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Defense Secretary Says Turkey Put U.S. in ‘Terrible Situation’ Turkish and Kurdish Forces Said to Clash in Syria
(about 5 hours later)
BRUSSELS — Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper accused Turkey on Thursday of putting the United States and its allies in the Middle East and Europe in a “terrible situation” with its agreement to police northern Syria with Moscow. BEIRUT, Lebanon — Turkish forces and Turkish-backed militias appeared to have clashed with the Syrian army and the Kurdish-led militia in northeastern Syria on Thursday, raising the temperature in a volatile area where the Syrian government, Turkish forces, Kurdish-led fighters and Russia are maneuvering for position after the abrupt pullout of American troops.
His remarks were made at a NATO defense ministers’ meeting in Brussels, amid efforts by the Pentagon to pick up the tattered remnants of the American military’s efforts to defeat the Islamic State. Turkish-backed forces pushed into several villages held by the Syrian army, capturing one of them and causing an unspecified number of casualties, according to the Syrian government news agency. The Turkish-backed militias’ advance also forced the Kurdish-led militia, the Syrian Democratic Forces, to withdraw from several villages, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor.
Mr. Esper called on Ankara to start acting like an ally and not a foe of the United States and NATO. But he was besieged by questions about President Trump’s sudden decision to withdraw American troops and declare victory against the Islamic State in Syria. Three S.D.F. fighters were killed in the battle, the group said on Thursday.
During his first face-to-face meeting with his Turkish and European counterparts since Mr. Trump’s transfer of authority in Syria to Turkey and Russia, Mr. Esper was struggling to put rhyme and reason to his boss’s volte-face. Fighting between the Kurdish-led forces and Turkey would violate the United States-brokered cease-fire that President Trump said this week had brought peace to the area. But fighters with the Turkish-backed militias, known as the Syrian National Army, denied attacking the villages on Thursday.
“Nobody has yet offered a better alternative to what the United States did,” Mr. Esper told an audience at the German Marshall Fund, as he cited constant criticism of Mr. Trump’s withdrawal of American troops from northern Syria. The Turkish military said five of its soldiers had been wounded on Thursday in a Kurdish strike on the Syrian town of Ras al Ain. Turkish forces seized the town last week after the Syrian Democratic Forces, a former ally of the United States, and American troops withdrew from it in advance of the Turkish incursion.
That decision effectively opened the door for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey to send his troops into Syria and launch attacks against the Kurds who had fought alongside American troops there to battle the Islamic State, also known as ISIS. With American troops on the way out and their former allies falling back, the skirmishes on Thursday underscored that the future of northeastern Syria was largely in the hands of Turkey, the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad and Mr. Assad’s patron, Russia.
Mr. Trump’s decision “to withdraw less than 50 soldiers from the zone of attack was made after it was made very clear to us that President Erdogan made the decision to come across the border,” Mr. Esper said. Under an agreement on Tuesday between President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, Turkish, Russian and Syrian government troops will now share control of the swath of Syria vacated by the Americans and Kurdish-led forces.
The power shift was evident in other ways. Mr. Erdogan demanded Thursday that the United States hand over Mazlum Kobani, the Kurdish commander whose forces helped the United States drive the Islamic State out of Syria. Mr. Erdogan said he was “a terrorist” wanted for prosecution by Turkey.
“We have an extradition treaty with America,” Mr. Erdogan said in an interview with TRT Haber, the state news channel. “America should deliver this guy to us.”
In a letter to Mr. Erdogan two weeks ago, Mr. Trump suggested that Mr. Erdogan meet with Mr. Kobani rather than go to war. Mr. Erdogan, who reportedly threw the letter in the trash before going ahead with his military offensive, said Thursday that he was offended by Mr. Trump’s suggestion because Mr. Kobani was a wanted man.
Despite opening the door to Mr. Erdogan’s military operation, Trump administration officials have continued to criticize the move.
Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper accused Turkey on Thursday of putting the United States and its allies in the Middle East and Europe in a “terrible situation” because of its agreement with Russia.
Speaking at a NATO defense ministers’ meeting in Brussels, Mr. Esper called on Ankara to start acting like an ally and not a foe of the United States and NATO. But he was besieged by questions about Mr. Trump’s sudden decision to withdraw American troops and declare victory against the Islamic State in Syria.
“Nobody has yet offered a better alternative to what the United States did,” Mr. Esper told an audience at the German Marshall Fund.
Mr. Trump’s decision effectively allowed Mr. Erdogan to send his troops into Syria and launch attacks against the Kurds.
The decision “to withdraw less than 50 soldiers from the zone of attack was made after it was made very clear to us that President Erdogan made the decision to come across the border,” Mr. Esper said.
He said that the United States could “not jeopardize the lives” of American special operations troops in Syria and that the United States could not “start a fight with a NATO ally.”He said that the United States could “not jeopardize the lives” of American special operations troops in Syria and that the United States could not “start a fight with a NATO ally.”
But that rationalization, critics say, doesn’t protect the Kurdish fighters in Syria from Ankara, especially since on Wednesday Mr. Trump followed his withdrawal of American troops by lifting sanctions against Turkey. That small American force, however, had kept Turkey from invading. On Wednesday Mr. Trump lifted the sanctions against Turkey that he had imposed after its invasion.
That means the NATO defense ministers’ meeting this week, immediately following the whipsaw events of the past two weeks, was dominated on its first day by questions about what, if anything, to do about Turkey, an alliance member that increasingly has been going its own way. The NATO defense ministers’ meeting was dominated Thursday by questions about what, if anything, to do about Turkey, an alliance member that increasingly has been going its own way.
