Steven Heydemann Erdogan’s plan for war, and peace He wants to reshape the conflict in Syria 24 January 2023, 11:14am

Steven Heydemann

Erdogan’s plan for war, and peace

He wants to reshape the conflict in Syria

24 January 2023, 11:14am

There are ‘global issues that we both have on our plates’, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said, mysteriously, when he met with his Turkish counterpart last week. Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, standing by Blinken’s side, thought the same. ‘We will focus on areas of partnership in bilateral and regional issues.’ Diplomacy as usual, then.

Behind the boring platitudes lies a serious rift between Turkey and the United States. In late December, Syrian and Turkish defence ministers met in Moscow in the first proper meeting between the two governments in a decade. There are plans for another meeting between foreign ministers that could lead to a direct meeting between Turkey’s leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. Rapprochement between Turkey and Syria would bring about the most significant reshaping of the war in Syria since Russia’s brutal bombing campaign tipped it in Assad’s favour in 2015.

It’s not only the fate of millions of Syrian civilians at stake. Three-and-a-half million Syrian refugees in Turkey could soon find themselves vulnerable to forced return if an agreement is struck between Turkey and Syria; ongoing operations against the Islamic State could be jeopardised – and the security of US forces in eastern Syria compromised. What happens in Syria rarely stays in Syria, either. A Turkish withdrawal and a resurgent Assad will trigger a wave of migration into nearby Turkey and Iraq, and perhaps into Europe as well. Northwest Syria today is home to millions of people who support the Syrian opposition. They understand all too well what awaits them if the regime and its dreaded intelligence agencies return.

Problems at home are behind Erdogan’s decision to improve relations with Assad. Even though Erdogan has centralised power, marginalised his opponents, and undermined democracy in Turkey, his position – which is at stake in May’s election – has never been so precarious. Two issues will decide Erdogan’s fate: the economy and refugees. Turkey’s economy is a shambles, with inflation at 135 per cent according to ENAG, an independent research centre in Turkey. And there is hostility towards Syrian refugees in Turkey. Not too long ago, these people were welcomed into the country by Erdogan’s government. But in more recent times, pro-Assad opposition parties have stoked nativist fears to cut into support for his AK party.

Rapprochement with Assad gives Erdogan everything he wants, all at once

As a result, Erdogan turned to Syria to improve his domestic position. He focused his ire on the Syrian offshoot of a Kurdish irredentist group, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), that Turkey, the US, and EU, all designate as a terrorist organisation. The PKK’s Syrian counterpart, the Democratic Union Party (PYD) is a key partner of the US in the fight against IS and a recipient of US military and financial support.

Close ties between the US and Kurdish forces in Syria have not deterred Erdogan from using his military to suppress what he says is a threat to Turkey’s national security. In 2016, Turkey launched Operation Euphrates Shield to prevent the PYD’s armed wing, the People’s Protection Units (YPG), from establishing a Kurdish ‘canton’, from the Iraqi border in the east to the town of Afrin in the west of Syria. Erdogan’s intervention was followed by occupation, and subsequent incursions expanded the area under Turkey’s control to more than 3,400 square miles, but Kurdish forces still dominate a large swath of Syria’s northeast, benefiting from US protection.

Erdogan had planned to launch a new offensive to finally break the stalemate with the Kurds, but possible rapprochement with Syria has put that on hold. Neither Russia nor America is willing to green light what they knew would be a deeply destabilising conflict. So senior Russian officials encouraged Erdogan to join a Russian-mediated negotiation to repair ties with Syria and with Assad, which, if successful, would return Syrian troops to positions along the Turkish border. This would offer a first line of defence against what Erdogan says are Kurdish attacks.

Erdogan recognised the political gains. Rapprochement with Assad would silence critics of his Syria policy, strengthen efforts to push back Syrian refugees, and give him the buffer he wanted against the Kurds, all at once. With just these aims in mind, Erdogan had floated the idea of a meeting with Assad as early as August 2022, but he was quickly rebuffed by the Syrian side. Erdogan and senior Turkish officials made more efforts to arrange a meeting with Assad throughout last autumn.

Assad dragged his heels because he was reluctant to reward an adversary and boost Erdogan’s electoral prospects. Under apparent pressure from Moscow, though, Assad eventually agreed to the cabinet level talks that began shortly before the new year. There’s talk of the Turkish, Syrian and Russian foreign ministers meeting in the next fortnight. Assad no longer seems to rule out the possibility of an eventual meeting with his Turkish counterpart – a meeting Erdogan would like to see happen as close to the date of elections as possible.

Even if Erdogan and Assad do meet, though, the issues dividing Turkey and Syria are formidable. Turkey has not yet shown any willingness to withdraw from the territory it occupies – a deal breaker for Assad. The US would prefer the status quo, too. At the beginning of January, the State Department issued its sternest warning yet against normalisation of the Assad regime. ‘We will not normalise and we do not support other countries normalising relations with the Assad regime’, spokesman Ned Price said.

Nonetheless, whether Erdogan and Assad consummate the renewal of Syrian-Turkish relations, even the possibility has sparked uncertainty and fear among civilians and opposition groups across northern Syria. It has also heightened US concern about the status of its campaign against Isis, and renewed EU fears that a new wave of refugees might be coming. Russia’s gambit is a potent reminder that, even if violence has lessened in Syria, the conflict is far from over. In an ideal world, western governments would push forward a proper political settlement, but we’ll probably just get ‘concern’. Diplomacy as usual, then.

WRITTEN BY

Steven Heydemann

Steven Heydemann is a professor in Middle East Studies at Smith College, in Massachusetts