U.S., Turkey plan Islamic State-free zone in Syria
BEIRUT – Turkey and the United States have agreed on the outlines of a plan to rout the Islamic State group from a strip of Syrian territory along the Turkish border – a plan that opens the possibility of a safe haven for tens of thousands of displaced Syrians but one that also sets up a potential conflict with U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish forces in the area.
The move further embroils Turkey, a key NATO ally, in Syria’s civil war, and also catapults it into a front-line position in the global war against IS.
A senior Obama administration official said Monday that U.S. discussions with Turkey about an IS-free zone focused on a 68-mile stretch still under IS control. The U.S. has been conducting airstrikes there, which will accelerate now that the U.S. can launch strikes from Turkish soil, the official said.
No agreement between Turkey and the U.S. has yet been finalized, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity under regulations.
While details of the buffer-zone plan have yet to be announced, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Ankara and Washington have no intention of sending ground troops into Syria but wanted to see Syria’s moderate opposition forces replace IS near the Turkish border.
Turkey has also called a meeting of its NATO allies for today to discuss threats to its security and its airstrikes. Davutoglu said “NATO has a duty to protect” Turkey’s border with Syria and Iraq, and that Ankara will seek the alliance’s support for its actions at the meeting in Brussels.
But a Turkish-driven military campaign to push IS out of territory along the Turkish border is likely to complicate matters on the ground.
U.S.-backed Kurdish fighters in Syria, who have been the most successful in the war against IS, control most of the 565 mile boundary with Turkey, and have warned Ankara against any military intervention in northern Syria.
The Islamic State controls roughly a 60-mile stretch of that border, wedged between Turkish-backed insurgents with Islamist ideologies to the left and Kurdish forces from the People’s Protection Unit, known as the YPG, to the right.
And despite the U.S. and Turkey’s shared interests in fighting the Islamic State, the Turks have also prioritized defeating Syrian President Bashar Assad. While the U.S. says Assad has lost legitimacy, it has not taken direct military action to try to remove him from office and says he is not the target of its efforts in Syria.
Ege Seckin, a Turkey expert at IHS Country Risk, said IS is a national security threat for Turkey but is nonetheless secondary.
“The two key points in Turkey remain: one – topple the Assad regime, and two – prevent the establishment of a continuous Kurdish territorial entity in the region,” he said.