Boardman writes: "The continuing incoherence, insanity, and ultimate inanity
of US policy in and around Syria was highlighted brilliantly, albeit perhaps
inadvertently, by Vice President Joe Biden on a state visit to Turkey August
24, when he threatened the most effective fighting force against the Islamic
State - the Kurdish militias - with American punishment if they didn't play
nice with the Turks."
Turkish prime minister Binali Yildirim, right, and U.S. vice president Joe
Biden at Cankaya Palace in Ankara. (photo: AFP/Getty Images)
New US Policy: Kill the Kurds
By William Boardman, Reader Supported News
29 August 16
Syria: what do you do when you dont know what to do?
The continuing incoherence, insanity, and ultimate inanity of US policy in
and around Syria was highlighted brilliantly, albeit perhaps inadvertently,
by Vice President Joe Biden on a state visit to Turkey August 24, when he
threatened the most effective fighting force against the Islamic State the
Kurdish militias with American punishment if they didnt play nice with
the Turks, who have spent years supporting the Islamic State (aka ISIS or
ISIL), attacking bad Kurds in Turkey and Iraq, and who are now attacking
good Kurds in Syria.
This is not quite as complicated as it is stupid, self-defeating, and
ultimately deceitful. Lets review the bidding:
The Turks are a NATO ally whose reliability is an on-and-off thing
unrelated to Turkeys actual treaty obligations. The only reason Turkey is
part of NATO is because somebody during the Cold War thought it would be a
good idea to counter the USSR. With the USSR gone, Turkey is more like a
dagger pointed at the heart of NATO, hence the delicate
psycho-diplo-military dance NATO nations have had to follow for years,
unwilling to cut Turkey loose from NATO, even now, as the Turkish government
devolves toward authoritarianism and tighter ties with Russia. Putting it in
perspective, Turkeys longstanding, abysmal record on political and human
rights is a prime reason that the European Union continues to deny Turkey EU
membership. Turkey is not a truly modern state: Turks waged a genocidal
campaign against its Armenian citizens a century ago, but its still against
the law to mention that genocide in Turkey (by comparison, Americans can
talk freely about the greater American genocide against native peoples, but
the progress toward anything like justice is about the same in both
countries).
The Kurds are for the Turks, metaphorically, the 21st century
Armenians. The Turks exhibit all the signs of wanting to wage genocidal war
on the Kurds but they are held off by multiple factors, not least the
current taboo on genocide upheld by NATO and the EU, at least publicly, most
of the time. The Kurds are also more militarized than the Armenians ever
were, and the Kurdish home territory is a mountainous region that has
resisted invaders for centuries. Also the Kurdish region is spread over four
countries, so any Turkish genocide of the Kurds would work only if it
included attacks on Iran, Iraq, and Syria. Each of those countries has also
gone through periods of Kurdish repression, so there is always the
theoretical possibility of an allied genocide of the Kurds. Right now, the
Kurds in Turkey, having survived an attempted Kurdish genocide in the 1930s,
continue their low level conflict with the Turkish military, punctuated by
periods like the current high level conflict. The Kurds long for their own
country, a Kurdistan, and no one else wants them to have that for reasons
that are obscure and chronically destabilizing. (A similar situation keeps
Afghanistan unstable, where the Pashtun are spread across southern
Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan, and no one wants them to have their
own Pashtunistan, either.)
The US has no vital interests in any of these places. To be clear,
the country of the United States has no vital interests. The empire of the
United States is a different, undemocratic, self-directed global power
structure that sees vital interests in faraway yurts in the most distant
desert. That part is not up for debate. But the distinction between the US
as a country and the US as an empire helps to understand why the country is
pushed into doing things that are stupid, self-destructive, and
planet-threatening on behalf of the empire. Everybody pretty much knows,
even if they wont admit it, that with a nod from the US the Turkish
genocide of the Kurds could begin tomorrow, if not sooner. That is the
context for the creative tension within which the US VP makes his not so
veiled threats.
