When Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ordered troops to invade Syria in 2016, he justified the move by stating: “We have no territorial claims to Syria. We simply want to ensure that the rightful owners get their country back. We’ve only invaded to end the rule of the tyrant [Bashar] Assad.”
But even at the time, his sweeping words were backed by hard power politics. Ankara had supported armed insurgents in Syria from day 1, and was determined in the pursuit of toppling Syrian dictator Assad. Five years later, Turkey established a permanent military presence in the rebel stronghold of Idlib, in northern Syria.
Today, Turkey is one of the biggest strategic winners in Syria’s political upheaval, while Russia and Iran can be considered some of the biggest losers. Moscow was the most crucial ally to Assad’s regime, and Tehran provided support with paramilitary forces.
“Compared to the situation two weeks ago, Turkey has definitely won in Syria,” said Zaur Gasimov, an expert in Turkish-Russian relations at the Turkish-German University in Istanbul.
Gasimov believes Ankara will work closely with Syria’s future government. “Turkey will be heavily involved in reconstruction efforts, and will remain the key investor in war-ravaged Syria,” he said.
Berk Esen, a political scientist at the Sabanci University in Istanbul, agrees. “Ankara will also profit from Syria’s reconstruction economically, as soon as Turkish construction firms receive orders,” he said.
“Although Turkey’s politics toward Syria had long been dismissed as unsuccessful, Erdogan kept repeating that one day, Assad would lose power. Now, this will score him points,” Esen added.
Turkey looks to ‘expand its sphere of influence’
“Turkey played an important part in the recent offensive,” Esen pointed out. “Ankara will use this in the new Syrian [government] to expand its sphere of influence.”
Turkey supports the Syrian National Army, which now controls large parts of northern Syria. According to Esen, thanks to Turkey’s presence there, the country has also developed a certain proximity to the the militant Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group, despite repeatedly rejecting claims of having been involved in the stunning offensive that toppled Assad.
Although Turkey does not officially back HTS, and even classifies it as a terrorist organization, Ankara does support several northern Syrian militias that were involved in the insurgency.
Regional expert Andre Bank from the GIGA Institute of Middle East Studies in Hamburg believes it’s plausible to assume that Turkey provides indirect military support to HTS.
“HTS recently acquired new weapons. The group currently uses drones and missile systems. One could presume they were procured from Turkey,” he said.
Simon Mabon, an international politics professor at Lancaster University in the UK, is less convinced. “It’s a murky topic,” he said. “We’re not sure to which degree Turkey actually supported this offensive.”
Turkey, a member of the NATO military alliance, actually maintains good relations with Russia and Iran — much to the frequent frustration of Western allies. But political scientist Gasimov does not see this as causing a rift between Moscow and Ankara. Instead, he expects bilateral ties to deepen over time.
“Assad’s overthrow will make Turkey more important for Russia,” he said.
What happens with the Kurds?
Officially, Turkey’s goal in northern Syria is to prevent Kurdish forces from achieving territorial unity. Ankara fears this could lead to the creation of a Kurdish state in the region.
Now, forces supported by Turkey are moving against Kurdish militias, and have captured swaths of northern Syria, including the town of Manbij. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a coalition of primarily Kurdish fighters, control parts of northern Syria and are considered to be affiliated with the Turkish Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
In conflict with Turkey since 1984 with the goal of winning an independent Kurdish state, the PKK is classified as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union, among other governments.
“In the future, we might actually see an autonomous Kurdish region in Syria like the one in Iraq,” said Esen. “The difference is, in the mountainous north of Iraq, its easier for Kurds to defend their territory, whereas this could prove more difficult on flatter Syrian terrain.”
He added that it remained to be seen how the HTS will behave toward Kurds and other minorities in the country, such as Christians.
Turkey backs ‘safe and voluntary’ return of Syrian migrants
Turkey shares a roughly 900-kilometer (560-mile) border with Syria and hosts about 3 million displaced Syrians, making it the country with the most Syrian refugees in the world.
Although Erdogan’s government took in countless Syrians after the civil war erupted in 2011, his administration is now under immense pressure. Resentment toward Syrian migrants has been rising in recent years, amid economic difficulties.
“Turkey attaches great importance to the national unity, stability, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Syria,” Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Sunday. “Millions of Syrian who were forced to leave their homes can now return to their land.”
Now, expectations in Turkey are growing that this will happen sooner rather than later. On Monday, Erdogan announced Turkey was opening its Yayladagi border gate with Syria, to allow for the “safe and voluntary” return of Syrian migrants.
This article was originally written in German.
