How Will Turkey Play the Major Cards It Now Holds?

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The fall of the Assad regime in Syria is a fatal blow to Iran’s position in the Middle East and could disrupt Russia’s power projection in the Mediterranean and Africa. But the extent to which this rolls back the Moscow–Tehran “Axis of resistance” will depend on how Turkey exercises its new role as a regional power broker.

Rebel groups launched the ten-day lightning offensive that captured Syria’s capital, Damascus, amalgamating the Turkish-created Syrian National Army (SNA) and the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), operated from the northern Syrian province of Idlib, which has been controlled by Turkey for over a decade.

The origins of HTS, which heads the new Syrian government, are traced to Al Qaeda in Iraq. It’s designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. But the group has been deeply penetrated by Turkey’s prolific intelligence service MIT, which virtually runs Idlib and supported the rebel offensive with Bayraktar TB2 drones and other weapons supplied through SNA.

MIT chief Ibrahim Kalin was the first senior foreign official to visit Damascus following the rebel takeover and is believed to have advised on the formation of the new government under HTS leadership. He was followed within days by Turkish Defense Minister Yasar Guler, who said that Turkey would provide military training for a new Syrian army.

Despite being a long-time U.S. ally and founding member of NATO, Turkey has tended to adopt ambiguous policy positions in sensitive areas, reflecting its own national interests in the Middle East and Southeastern Europe that once formed part of the Ottoman Empire. This tendency has become more marked under the nationalistic Islamist government of President Tayyip Erdogan who has at times followed his own agenda in his relations with Iran and Russia.

Turkey’s immediate priority will be gaining control of areas in northeastern Syria held by U.S.-backed Kurdish rebels connected to the separatist PKK, which Ankara considers a terrorist group.

Serious armed clashes have erupted between U.S.-supported Kurdish rebels known as Syrian Democratic Forces (SDA) and Turkish-backed militias as both sides maneuver to seize territory previously held by Assad’s army. Turkey wants to disarm the Kurdish rebels that are protected by 900 American troops stationed in Kurdistan.

President Trump proposed pulling out the U.S. troops during his last administration but was dissuaded by security advisors who believed in maintaining the military presence to counter ISIS, which presented a major threat at the time. With assistance from SDA and the Iraqi army, U.S. special forces have largely rooted out the ISIS bases straddling the northern border between Syria and Iraq.

Turkey says that ISIS is no longer a threat. “Has anyone heard of any attacks by ISIS terrorists in Syria in the last three years? We don’t see or hear anything about ISIS at the moment,” Defense Minister Guler is quoted as saying by Reuters.

The only recent ISIS attack was in Russia, where a central Asian cell conducted a massacre at the Crocus concert hall near Moscow last March,

Guler says that three “Maroon Beret” commando brigades with ample experience in counter-terrorism can keep the area clear of ISIS. Some leading U.S. policy analysts fear that the Turkish troops could unleash an “ethnic cleansing” in Kurdish provinces. Turkey’s horrific genocide of ethnic Armenians during WWI remains fresh in many memories.

But Turkey holds major cards now. It can use its influence and security leverage in Syria to block Iran from regaining positions and prevent a resurgence of Hezbollah, already seriously weakened by Israel’s unrelenting ground and air campaign in Lebanon.

The Erdogan government has given asylum to Hamas leaders and voiced strong opposition to Israel’s invasion of Gaza. But it’s kept silent over recent Israeli advances on the Golan Heights and air strikes targeting Syria arms depots that could fall into the hands of Iranian proxy groups.

But Turkey doesn’t seem inclined to push out Russia. “I don’t think the Russians are going to leave (Syria). They’ll do everything they can to stay,” Guler told Reuters. Despite Russia’s extensive military support for Assad, who is now exiled in Moscow, they are trying to convince the new Syrian government that its bases can be a counterweight to Israeli moves on the Golan Heights, according to some Western intelligence reports.

While there are multiple media reports about the movement of Russian military equipment out of Syria, Guler explains that Russia is just moving military assets from different parts of Syria to its two main bases, the Hmeimim air base in Latakia and the naval base in Tartus.

Turkey is highly ambivalent toward Russia. At the same time that it was negotiating the acquisition of advanced Russian air defense S-400 missiles some years ago, its F-16s were shooting at Russian Sukhoi jet fighters over Idlib. It’s also engaged in a proxy conflict with Russia in Libya.

Since the fall of the regime of Muammar Qadaffi, Turkish forces have been supporting the U.N.-recognized government that holds power in the capital Tripoli against Russian-supported rebels under General Khalifa Haftar which controls the eastern port of Benghazi.

Russia has built three air bases in eastern Libya and is reported to be building a naval facility near Benghazi. These are vital projection points for Russia’s expansion in Africa where it currently supports a string of military dictatorships in former French colonies, stretching from the Sahel region bordering the Atlantic to the Central African Republic where it’s fueling a civil war in neighboring Sudan.

Turkey has over 2,000 troops deployed in western Libya, including a unit of SNA fighters transferred from Syria. An offensive into eastern Libya combined with an expulsion of Russian bases from Syria would be disastrous to Moscow’s position in Africa.

There is little indication that such moves are being planned or even contemplated at the moment, but Trump may suggest such a joint maneuver to Erdogan when they sit down to talk about Kurdistan. He may start by suggesting that Turkey close its airspace to Russian Ilyushin military transports flying regularly from Russia to Libya.

Trump might also point out to Erdogan that weakening Russia could make the Kremlin more amenable to negotiating a lasting peace deal with Ukraine. Turkey’s leader has shown past interest in a peace agreement.

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