Biden to Kurds: defend yourselves from the Turks and we will hurt you
August 24, the day that VP Biden was talking tough in Ankara, was the same
day the US and Turkey went to war against Syria, although it mostly wasnt
reported that way. It was advertised as Turkey finally responding to pleas
to fight ISIS. Some called it an escalation and some called it an
incursion, echoing official lines in Viet Nam, but it was an invasion. As
invasions go, it was pretty small potatoes, unreported in detail, but
involving probably a few hundred troops with heavy artillery support, and
maybe dozens of tanks and aircraft. This was not the first Turkish attack on
Syria, but its the first to seize and hold territory, and to do so with US
sanction and air support (even though US special forces are on one of the
other sides).
The reality is that Syria is still a sovereign country with a legitimate
government still in place. No matter what may be true about the Syrian
government or the all-but-uncountable forces arrayed against it and within
it, the government remains legitimate, which is why the US and others keep
calling for its overthrow. The Syrian government is fighting a very
complicated, five-year-old civil war against combatants both Syrian and
foreign, some of whom control significant areas of Syria, over which theyre
fighting with the Syrian government and each other. As civil wars go, this
one is particularly messy, not only because Syria was made up all along of
different ethnic groups. Since Syrian citizens took up arms against their
government, they have enjoyed, if thats the right word, outside support of
various kinds and quantities of fighters and materiel from the US, Turkey,
Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Israel, Lebanon, and probably Jordan (which, with
Turkey, has sheltered millions of Syrian refugees).
Even so, when the Turkish military with US air support crosses the border
and captures the town of Jarabulus (population around 26,000), thats a new
thing in this war where other countries mostly use proxies to fight for
whatever they think theyre fighting for, not their own armed forces. Russia
is an exception, fighting for the Syrian government at the invitation of the
Syrian government. Every other combatant is an uninvited guest. When the
US-backed Turkish military crossed the border and captured Syrian territory,
that was an act of undeclared war (like the US war with the Saudis on
Yemen).
So who is the target, who is the enemy, and are they the same?
Billed as a significant escalation of Turkeys role in the fight against
the Islamic State (New York Times), the Turkish attack seems more seriously
directed at the Kurdish citizens of Syria who have lived there right along.
The Syrian Kurds have proved the most effective fighting force in Syria
opposing ISIS, other than the Syrian government. And the Syrian Kurds enjoy
the support of several hundred US Special Forces, who now find themselves
facing the prospect of being attacked by a NATO army supported by their own
country.
Jarabalus is on the west bank of the Euphrates River, which separates it
from the Kurdish-dominated region of northern Syria. In 2013, ISIS forces
took control of Jarabalus and have held it until recently, with little
objection from Turkey. ISIS used this Turkish-Syrian border town as one of
several crossing points for fighters and supplies with little interference
from the Turks. In 2015, Syrian Kurdish forces threatened to attack ISIS in
Jarabulus. Turkeys President Erdogan warned the Kurds that such an attack
would be met by the Turkish military, securing ISIS control of the town for
another year. Now its the US vice president warning the Syrian Kurds not to
interfere in their own country. Referring to the Kurdish desire to control
that part of Syria where they live along the Turkish border, Biden said
there would be no Kurdish corridor (as fragmentarily reported in the
Washington Post):
Period. No separate entity on the border. A united Syria
. We have made it
absolutely clear to
the YPG [Kurdish Peoples Protection Units in Syria]
that
they must move back across the river
. They cannot, will not, and
under no circumstances will get American support if they do not keep that
commitment. Period.
The corridor referred to by Biden is a hypothetical area that, if
controlled by the Kurds, would connect western Kurdistan near Aleppo with
the rest of Kurdistan in northeastern Syria. The Turks are dead set
against this, as they consider all Kurds terrorists. The US has gone along
with the Turks calling the Kurds in Turkey terrorists, but the US considers
the Kurds in Syria non-terrorists, mostly because of their success fighting
ISIS. Part of that Kurdish success was working with US Special Forces to
take territory south of Jarabulus (Manbij and surrounding towns). According
to Biden, that operation was carried out under a Kurdish promise to go back
across the Euphrates and leave the area to Syrian rebels (who had been
unable to take it on their own).
