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| The Grand Turk | |
| Will Turkey Invade Syria? | |
| 2011-08-11 | |
| by Lord Garth There are only two regional powers that could invade Syria and hold territory. One is Israel which will not be doing so and one is Turkey which might. Turkey has an enormous advantage in air power over Syria probably has enough competent ground forces to take and hold a buffer zone. The questions are: - 1. What would be in it for Turkey; and, - 2. What would the rest of the world do? #1, Turkey feels its prestige is on the line. They hate the thought of chaos on one of their borders. They hate the thought of a neighbor essentially defying them. They also believe that the population in a buffer zone would consider them as heros. On the other hand, an invasion would be costly. It would also seem to be a danger diplomatically which brings us to #2, The Gulf States, the Saudis and maybe a few more countries would probably support such a move. If Assad fell as a result, any condemnations would be hollow and any UN statements would be even more watery than otherwise. Any bets on whether this plays out and how deep a buffer zone would be needed, e.g., 5 mi or 10 mi or 15 mi?
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| Posted by:Lord Garth |
| #14 What about Iran's nukes? The won't announce that capacity until they get nuclear tipped ICBMs, targeted at US cities. Why would they wait until they can reach the U.S., Glavitle Bucket1058, when Israel is so much closer, and they see wiping Israel off the map as necessary to redeem the entire Muhammed experiment? |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2011-08-11 22:47 |
| #13 Good question, because Iran is already thinking about colonizing Iraq, when the US leaves. Taking Syria would leave them with a huge Near East bloc. What about Iran's nukes? The won't announce that capacity until they get nuclear tipped ICBMs, targeted at US cities. Why won't BHO pre-empt a Homeland threat? His Homeland isn't in the US. |
| Posted by: Glavitle Bucket1058 2011-08-11 21:01 |
| #12 well, except for the nukes at Incirlik. |
| Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain 2011-08-11 16:04 |
| #11 Syria has WMD and Turkey doesn't. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2011-08-11 16:01 |
| #10 I'm with Moose and Zang. Turkey looks like it is going thru a soft version of the purges after the Iranian 'revolution'. The last thing the Turk Government would want to do is mobilize the army. + no one is going to welcome the Turks as liberators. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2011-08-11 15:21 |
| #9 The Kurds don't lack for small arms or training. They've made nods & winks and a package dropped off the truck or 2 into a well organized, experienced and effective National Militia, reminds of um..... that deh... Haganah. |
| Posted by: S 2011-08-11 14:04 |
| #8 Finally, the Iranians would definitely go nuts if Turkish soldiers started playing "Blitzkrieg along the Euphrates". It probably wouldn't go so far as actual festivities, but I doubt Erdogan needs the mullahs making faces across his eastern border. They might even start arming the Kurds. I think this is the biggest factor weighing against any invasion. Well, second biggest, after the chaos unleashed by the latest purges. |
| Posted by: charger 2011-08-11 11:38 |
| #7 Dollars to donuts Erdogen is trying to replace the entire military command with hand picked Islamist loyalists with no serious military training or experience, just like what the Iranians did after their revolution. Such people are utterly indifferent to their own military getting slaughtered, since they distrust or even hate them anyway. Then their next thought is to augment their diminished numbers with civilians to charge the enemy machine guns. I think the mistake here is in assuming that Turkish soldiers will simply obey their superiors. The Islamists are at a point of inflexion. The existing internal security apparatus isn't strong enough to be able to use the usual threats of assassination and torture to cow the Turkish military. The problem is that to get over the threshold, the Islamists in power need to push beyond the point that fear supersedes resentment and rebellious sentiment. But in taking the steps to get to the point where fear inspires automatic obedience, they may trigger an insurrection by troops fearing that it may soon be too late to remove the looming tyranny. The other problem is that the Arabs won't take too kindly to Turks invading Arab lands. It's one thing to invite Turks into a country, and quite another to get them to leave. Talk about deja vu all over again. I don't think there is a single Arab country that thinks it could stop the Turks once they get going. Why would Saudi Arabia want Turkish troops closer to its borders? Didn't they have enough trouble evicting the Turks after centuries of Turkish domination? Note that the Turks don't have a problem exterminating rebellious populations. How do Arabs justify supporting a Turkish invasion that then - in order to minimize Turkish casualties - kills millions of Arabs in an effort to drive them out of Syria? |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2011-08-11 10:44 |
| #6 Frankly, if I were a Turkish officer, given an order to plan an invasion of a neighboring country with which we were technically at peace, I might convert the exercise into a coup myself if I thought I could get away with it. Precisely. A troop mobilization could turn into a purge of Turkey's Islamists. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2011-08-11 10:30 |
| #5 Such people are utterly indifferent to their own military getting slaughtered, since they distrust or even hate them anyway. Then their next thought is to augment their diminished numbers with civilians to charge the enemy machine guns. Because, in the final analysis, such scum don't give a crap about civilian casualties, either. Same could be said about a great many governments. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2011-08-11 10:24 |
| #4 Dollars to donuts Erdogen is trying to replace the entire military command with hand picked Islamist loyalists with no serious military training or experience, just like what the Iranians did after their revolution. Such people are utterly indifferent to their own military getting slaughtered, since they distrust or even hate them anyway. Then their next thought is to augment their diminished numbers with civilians to charge the enemy machine guns. Because, in the final analysis, such scum don't give a crap about civilian casualties, either. The only twist to this scenario is NATO, because they won't give diddly for support to a non-NATO certified officer, even if he is adorned as a 14-star general. While it's unlikely that Erdogen would pull out of NATO, Turkey would no longer be a functioning part of it. Much to the delight of the Greeks, who are capitalizing on every gaffe the Turks pull. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2011-08-11 10:14 |
| #3 no link... it is an opinion piece by me |
| Posted by: Lord Garth 2011-08-11 09:38 |
| #2 Is there an article this is supposed to be linked to? The Turks aren't going to invade Syria. For one thing, Kurds aren't nomads, you can't convince them to go seize Arab lands to the south & evacuate their actual homes in southern Turkey. Not unless you want to indulge in the usual ethnic-cleansing atrocities to *make* them want to do so. Also, the Turkish military is paralyzed by Erdogan's rolling purge and decorative show trial display. They couldn't even plan an incursion right now, not without half the staff involved getting tossed in jug for plotting another phantasmic coup. Frankly, if I were a Turkish officer, given an order to plan an invasion of a neighboring country with which we were technically at peace, I might convert the exercise into a coup myself if I thought I could get away with it. Finally, the Iranians would definitely go nuts if Turkish soldiers started playing "Blitzkrieg along the Euphrates". It probably wouldn't go so far as actual festivities, but I doubt Erdogan needs the mullahs making faces across his eastern border. They might even start arming the Kurds. |
| Posted by: Mitch H. 2011-08-11 09:17 |
| #1 Turkey has a Kurdish problem. The Kurds are breading faster than the Turks so the problem will become worse. Invading Syria and convincing Turkish Kurds to move and give up all claim to land in Turkey in exchange for their own homeland would solve that problem. Manage that and then Turkey just has to solve their self-created Cypress problem. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2011-08-11 09:07 |