “We will work very closely with Turkey in support of their security on their southern border. It’s Europe’s southern border, and we’ll stay closely connected.”
On Tuesday, hours before the US announced it would start arming the YPG, Gen Mattis said Washington would work alongside Turkey to “take Raqqa down”.
Mr Erdogan is scheduled to travel to Washington next week for his first meeting with Mr Trump – a meeting that was expected to be tense even before the US announced it was going to arm Syria’s Kurds.
The YPG, which stands to gain not only weapons but power and greater legitimacy internationally through the deal, welcomed the additional backing from the US.
“The White House’s resolution to officially supply weapons to YPG fighters is rightful, albeit a bit late,” YPG spokesman Redur Xelil said yesterday. “We believe that henceforth, our units will play a more significant, influential and decisive role in the fight against terrorism.”
Bayar Dosky, a professor of political science at the American University of Kurdistan in the Iraqi Kurdish city of Dohuk, said the move could help establish Kurdish independence in Syria and force Turkey to accept the YPG’s presence there. He pointed out that Turkey’s opposition to Iraqi Kurdistan in the past – which included threats of invasion – had eventually waned, with the Kurdistan regional government now an important Turkish partner in the region.
“I don’t think Turkey can do a lot to change American policy in Rojava (the Kurdish area of Syria), at least regarding the YPG,” Mr Dosky said. “They (the US) made up their mind about that. They sent a very strong message to Recep Tayyip Erdogan.”
jwood@thenational.ae
* With additional reporting from Reuters