The US and Russia are nearing a de facto alliance against ISIS in eastern Syria, a development that would cap off a stunning reversal of fortune in 2016 for the Baathist regime of Bashar al-Assad, who with recent battlefield successes against ISIS is closing in on a once-unthinkable diplomatic coup: gaining legitimacy with the West as part of the anti-terror coalition.
That's especially so because terror-stricken Western Europe in particular is absolutely desperate for progress on the ground against ISIS whether in Iraq or Syria - but not surprisingly at all, US-backed Iraqi government forces have again choked bigtime, fleeing yet again in the face of the ragtag terrorist army in the vicinity of Mosul like they did almost two years ago, and badly delaying the liberation of Iraq's second city from the caliphate which was trumpeted by pro-US media as being virtually imminent a couple of weeks ago. (It now appears Washington felt pressured to hype up the whole campaign because the Russian-backed Syrian army and Iranian-led militias were making such good progress against ISIS around Palmyra in the immediate aftermath of the Brussels bombings.)
However, Turkey is clearly doubling down its resistance to the Axis of Fatima, in league with Saudi Arabia. Having secured a deal with Merkel to return Syrian refugees from Greece to Asia minor and beef up a crackdown on illegal trafficking of more migrants into Europe, Mr. Erdogan apparently feels he has enough leverage now to up the ante in his long war to eliminate Assad even if it means openly supporting Western-recognized terrorists - or at least preserve what remains of the non-ISIS jihadistan in northwestern Syria that the Axis of Fatima's February victories threatened with extermination.
Turkey's blatant support for Al Qaeda affiliate Al Nusra Front is becoming less and less of a suspicion - even Ankara increasingly seems okay with it gradually coming to the open as a plain established fact. Among other developments, the terror group's apparent acquisition of advanced Western surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) from Turkish dealers has resulted in two Syrian warplanes being downed by militants in a month: the Saudis had specifically warned of this if they didn't force Assad's immediate resignation at the start of the Geneva-brokered political transition. Rogue Turkish officers are also reportedly recruiting for Al Nusra in northern Aleppo province to fend off the campaign of attrition by the Kurds and pro-regime forces.
Last weekend, Al Nusra opportunistically captured a weak link in the regime's siege ring around Aleppo city, capitalizing on Damascus' newfound focus on ISIS further south and east. With stepped-up Turkish materiel and Saudi monetary aid, it apparently thwarted Aleppo's pacification, but Russian air power continues to reign supreme, allowing the government to launch a counteroffensive, as they've done so repeatedly against both ISIS and other rebels in the vicinity in recent months.
Interestingly, however, as the article mentions, the US is now stepping up its own airstrikes against Nusra fighters, killing a top commander. This indicates that not merely in ISIS' heartland Raqqa governorate, but also in northwestern Idlib, American and Russian warplanes are buzzing around the same sectors to hit essentially the same enemies (one presumes in coordinated fashion to avoid targeting conflicts and redundancies).
But this highlights just how potentially explosive - and not merely embarrassing - things can get in both the strained US-Turkey relationship and, much closer to home, the simmering rivalry between two bureaucratic empires right here inside the Beltway. Ever since Washington got sucked into a proxy war with itself when its CIA and Turkish-backed Syrian Arab rebels started shooting with its Pentagon-backed Syrian Kurdish rebels in Aleppo province back in February, Erdogan has been barking down Obama's nose about making a choice between Turkey and the Kurds. The problem is, Obama obviously hasn't decided one or the other - allowing his disparate intelligence and defense agencies to escalate what's essentially a proxy war with one another!
The sheer absurdity of this whole situation should be the butt of all manner of standup comedy jokes - only it's anything but not deadly serious. Just imagine: the CIA is furnishing Al Qaeda terrorists with advanced SAMs - which could be aimed at Pentagon warplanes!
All the while, weak and feckless Western Europe has become such a geopolitical sissy that Donald Trump has opened a debate about whether NATO isn't already an obsolete relic; and Turkey and Russia have very obviously opened up a new front in their proxy war as their respective vassals Azerbaijan and Armenia reignite a frozen conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Perhaps we in America need some kind of rude awakening as to the sheer folly of our foreign policy. Things are getting awfully interesting.
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