Turkey’s invasion of northern Syria manages to unfold the entire strategy of the Middle East and Eastern Mediterranean agenda. The US shift towards the Persian Gulf, strengthening their military presence in Saudi Arabia with an increasing number of fighter aircraft and personnel beyond 2000, manages to keep up the pressure on Iran, but ignoring the possible future geopolitical developments that will occur in the Middle East, starting from Syria.
The withdrawal of US troops from Syria (it is a wrong policy in our view) is essentially a recognition of the primary role Russia now has in the region, while at the same time increasing Turkey’s influence in Syria and in general in the Middle East.
by Thanos S. Chonthrogiannis
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Photo by Orhan Erkilis, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_domain
The reasons for the tolerance of NATO and the international community in Turkey’s campaign
Turkey before invading northern Syria, presented a convincing argumentation to NATO partners in its well-planned and prepared campaign. The reasons that NATO and the International Community in general gave the green light to Turkey, despite their platonic protests that are purely for internal consumption in their countries is based on that:
1. Turkey invades a region controlled by Syrian Kurds.
2. Its campaign will not go further south in the big cities of Qamishli and Kobane.
3. Turkey promised that in this created security zone, 30 kilometers deep and 100 kilometers long, it would rebuild new dwellings to carry 3.6 million Syrian refugees who currently live in Turkey. Of course, the funding of these projects will be provided by the EU and since the EU does not it has military power and no common will that can be imposed in practice.
4. Given the implementation of this project these Syrian refugees will not be transferred from Turkey to Europe, thereby softening the migration problem that is structurally affecting EU cohesion.
5. Turkey’s President Erdogan manages to achieve political benefits within his country by increasing his party’s percentages given the fatigue of the Turkish opinion that is tired of the continued presence of Syrian refugees in Turkey.
6. The Turkish invasion will avoid confrontation with the Syrian army of Bashar al-Assad, supported by Russia, and given that the Syrian army does not have the resources to come in opposition to the Turkish army in turn.
7. Russia agrees with Turkey’s invasion, because this way it succeeds:
a) to coerce the Kurds, who in the Syrian civil war crisis were on the side of the United States and not Russia, to join Bashar al-Assad (Syrian Kurds former enemy) in order to protect them from the Turkish army in exchange for surrender their targets for an independent Kurdish state.
b) to maintain its very good relations with Turkey, which acts as a rebel within the framework of NATO and is a potential candidate to participate in the future in the Eurasian Union and BRICS.
8. Iran can, in words, condemn the invasion of Turkey because it must satisfy the pressure exerted by the Kurds living in Iran, but it supports this invasion because of the non-capacity to create a Kurdish state that will included and Kurds of Iran.
At the same time, Iran does not conflict with Turkey because it needs Turkey due to the pressure exerted by the US sanctions, and at the same time it strengthens its role in Syria and in general in the Middle East.
Photo by Panonian, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_domain
The New geopolitical developments in the Middle East as the Turkish invasion is successful
It is evident that the countries affected by the Turkish invasion of northern Syria are the USA, Israel, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
Israel because it has always been a supporter with the US and Saudi Arabia of the plan of a Kurdish state that would intervene between Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria and would function as a security shield for the state of Israel.
Despite Israel’s promising humanitarian aid to the invading Kurdish populations, Israel has reacted in a hypotonic way given the political uncertainty that is currently in Israel and why it possessed out of fear that a destabilisation of Syria will have a serious impact on the security of the Israeli state.
In our opinion, Israel should create a government of national unity that can slowly and steadily integrate both politically and economically the Israeli citizens of Arab descent with aim to reduce tensions and conflicts and always with respect for the rights of minorities living in Israel.
Then, and given that Israel is linked to the EU through underwater power supply and later with a corresponding natural gas, it should seek its full membership in the Eurozone and in the EU, in order to cover the ever-increasing security gap that it leaves the withdrawal of US troops in the Syrian region. Israel’s security should come from the Mediterranean Seaside.
