It is not stated where the author writes from, but it is not inside Turkey.
Turkey's "invasion" of Efrin is not about border security. It is about a deal between Turkey, Iran, Syria (Assad) and Russia. It is about oil assets and access for pipelines to deliver it to Europe.
Far too much blood has been spilled already. It is time to end this.
Turkey is particularly unstable and dangerous under Erdogan the Islamist. But it has always had some of this baggage. Erdogan is not an ally of the US. He was a close friend of Obama and is on the side of ISIS and Al Qaeda. Both of which are in his FSA army.
I suspect the new troops he has deployed to the border are Turks. They have moved large numbers of tanks and Howitzers to the border. For the past week since the UN declared the ceasefire (?), Turkey has greatly increased the air attacks and shelling. Neither of those are targeted attacks, they are aimed at destroying entire villages and civilian assets. This has greatly increased both civilian and combat deaths and injuries. The Turkish claims of Syrian combatant kills is far too high, the Human rights claims of kills is too low. Reason? Turkey Lies. NGO's are cautious to verify each death. SDF is more accurate than the other 2 on their reports. Efrin Syrian combat deaths are high, but Turkish FSA combat deaths are far larger. Turkish combat deaths are larger than Turkey admits.
Can’t involve Russia.
They’re the savior of Christianity.
/s
Russia is fightig in Syria to maintain assad’s power. I am glad that Christians have benefited and they have slaughtered ISIS members.
But TOO MANY here go way overboard in their praise of Putin.
yesterday, the Kurds accused the U.S. of abandoning them.
i wonder which is it ?
Since I spent a little time in Turkey myself, I have never thought of Turkey as our friend and ally.
“I suspect the new troops he has deployed to the border are Turks. They have moved large numbers of tanks and Howitzers to the border.”
If it is tanks and howitzers, they are Turks. I would guess that this is the reinforcement that we speculated might be committed, when the Turkish Army Chief of Staff visited the battle front near Afrin, a few weeks ago.
It could be a reaction to bad results (the more favorable scenario), or it might have been built into their original plan (a less favorable scenario, where there is little internal pressure to withdraw). I find it hard to believe that they would have planned for the operation to advance this slowly.
The original Turkish campaign plan likely included phases, with additional units designated to enter combat, when certain conditions were met. The obvious phase would be deployment of an urban assault force, once the city of Afrin was encircled. They might have also planned for a reinforcement, in case planned rates of advance were not achieved.
In any case, it does not seem that the level of casualties or equipment losses inflicted on Turkish forces has yet been enough to deter them. Operationally, they could continue to send wave after wave of fresh units, every couple of months in a long grind, as long as they have the political will to do so. Alternatively, they might also commit to attempt a larger (quicker) blitzkrieg - but that is probably what they thought they would have achieved with their original assault.
The Kurdish options are to either inflict enough casualties/losses to deter the Turks politically, or hold back Turkish advances until political conditions turn against Turkey. No easy options.