Turkey’s plan in Jarabulus is all domestic

Ankara’s tanks have crossed the border into Syria – but for reasons that are entirely local

The retaking of the strategic Syrian town of Jarabulus from ISIL is an event worth celebrating. Yet the way it has come about has further complicated what is already the most complex political conflict in the Middle East. The news that the Turkish military crossed the Syrian border, backed by its own fighter jets and those of the United States, gave heart to many who wish to see the Assad regime defeated. To some, it felt like a success, a recognition by Turkey that the war was dragging on, that Russia was now entrenched in the conflict, and that without an intervention, the forces of the Assad regime were only likely to get stronger and stronger.

If only that were the story. With this incursion, Turkey has very limited goals, goals that have nothing to do with unseating the regime in Damascus. Its goals are much closer to home – indeed, they are entirely domestic.

Start with the most obvious element. After several devastating attacks inside Turkey itself, blamed on ISIL, the country is looking for retaliation and a quiet border. By pushing ISIL out of Jarabulus, Ankara ensures the border can be, to use its term, “cleansed”. Having an ISIL presence right up to such a long border is dangerous for Turkey.

Yet Turkey has a bigger issue with the armed groups on its border. The Kurdish PYD, which Turkey says, with some justification, is allied with the outlawed PKK inside its borders, is gaining territory on the Syrian-Turkish border. The PYD appears to want to link up with other Kurdish territory further east, near Aleppo.

For Turkey, having a strip of territory on its border controlled by a Kurdish group with links to the PKK would be impossible to imagine. Even the US, which aids the PYD but recognises the PKK as a terrorist group, considers this a step too far. It has warned the PYD it must go back to its heartlands. In any case, Ankara is not waiting to find out if it will fall back or not. By seizing Jarabulus from ISIL, it has now prevented the Kurds from completing this plan. But the PYD are still furious with both the US and Turkey. Its leader promised Turkey “would be defeated like [ISIL]”.

The Syrian war is now even more complicated than it was mere hours ago. The most intractable part is that everyone involved – Turkey, the US, the Kurds in Syria – are convinced their moves are essential. There is no possibility of compromise on these issues for them. Which means there is now one more entity inside Syria that is unwilling to compromise.