Turkey has long been shelling Kurdish communities in Syria, killing
civilians with indifference, since Turkeys main objective vis à vis the
Kurds is ethnic cleansing. Now, with US blessing, Turkey is using its
invasion of Jarabulus to attack Kurdish settlements to the south, killing
dozens of civilians in attacks on Jub al-Kousa and al-Amarna. These are not
Kurds who should have gone back across the Euphrates, these are Kurds who
live in those towns.
There are roughly two million Kurds in Syria and about 30 million in the
region. The Kurds have been subjugated and marginalized in all the countries
where they live at one time or another. They have long been restive in
Turkey. Then the chaos Americans brought to Iraq gave Iraqi Kurds some
independence. In Syria, the Kurds earned greater independence by fighting
ISIS more effectively than anyone else.
Having invaded Syria to fight ISIS, Turkey is now joining with Syrian rebels
(of some sort) to attack Kurds. This is American policy at work. In effect,
VP Biden has said: Hey, you Kurds, youre subjugated people, youve been
subjugated people long enough to be used to it, and youre gonna stay
subjugated, OK, so suck it up.
So we leave the Kurds to the mercy of their perennial persecutors, and for
what? Some dim hope that Turkey will improve its human rights record and
stop torturing prisoners? Or perhaps our wishful thinking is that if we abet
the Turks in their darkest whims, maybe they wont cozy up to the Russians
so much? Whatever the Obama administration is thinking assuming there is
any thinking going on in this secretive government American policy seems
politically incoherent, as if its enough to say: This is what the American
empire requires, dont ask questions. But it is more than politically
incoherent. American policy toward a people yearning to be free is morally
repugnant.
________________________________________
William M. Boardman has over 40 years experience in theatre, radio, TV,
print journalism, and non-fiction, including 20 years in the Vermont
judiciary. He has received honors from Writers Guild of America, Corporation
for Public Broadcasting, Vermont Life magazine, and an Emmy Award nomination
from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission
to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader
Supported News.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid. Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
Turkish prime minister Binali Yildirim, right, and U.S. vice president Joe
Biden at Cankaya Palace in Ankara. (photo: AFP/Getty Images)
http://readersupportednews.org/http://readersupportednews.org/
New US Policy: Kill the Kurds
By William Boardman, Reader Supported News
29 August 16
Syria: what do you do when you dont know what to do?
he continuing incoherence, insanity, and ultimate inanity of US policy in
and around Syria was highlighted brilliantly, albeit perhaps inadvertently,
by Vice President Joe Biden on a state visit to Turkey August 24, when he
threatened the most effective fighting force against the Islamic State the
Kurdish militias with American punishment if they didnt play nice with
the Turks, who have spent years supporting the Islamic State (aka ISIS or
ISIL), attacking bad Kurds in Turkey and Iraq, and who are now attacking
good Kurds in Syria.
This is not quite as complicated as it is stupid, self-defeating, and
ultimately deceitful. Lets review the bidding:
The Turks are a NATO ally whose reliability is an on-and-off thing
unrelated to Turkeys actual treaty obligations. The only reason Turkey is
part of NATO is because somebody during the Cold War thought it would be a
good idea to counter the USSR. With the USSR gone, Turkey is more like a
dagger pointed at the heart of NATO, hence the delicate
psycho-diplo-military dance NATO nations have had to follow for years,
unwilling to cut Turkey loose from NATO, even now, as the Turkish government
devolves toward authoritarianism and tighter ties with Russia. Putting it in
perspective, Turkeys longstanding, abysmal record on political and human
rights is a prime reason that the European Union continues to deny Turkey EU
membership. Turkey is not a truly modern state: Turks waged a genocidal
campaign against its Armenian citizens a century ago, but its still against
the law to mention that genocide in Turkey (by comparison, Americans can
talk freely about the greater American genocide against native peoples, but
the progress toward anything like justice is about the same in both
countries).
