Alwaght- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says his country will soon launch a new military operation east of the Euphrates River in northern Syria.
The upcoming operation, the Turkish leader went on, will be larger than its precedents in the region, where the Turkish army has been fighting the US-covered Syian Kurdish militants.
“Our preparations and plans [for an operation] are done, we will soon bring down the terror formation east of the Euphrates,” Erdogan told his fellow party members in a speech on Tuesday.
Anadolu news agency of Turkey on Sunday reported that the Turkish jets bombed Kurdish positions east of Euphrates banks. The targeted group was the People’s Protection Units, or YPG, blacklisted by Ankara as a terrorist group. Turkey argues that the YPG is an offshoot of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a terrorist group Ankara has been fighting for over three decades.
The US covers the YPG operation by its air raids.
First major operation in Syria by Turkey was launched in 2016, when Ankara allied with the Syrian opposition armed wing in Operation Euphrates Shield. The second Operation came earlier this year, which led to the capture of Afrin from the Kurds.
Damascus called the operations on its soil a violation of its sovereignty and called for Ankara to pull out. Turkey vowed to continue to chase the Kurdish fighters in Syria's north.
New confrontation with Washington?
The remarks will be taken seriously by the US and the Kurdish militias.
The new operation, if launched, will possibly put Ankara and Washington at each other’s throats afresh. While Turkey is determined to remove the Kurds from its borders, the US insists on keeping protecting them as a key play card.
Erdogan several times called on Washington to stop helping the Syrian Kurds militarily and logistically. To his frustration, the Americans kept their alliance with them.
On June 4, the US and Turkish foreign ministers agreed to eject the Kurdish fighters from Manbij town in Aleppo province.
Turkey, however, presses the US for a full withdrawal of cover for the Syrian Kurds, something the Americans so far declined to do. Some call the Kurdish fighters an infantry to the US intervention in Syria.
The Department of Defense has in April last year confirmed delivery of heavier weapons to US-allied Kurdish fighters ahead of Raqqa operation.
Things have been going worse recently between Ankara and Washington and their proxies, of course.
Sharvan Darwish, spokesperson of the Manbij Military Council (MMC), on Sunday accused the Turkish-backed Euphrates Shield rebels of targeting MMC positions in Manbij and villages near the town, such as al-Harima, Kareidiya, and al-Hamran.
The new shelling and the threats of the upcoming operation may signal that the Turkish leader wants to seal a new deal with the Americans to check the Kurds’ advances and bargaining power as the war nears its end.
The agreement that led to the ejection of the Kurdish fighters from Manbij followed a major military operation that led to Afrin capture after 50 days.