Saudi Arabia because of the problems it faces with Iran knows that it will limit its influence in the Middle East. The liberation from the Kurds of thousands of Jihadists will lead many of them to be transported to Saudi Arabia to act as “lone wolves” by sabotaging the economic structures of the kingdom.
It is wrong to believe that all those Jihadists who will be freed will try to revive the Islamic State in the Middle East or that most of them will be directed to Europe. Europe and the West in general have acted on this issue.
All these Jihadists will be scattered in Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Egypt with aim to act as destabilizers of governments with lone wolf actions and as “teachers” of Jihad in the countries there.
In this way both Iran and Turkey through their support to them will acquire hidden levers of pressure-destabilisation in these Arab countries. Many of the Jihadists will be directed to the Libyan front to support the front against the Libyan Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar.
Egypt is the key after Libya. If Libya falls into the hands of the Jihadists, Europe will have a terrorist state facing it, which will drive ever greater flows of migrants into Europe. This state will belong to the sphere of influence of Turkey and Iran. Their next victim will be Egypt and since the Government of Egypt has not solved the problems of extreme poverty of the Egyptian people.
The poor population of a country that seeks solutions to the daily problems of survival is easy to convert from any extreme element. In a general context Egypt in order to escape poverty problems should create desalination plants on its coastlines that will then transport drinking water from northern and western Egypt to central and southern Egypt by converting the desert in farmland.
At the same time, it will have to divide the land into its poor population by making them fully landowners in order to cultivate it. In combination with natural gas covering all the needs of the population coming from the underwater gas deposits in the Mediterranean Sea Egypt should also invest in RES that will lead to mass production and export of electric power to its neighbouring countries and the EU.
The drastic increase in agricultural production will cover the biotic needs of the Egyptian population by removing the influence of extreme elements in its society. More about how to solve poverty problems in the analysis titled “Policies to reduce increased poverty rates in Egypt”.
Russia will in turn not be able to further increase its influence in the Middle East because of the economic constraints imposed on its economy by the US and EU sanctions due to Ukraine and the attachment of Crimea, but to the economic hemorrhage in Syria and Venezuela.
These economic constraints do not allow Russia to carry out its own reconstruction in Syria, where the funds that will be required will be of enormous proportions.
In this case, Russia will seek economic cooperation between Iran and Turkey to share the cost of rebuilding Syria. But since the economies of both Iran and Turkey (which will at some point be subject to financial sanctions) are not in good shape due to economic sanctions, Russia will address China for financial support.
China as a geopolitical factor in exchange for financial support will achieve political, economic and military benefits from the countries of the region, as China will invest billions to rebuild the ancient trade routes from western China, Pakistan, Tehran, Baghdad and the Mediterranean Sea of Syria. It is likely that China will acquire a naval and air base in the future, both in Syria and in Turkey.
China already has naval bases in the Gwadar of Pakistan on the shores of the Arabian Sea and 370 miles from the “mouth” of the Persian Gulf but also in Djibouti in the Horn of Africa. With the acquisition of naval and air base in Syria, the entire Arabian Peninsula has been circled by the Chinese armed Forces.
The chances of success of the Turkish invasion
All these geopolitical developments will be launched if Turkey’s invasion of northern Syria is successful. This is however a difficult scenario because Turkey during the operation “Olive branch” and with absolute superiority in number and air support, occupied only 18 kilometers of land with significant losses. Now that Assad’s army is united with the Kurds, things are going to be even harder.
That is why it is not possible to exclude Turkey from being involved in a long-standing guerrilla war in the region, but also to finally be able to attach this ‘safety zone’ to the Syrian territory, once again violating the Treaty of Lausanne.
This was done in the past before the WWII when Turkey again at the expense of Syria annexed Alexandretta. He had done the same with the occupation of more than half of Cyprus in 1974.
The money that will be given from Western sources to rebuild housing in this “safety zone” will be taken over by Turkish companies assisting the Turkish economy, while the Turkish army with its Turkish paramilitaries will control the Syrian refugees are established there, who will be Turkmen in the long term.
But the worst of all is that with the US and NATO tolerance, Turkey’s President Erdogan will probably emerge victorious from this opportunistic policy.
