{"id":180370,"date":"2017-05-09T22:27:00","date_gmt":"2017-05-10T03:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2017\/05\/09\/well-this-is-a-fine-f-you-to-erdogan\/"},"modified":"2017-05-09T22:27:00","modified_gmt":"2017-05-10T03:27:00","slug":"well-this-is-a-fine-f-you-to-erdogan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2017\/05\/09\/well-this-is-a-fine-f-you-to-erdogan\/","title":{"rendered":"Well, This Is a Fine F%$# You to Erdo\u011fan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/VRNAyiF.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/VRNAyiF.jpg\" style=\"cursor: pointer; float: right; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px;\" width=\"350\" \/><\/a>The US has decidedly to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/checkpoint\/wp\/2017\/05\/09\/in-blow-to-u-s-turkey-ties-trump-administration-approves-plan-to-directly-arm-syrian-kurds-against-islamic-state\/\">supply arms directly to Kurdish fighters in Syria<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span style=\"color: blue;\">President Trump has approved a plan to directly arm Kurdish forces fighting in Syria, the Pentagon said on Tuesday, inflaming already strained ties with Turkey and putting the U.S. military a step closer to seizing a remaining Islamic State stronghold.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">Pentagon spokeswoman Dana W. White said the president made the decision Monday, describing the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a diverse group dominated by Kurdish fighters, as \u201cthe only force on the ground that can successfully seize Raqqa in the near future.\u201d For more than a year, the U.S. military has been advancing plans to capture Raqqa, the Syrian city that is the Islamic State\u2019s de facto capital, as the final major step in its nearly three-year effort to defeat the militant group.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">\u201cWe are keenly aware of the security concerns of our coalition partner Turkey,\u201d White said in a statement. \u201cWe want to reassure the people and government of Turkey that the U.S. is committed to preventing additional security risks and protecting our NATO ally.\u201d<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">Ankara sees the YPG as an extension of the banned Kurdistan Workers\u2019 Party, or PKK, which is considered a terrorist group by both Turkey and the United States.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Since Turkey is perhaps the 2<sup>nd<\/sup> worst external actor in Syria, after the House of Saud, so the fact that their agenda is going pear shaped is a good thing.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s fairly clear that Erdo\u011fan is using the conflict with ISIS to reinforce his authoritarian rule, and it appears highly likely that he is intent on creating some sort of Turkish zone of influence akin to the Ottoman empire.<\/p>\n<p>That reality is disabusing Erdo\u011fan of his delusions is a good thing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The US has decidedly to supply arms directly to Kurdish fighters in Syria: President Trump has approved a plan to directly arm Kurdish forces fighting in Syria, the Pentagon said on Tuesday, inflaming already strained ties with Turkey and putting the U.S. military a step closer to seizing a remaining Islamic State stronghold.Pentagon spokeswoman Dana &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[489,394,378,379,697,696],"class_list":["post-180370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-civil-war","tag-foreign-relations","tag-middle-east","tag-military","tag-near-east","tag-syria"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180370"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180370\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}