Turkish Inaction on ISIS Advance Dismays the U.S.

[Purveyor]

By MARK LANDLER, ANNE BARNARD and ERIC SCHMITTOCT. 7, 2014

MURSITPINAR, Turkey — As fighters with the Islamic State bore down Tuesday on the Syrian town of Kobani on the Turkish border, President Obama’s plan to fight the militant group without being drawn deeper into the Syrian civil war was coming under acute strain.

While Turkish troops watched the fighting in Kobani through a chicken-wire fence, Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said that the town was about to fall and Kurdish fighters warned of an impending bloodbath if they were not reinforced — fears the United States shares.

But Mr. Erdogan said Tuesday that Turkey would not get more deeply involved in the conflict with the Islamic State unless the United States agreed to give greater support to rebels trying to unseat the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad. That has deepened tensions with President Obama, who would like Turkey to take stronger action against the Islamic State and to leave the fight against Mr. Assad out of it.

Mr. Erdogan has also resisted pleas to send his troops across the border in the absence of a no-fly zone to ward off the Syrian Air Force.

Even as it stepped up airstrikes against the militants Tuesday, the Obama administration was frustrated by what it regards as Turkey’s excuses for not doing more militarily. Officials note, for example, that the American-led coalition, with its heavy rotation of flights and airstrikes, has effectively imposed a no-fly zone over northern Syria already, so Mr. Erdogan’s demand for such a zone rings hollow.

more...

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/08/world/middleeast/isis-syria-coalition-strikes.html?_r=0

[Warren Stupidity]

1. If ISIS is killing Kurds, Turkey is all for it. If ISIS is killing Shiites

the Sauds and the emirates and Israel are all for it, actually so are we sort of, only we can't admit it.

To put it mildly, our policy in the mid east in incoherent.

[gwheezie]

2. I don't get it either

why would anyone think turkey would defend Kurds

[HoosierCowboy]

3. Turkey will need Causus Belli

Which will happen when ISIS forces defile the tomb of Suleyman II.
They're just waiting to kick ISIS off the planets largest untapped reserve of petroleum, which used to belong to Turkey, but was lost in the aftermath of WWI in the Treaty of Versailles.
While ISIS exhausts itself fighting the Kurds, Turkey will sit back and wait for the proper moment.
It was Churchill's doing that forced Turkey into the Austro Hungarian side during WWI by screwing them out of a battleship. It's an interesting history.
ISIS is dead meat sitting on all that oil.

[Igel]

4. Not only is ISIS draining the pool of Kurdish militants and weapons,

they're not a direct threat at present to Turkey.

ISIS is not stupid. They've actually been quite rational, on their own terms.

They have their goals--Syria and Iraq, for now. (And probably not all of Iraq.)

They fight those who fight them. That's basically common sense. The first beheading of a Westerner said as much:
Here's a captive we've had kicking around, but now that you've killed some of us we're going to kill some of yours. If you don't want more dead, stop attacking us.

No real declaration of war. Jordan? Same thing. Lebanon? Shi'ites in Lebanon are fighting, so they're fair game.

Turkey? Not a problem, don't attack it. Turkey has the most to lose, as well, if it draws first blood: A common border, the ability of ISIS to easily infiltrate and launch attacks inside its borders. Makes paranoid US Congressmen's dreams look like nothing.

Moreover, Turkey has its own internal ISIS supporters. If they're dealt with internally, it'll make Turkey a more stable place. If they're still around when Turkey battles ISIS, they're suddenly a fifth column on ISIS' side. While Turkey's cleaning house, every fighter and bullet ISIS expends is likely to be one fewer that it'll have if and when Turkey does get involved.

"Dismay"? Really? Sounds like common sense, except for those who demand sycophantic loyalty.

[KoKo]

7. The massacre of that many Kurds on the Turkish border

will not sit well with the rest of the Kurds. The Kurds on Turkish border aren't as well armed as the Iraqi Kurds which we have aided with modernized weapons. How can they fight without proper weapons. If there is a slaughter of Kurds by ISIL then how does Turkey save face with mass slaughter and a city wiped out....so that it has access to the oil you say is underground?

So....how does this turn out as advantageous as you are describing for Turkey with all that blood on their hands?

[geek tragedy]

5. Edrogan fears genocide of the Kurds the way kids fear chocolate ice cream. nt

[flamingdem]

6. This article looks like a cover story. They must understand why

Turkey is not getting involved.

I think that we're back to the fact that Kobane became a cause celebre since foreigners and media could participate from the safety of Turkey.

Then it finally got through to the powers that be and airstrikes began in earnest.

Their focus really is Iraq and that's complicated enough!

In Syria they were after the Khorasan Group and the mission was largely successful.