The Kurds are for the Turks, metaphorically, the 21st century
Armenians. The Turks exhibit all the signs of wanting to wage genocidal war
on the Kurds but they are held off by multiple factors, not least the
current taboo on genocide upheld by NATO and the EU, at least publicly, most
of the time. The Kurds are also more militarized than the Armenians ever
were, and the Kurdish home territory is a mountainous region that has
resisted invaders for centuries. Also the Kurdish region is spread over four
countries, so any Turkish genocide of the Kurds would work only if it
included attacks on Iran, Iraq, and Syria. Each of those countries has also
gone through periods of Kurdish repression, so there is always the
theoretical possibility of an allied genocide of the Kurds. Right now, the
Kurds in Turkey, having survived an attempted Kurdish genocide in the 1930s,
continue their low level conflict with the Turkish military, punctuated by
periods like the current high level conflict. The Kurds long for their own
country, a Kurdistan, and no one else wants them to have that for reasons
that are obscure and chronically destabilizing. (A similar situation keeps
Afghanistan unstable, where the Pashtun are spread across southern
Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan, and no one wants them to have their
own Pashtunistan, either.)
The US has no vital interests in any of these places. To be clear,
the country of the United States has no vital interests. The empire of the
United States is a different, undemocratic, self-directed global power
structure that sees vital interests in faraway yurts in the most distant
desert. That part is not up for debate. But the distinction between the US
as a country and the US as an empire helps to understand why the country is
pushed into doing things that are stupid, self-destructive, and
planet-threatening on behalf of the empire. Everybody pretty much knows,
even if they wont admit it, that with a nod from the US the Turkish
genocide of the Kurds could begin tomorrow, if not sooner. That is the
context for the creative tension within which the US VP makes his not so
veiled threats.
Biden to Kurds: defend yourselves from the Turks and we will hurt you
August 24, the day that VP Biden was talking tough in Ankara, was the same
day the US and Turkey went to war against Syria, although it mostly wasnt
reported that way. It was advertised as Turkey finally responding to pleas
to fight ISIS. Some called it an escalation and some called it an
incursion, echoing official lines in Viet Nam, but it was an invasion. As
invasions go, it was pretty small potatoes, unreported in detail, but
involving probably a few hundred troops with heavy artillery support, and
maybe dozens of tanks and aircraft. This was not the first Turkish attack on
Syria, but its the first to seize and hold territory, and to do so with US
sanction and air support (even though US special forces are on one of the
other sides).
The reality is that Syria is still a sovereign country with a legitimate
government still in place. No matter what may be true about the Syrian
government or the all-but-uncountable forces arrayed against it and within
it, the government remains legitimate, which is why the US and others keep
calling for its overthrow. The Syrian government is fighting a very
complicated, five-year-old civil war against combatants both Syrian and
foreign, some of whom control significant areas of Syria, over which theyre
fighting with the Syrian government and each other. As civil wars go, this
one is particularly messy, not only because Syria was made up all along of
different ethnic groups. Since Syrian citizens took up arms against their
government, they have enjoyed, if thats the right word, outside support of
various kinds and quantities of fighters and materiel from the US, Turkey,
Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Israel, Lebanon, and probably Jordan (which, with
Turkey, has sheltered millions of Syrian refugees).
Even so, when the Turkish military with US air support crosses the border
and captures the town of Jarabulus (population around 26,000), thats a new
thing in this war where other countries mostly use proxies to fight for
whatever they think theyre fighting for, not their own armed forces. Russia
is an exception, fighting for the Syrian government at the invitation of the
Syrian government. Every other combatant is an uninvited guest. When the
US-backed Turkish military crossed the border and captured Syrian territory,
that was an act of undeclared war (like the US war with the Saudis on
Yemen).
So who is the target, who is the enemy, and are they the same?
Billed as a significant escalation of Turkeys role in the fight against
the Islamic State (New York Times), the Turkish attack seems more seriously
directed at the Kurdish citizens of Syria who have lived there right along.
