Posted on 02/10/2016 12:43:58 PM PST by Trumpinator
Turkish leader: U.S. responsible for 'sea of blood' for supporting Syrian Kurds
By Greg Botelho, CNN
Updated 12:29 PM ET, Wed February 10, 2016
(CNN)Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has had no shortage of harsh, withering words for enemies involved in the bloody civil war in neighboring Syria.
Now, he's turning his verbal barrage on a key NATO ally: the United States.
Erdogan ripped into Washington on Wednesday, claiming it's responsible for a "sea of blood" in Syria for what he called its ignorance about dangers posed by other groups, not just ISIS, in the region. Specifically, he slammed America's refusal not just to resist branding Syrian Kurdish fighters as terrorists but in supporting them militarily.
"I told you many times: Are you with us or with this terrorist organization?" a fiery Erdogan told a gathering of village leaders, according to Turkish state media.
Such anger against Washington is noteworthy, though a Turkish leader lashing out at Kurds is nothing new. The ethnic group has been a thorn in Ankara's side for decades, having been blamed for violence as part of its separatist push. Ankara has fought back and is still fighting back, with the Kurds viewed as a very real threat.
Generally, Turkey's allies haven't gotten involved in this fight. But what's happening in Syria -- specifically, the rise of ISIS, which is widely regarded as a ruthless and, at times, barbaric terrorist group -- has changed the equation.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
It was once the case no foreign leader of a banana republic client state to the USA would dare speak like that about the US.
Wasn’t Turkey buying ISIS oil? ...stolen oil.
We should have been supporting Kurds going way back to the Bush administration.
We are late to the game, and the Russians have beat us to the Kurds, and probably will get some Air bases on Kurdish soil. - Tom
Images and videos surfaced this past weekend that appeared to show an armored police vehicle dragging the body of a Kurdish man tied by the neck to the back of the vehicle. Much of the state controlled media in the country quickly questioned the authenticity of the footage, but later said it was likely done as safety precaution. The pro-AKP Aksam daily claimed that dragging bodies was a routine practice that is performed across the world as a security precaution, for dead bodies suspected of being booby-trapped.
It was later discovered that the body was of Hac Lokman Birlik, the brother-in-law of Peoples Democratic Party (HDP) Member of Parliament Leyla Birlik. Turkey Today Zaman newspaper said that Birlik was buried after a funeral on Saturday in the Dicle neighborhood in Sirnak, and that local HDP authorities including Leyla Birlik attended the funeral.
Kurds are putting up a good fight, but isn’t their lead organization already Communist aligned?
If Russia can destabilize Turkey to a point where Kurds are supported and can get a better foothold, Russia solves a major problem.
ISIS will have no way to get to Russia via the middle east. Turkey and Syria are their firewall.
When we were fighting in Iraq the Kurds seemed to be the only group of Muslims who were not against us.
The Kurds never got their Kurdistan when that area was chopped up by the European decision makers, and the boundaries were drawn. Whatever their allegiances are now, they were not a hindrance to us.
We have shown we can't be relied on, so the Kurds should look out for their own interests, and not count on our fickle support. - Tom
God Bless the Kurds glad your OK
Vacate our bases in Turkey and kick Turkey out of NATO. There was a time when, logistically, having Turkey in NATO made sense. And even that was predicated on Turkey being a secular and moderate (relatively speaking) country. Turkey is no longer secular and no longer “moderate,” so its usefulness is over. What’s more, it is not just useless, it is an outright liability.
Just like those damn Armenians that the Turks had to dispose of.
I realize it was long ago but Kurds had no problems murdering thousands of their Christian neighbors in dozens of towns when told to do so by the Turkish Authorities. Read up on Armenian massacres of the 1890’s and around WWI. They have been since then and to this day horrible to Christians in the Karabakh region.
It’s maddening!
bttt
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