[News] What's goin' on at the Turkish-Syrian border?

[Anti-Imperialist News]

What's goin' on at the Turkish-Syrian border?
By Pepe Escobar

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/ND12Ak03.html

There is a video [1] that could be loosely translated as "Terrorist 
Turkish border opening fire on the Syrian side" that pretty 
accurately sums up what's going on at the ultra-volatile geopolitical 
hotspot of the moment.

The voice over says, "This is the Syria-Turkey border, and this is an 
operation of the Free Syrian Army [FSA] ... The Gate [that would be 
the Syrian side of the border, housing the Gate checkpoint] is going 
to be seized."

What this means is that Turkey is sheltering the FSA right on the 
border, only a few meters - and not kilometers - away from Syrian 
territory. Way beyond hosting a North Atlantic Treaty Organization 
(NATO) command and control center in Iskenderun for months now - a 
fact already reported by Asia Times Online - Turkey has now advanced 
right to the border, enabling a back-and-forth by heavily weaponized 
guerrillas/mercenaries to attack a sovereign state.

Imagine a similar scenario happening, say, at a Mexican-US border in 
Arizona or Texas.

This can be seen as a very peculiar Ankara interpretation of "safe 
havens" and "humanitarian corridors" as outlined by what can be seen 
as the prime blueprint for regime change in Syria: a report [2] by 
the Saban Center at the Brookings Institution, authored by the usual 
cocktail of Israeli firsters and Qatar-affiliated Middle East "experts".

So expect to see this movie generating countless sequels; the FSA 
attacking a Syrian border checkpoint, killing soldiers and then 
retreating under a hail of bullets, which will inevitably hit a 
nearby Syrian refugee camp.

The border escalation graphically illustrates the wider scenario: civil war.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu - of the fabled "zero 
problems with our neighbors" policy - had to abruptly cut short his 
trip to China and return to Turkey because of the border escalation. 
It would be very enlightening to learn how the Beijing leadership 
told him that Turkey's agent provocateur gimmicks amount to playing 
with a ball of fire.

The border escalation also proves that NATO has less than zero 
interest in the success of the ceasefire widely brandished as the 
Kofi Annan plan (that's in fact a diluted version of both the Russian 
and Chinese plans). Trouble will escalate further - as suggested by a 
RT report. [3]

Obviously, a sovereign government - in this case Syria - had to 
demand written guarantees that its weaponized opponents would also 
abide by the Annan ceasefire.

The single-most important reason that they won't - and they have 
already stressed so publicly - is that not only the FSA and splinter 
guerrillas will continue to be weaponized by Qatar and the House of 
Saud, and sprinkled with Libyan "rebels" flown into Syria; it's that 
two United Nations Security Council permanent members - Britain and 
France - also have their own special forces on the ground, engaged in 
training, intel and combat operations.

The trillion Turkish lira question is whether Ankara will go one step 
beyond and actually implement those "safe havens"; that would amount 
to being directly involved in the Syrian civil war, ie, a declaration 
of war against Damascus. That's exactly what the FSA has been begging 
the Turks to do. But even that would not be enough to topple the 
Bashar al-Assad regime.

As for the Assad police state/military apparatus, it just has to be 
wily enough not to be provoked into an orgy of torture, summary 
executions and artillery bombardment - the necessary condition to 
maintain the key diplomatic support of BRICS members Russia and 
China. Once again, it's average Syrians, caught in the middle, who 
will be the tragic losers.

Notes
1. See here.
2. See here.
3. See here.

Pepe Escobar is the author of Globalistan: How the Globalized World 
is Dissolving into Liquid War (Nimble Books, 2007) and Red Zone 
Blues: a snapshot of Baghdad during the surge. His most recent book, 
just out, is Obama does Globalistan (Nimble Books, 2009).

He may be reached at pepeasia at yahoo.com



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