The Syrian Kurds have proved the most effective fighting force in Syria
opposing ISIS, other than the Syrian government. And the Syrian Kurds enjoy
the support of several hundred US Special Forces, who now find themselves
facing the prospect of being attacked by a NATO army supported by their own
country.
Jarabalus is on the west bank of the Euphrates River, which separates it
from the Kurdish-dominated region of northern Syria. In 2013, ISIS forces
took control of Jarabalus and have held it until recently, with little
objection from Turkey. ISIS used this Turkish-Syrian border town as one of
several crossing points for fighters and supplies with little interference
from the Turks. In 2015, Syrian Kurdish forces threatened to attack ISIS in
Jarabulus. Turkeys President Erdogan warned the Kurds that such an attack
would be met by the Turkish military, securing ISIS control of the town for
another year. Now its the US vice president warning the Syrian Kurds not to
interfere in their own country. Referring to the Kurdish desire to control
that part of Syria where they live along the Turkish border, Biden said
there would be no Kurdish corridor (as fragmentarily reported in the
Washington Post):
Period. No separate entity on the border. A united Syria
. We have made it
absolutely clear to
the YPG [Kurdish Peoples Protection Units in Syria]
that
they must move back across the river
. They cannot, will not, and
under no circumstances will get American support if they do not keep that
commitment. Period.
The corridor referred to by Biden is a hypothetical area that, if
controlled by the Kurds, would connect western Kurdistan near Aleppo with
the rest of Kurdistan in northeastern Syria. The Turks are dead set
against this, as they consider all Kurds terrorists. The US has gone along
with the Turks calling the Kurds in Turkey terrorists, but the US considers
the Kurds in Syria non-terrorists, mostly because of their success fighting
ISIS. Part of that Kurdish success was working with US Special Forces to
take territory south of Jarabulus (Manbij and surrounding towns). According
to Biden, that operation was carried out under a Kurdish promise to go back
across the Euphrates and leave the area to Syrian rebels (who had been
unable to take it on their own).
Turkey has long been shelling Kurdish communities in Syria, killing
civilians with indifference, since Turkeys main objective vis à vis the
Kurds is ethnic cleansing. Now, with US blessing, Turkey is using its
invasion of Jarabulus to attack Kurdish settlements to the south, killing
dozens of civilians in attacks on Jub al-Kousa and al-Amarna. These are not
Kurds who should have gone back across the Euphrates, these are Kurds who
live in those towns.
There are roughly two million Kurds in Syria and about 30 million in the
region. The Kurds have been subjugated and marginalized in all the countries
where they live at one time or another. They have long been restive in
Turkey. Then the chaos Americans brought to Iraq gave Iraqi Kurds some
independence. In Syria, the Kurds earned greater independence by fighting
ISIS more effectively than anyone else.
Having invaded Syria to fight ISIS, Turkey is now joining with Syrian rebels
(of some sort) to attack Kurds. This is American policy at work. In effect,
VP Biden has said: Hey, you Kurds, youre subjugated people, youve been
subjugated people long enough to be used to it, and youre gonna stay
subjugated, OK, so suck it up.
So we leave the Kurds to the mercy of their perennial persecutors, and for
what? Some dim hope that Turkey will improve its human rights record and
stop torturing prisoners? Or perhaps our wishful thinking is that if we abet
the Turks in their darkest whims, maybe they wont cozy up to the Russians
so much? Whatever the Obama administration is thinking assuming there is
any thinking going on in this secretive government American policy seems
politically incoherent, as if its enough to say: This is what the American
empire requires, dont ask questions. But it is more than politically
incoherent. American policy toward a people yearning to be free is morally
repugnant.
William M. Boardman has over 40 years experience in theatre, radio, TV,
print journalism, and non-fiction, including 20 years in the Vermont
judiciary. He has received honors from Writers Guild of America, Corporation
for Public Broadcasting, Vermont Life magazine, and an Emmy Award nomination
from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission
to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader
Supported News.
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
