The Arab Spring

Trying to annex northern Iraq would piss off the Iraqi Kurds, the one group of Kurds that Ankara is on good terms with. Plus, the place is a ruin. Gaining influence/soft power over the regional government is one thing but annexing that basket case of a region? Can't see Turkey pulling that.

If Turkey's long game is to stop Kurdish movements for independence in the long term, they might be willing to take control of a costly and dangerous Kurdish region. At least then they'd be able to monitor and perhaps control the Kurds there. It's a very heavy cost for a relatively small, and not very sustainable, gain, but it's all a matter of priorities. If you value controlling the Kurds very highly you'll be able to pay a high price to achieve that.

I really hope that's not where this is going, though. I know that nobody with a lot of power in the region wants the Kurds in northern Iraq to become independent, but the best solution for Kurds probably would be to establish a Kurdistan out of Iraq and Syria's Kurdish regions. With that goal basically ruled out by Turkey and the US supporting an Iraq that will remain hostile to that idea, perhaps the next best and most realistic outcome might be to have a Kurdistan in Syria. It would be a small fraction of the true land of the Kurds, but if this is what they can win from all this it's what they must take.

I'm basing that on the assumption that Syria will not survive as a single political entity. Of course Assad could still win, if ISIS is destroyed and the legitimate resistance is either framed as part of ISIS and destroyed with them, or eradicated seperately by Assad and Russia. If that happens the Kurds have no hope of establishing a country in Syria.

Assad doesn't have the manpower or cohesion to hold more than he already does at this point. Aleppo is the last great hurrah for him as well, either way.

I thought a couple of years back that Assad was gone, but then ISIS got going and now I don't know if Assad might sort of win by default just by being alive longer than anyone else.

Which is why he will survive...but not with all of Syria.

So a development, which is also not helping my fear about the Turks. It seems the Turkish backed rebels at the border are in a race with the SDF forces based in Afrin for the city of al-Bab. To the point that the rebels have stopped advancing to said city and have now launched a massive offensive against Afrin, particularly the corridor it is trying to make to al-Bab.

EDIT- For more fun, a successful collapse of this Kurdish corridor would put the rebels in contact with Assad's forces. I do not see Erdogan successfully putting the leash on them.

edited 22nd Oct '16 9:38:59 AM by FFShinra

Said offensive on Afrin-based SDF has not only not stopped, but the Turks and FSA are no longer bothering to push south toward Al Bab as they put their full focus on Afrin Canton.

Ugh.

So is that bad or very bad?

Bad vis a vis the fight against Daesh (there is no doubt that the Turks will eventually push south again, its just giving them a reprieve which is not helpful at the moment), very bad for the Kurds and their allies in the SDF.

For the war overall, it might be nothing...or it could be another Hatay in the making.

In case you missed it, yes, MARSOC and US Navy SEALs are embedded in Peshmerga forces fighting for Mosul

I'd be surprised to hear that they weren't.

Airstrikes by Russian or Syrian forces hit school killing 26 people, mostly children.

Good going Assad, next time you will say that was a rebel school training militants for the Islamic State.

We did it Assad! We saved the city!◊

Some Russian officials are scared shitless that a Russian pilot may have done the deed.

Ambassador Chukin called the condemnations at the UN akin to preaching at a church.

edited 27th Oct '16 5:13:54 AM by Ominae

Well Ambassador, you kinda have to preach in a church....

edited 27th Oct '16 8:58:09 AM by FFShinra

Well I'm sure all this is just a plot made up by the evil Western media to make Putin look bad.....

Everything is a Western plot to make Putin look bad. Literally everything. Why, reality has a Russophobic anti-Putin bias, so you can't trust it! (That's why RT and Sputnik are largely disconnected from reality—insulation from that bias, see?)

If only that was a joke...

Really, people, can we all not keep kicking that dead horse with regards to RT working towards the Kremlin?

Especially since coverage of Russia in American and occasionally British news often really is lackluster.

Anyway - so it actually might have been a Russian pilot? Interesting.

edited 27th Oct '16 1:52:26 PM by KnitTie

'Working for the Kremlin is one thing, fabricating stories and publishing falsehoods as news is another.

Keep that fight to the Russia thread, guys.

Will do.

Not really. We covered that back in the Russia thread, which I suggest we move into.

It seems Russia hasn't really resumed strikes. Something about Putin saying its not the right time yet.

At the same time, there has been another rebel push to break the siege of east Aleppo....

Wait, you mean that we weren't airstriking since when?

Since the humanitarian pause went into effect. Last ten days.

It explains why the rebels suddenly have an opening to launch an attempt to break the siege. BBC is reporting that the Russian air commander in the area asked Moscow for permission and was denied.

It also means its likely the Syrian Air Force was the one that bombed those kids.

That explains why our officials were so shocked. And makes our MD's decision to go for an "It wasn't a school that was hit!" party line instead of an "It wasn't us!" one even more stupid.