“We see them spinning closer to Russia’s orbit than in the Western orbit and I think that is unfortunate,” Mr. Esper said.“We see them spinning closer to Russia’s orbit than in the Western orbit and I think that is unfortunate,” Mr. Esper said.
Beyond Syria, Ankara has ignored American demands to reject delivery of Russian S-400 missile defense systems, which the Pentagon says could allow Moscow to spy on American F-35 technology. In retaliation, the United States has begun to remove Turkey from a joint F-35 jet production program. Beyond its incursion into Syria, Ankara has ignored American demands to reject delivery of Russian S-400 missile defense systems, which the Pentagon says could allow Moscow to spy on American F-35 fighter jet technology. In retaliation, the United States has begun to remove Turkey from a joint F-35 production program.
Mr. Esper scheduled a meeting with Defense Minister Hulusi Akar of Turkey for Thursday night. But it was unclear what the Pentagon, in the absence of any backing from Mr. Trump, could do to prod Ankara. Since the beginning of his trip, Mr. Esper has been hounded by the repercussions of Mr. Trump’s Syria pullout. Mr. Esper arrived in Afghanistan on Sunday and was greeted by a tweet from his boss claiming that a cease-fire in Syria was “holding up very nicely.”
Since the beginning of his trip, with stops in Afghanistan, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, Mr. Esper has been hounded by the repercussions of Mr. Trump’s Syria pullout. Mr. Esper arrived in Afghanistan on Sunday and was greeted by a tweet from his boss claiming that a cease-fire in Syria was “holding up very nicely,” and attributing that view to Mr. Esper. But Mr. Trump called Mr. Esper “Mark Esperanto” in the tweet — a misspelling that eludes repeated efforts to duplicate it via autocorrect on smartphones. He arrived in Saudi Arabia as Russian troops were taking over military bases abandoned by American troops in Syria. And in Iraq, he was faced with Iraqi officials who loudly insisted that American troops relocating to Iraq from Syria could not stay long in the country.
Mr. Esper arrived in Saudi Arabia as Russian troops were taking over military bases abandoned by American troops in Syria. And in Iraq, he was faced with public posturing from Iraqi officials who loudly insisted that American troops relocating to Iraq from Syria could not stay long in the country. Hanging over all this was the question of how to secure 2,000 Islamic State prisoners in Syria who were being held by the Kurds.
Hanging over all this was the question of how to secure 2,000 Islamic State prisoners in Syria, who were being held by the Kurds. “It is extremely important to make sure that captured ISIS fighters are not set free, so those who are present on the ground have a responsibility to make sure that doesn’t happen,” NATO’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, told reporters on Thursday.
“It is extremely important to make sure that captured ISIS fighters are not set free, so those who are present on the ground have a responsibility to make sure that doesn’t happen,” NATO’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, told reporters on Thursday. Standing beside Mr. Esper a few hours later, he expressed concern “about jeopardizing the progress we have made in the fight against” the Islamic State. Standing beside Mr. Esper a few hours later, he expressed concern “about jeopardizing the progress we have made in the fight against” the Islamic State.
At NATO, the big hurdle that officials were grappling with was how to handle Turkey. (As if to highlight his refusal to bend to NATO’s collective will, Mr. Erdogan said on Thursday that if the Kurdish militants appeared in the so-called safe zone in Syria after an agreed-upon withdrawal period, Turkey would use its right to “crush them.”) As if to remind themselves why the alliance needed to exercise patience with Turkey, officials were passing around a 1979 brief from Margaret Thatcher, the former prime minister of Britain, in which she warned of dire consequences if NATO pushed Turkey away.
As if to remind themselves why the alliance needs to exercise patience with Turkey, officials were passing around a 1979 brief from Margaret Thatcher, the former prime minister of Britain, in which she outlined dire consequences if NATO pushed Turkey away. “NATO would lose control exercised by Turkey over the Bosporus and Dardanelles choke points which give the Soviet Black Sea fleet its only point of exit to the Mediterranean,” the brief said, and the United States “would be denied Turkish sites for important intelligence and air defense surveillance.”
“If Turkey abandoned her Western orientation, a number of strongly adverse military consequences would follow for the West,” the brief said. “NATO would lose control exercised by Turkey over the Bosporus and Dardanelles choke points which give the Soviet Black Sea fleet its only point of exit to the Mediterranean.” It concluded that “the military position would be the more serious if the Soviet Union were herself able to exploit Turkish airspace or, worse, given use of Turkey’s airfields.”
The brief added that “the U.S.A. would be denied Turkish sites for important intelligence and air defense surveillance facilities and the use of Turkish military airfields.” The Turkish Parliament hit back on Thursday at the European Parliament, rejecting its declaration that Turkey’s operation in northern Syria violated international law.
It concluded that “the military position would be the more serious if the Soviet Union were herself able to exploit Turkish airspace or, worse, given use of Turkey’s airfields. In that event, the Eastern Mediterranean might become untenable by NATO in times of tension or war.” Turkey’s two ruling parties were joined by the two leading opposition parties in accusing the European Parliament of showing support for a terrorist group, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or P.K.K., instead of aligning itself with Turkey, a NATO ally, in fighting the group.
The Syrian Defense Forces have ties to the P.K.K.
Vivian Yee reported from Beirut, and Helene Cooper from Brussels. Karam Shoumali contributed reporting from Berlin, and Carlotta Gall from Akcakale, Turkey.