If such a plan is adopted, it would signify a shift in US policy and would further fracture an already delicate relationship between the US and Turkey.
US National Security Council staff are discussing ways to speed up the fight with ISIS with the aim of liberating Raqqa, the self-proclaimed caliphate’s de facto capital, something President Barak Obama would like to see underway before he leaves office in early 2017, the New York Times reported.
Ankara considers the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and People’s Protection Units (YPG) as extensions of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and, therefore, terrorist organizations. Turkey’s leaders have repeatedly and forcefully objected to Washington’s relationship with the YPG and the YPG-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
When Obama met his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the G20 leaders’ meetings earlier this month, Erdogan insisted that the US and Turkey must present a common front against terrorism and there should be no distinction between “good terrorists” and bad terrorists; all terrorism is bad, he said.
In late August, Turkey launched operation Euphrates Shield that aimed to clear all “terrorist elements” from its border with Syria west of the Euphrates and to prevent advances of Kurdish forces.
After the Turkish army crossed the border and reports of clashes between Kurdish forces and Turkey, along with Turkish-backed militias, emerged, the US’ special presidential envoy to the anti-ISIS global coalition, Brett McGurk, visited Kurdish forces in northern Syria to promise “ongoing US support for the SDF in the fight against ISIL [ISIS],” according to a State Department spokesperson.
The US has insisted that the Kurdish forces are the most effective force on the ground and a key ally. The US-led international coalition has coordinated airstrikes in support of Kurdish advances on the ground in northern Syria and US special forces have been pictured with the Kurdish forces in northern Syria.
The plan to arms the Kurds, if approved, according to the New York Times, would see the US providing them with small arms, ammunition, and mission-specific supplies, but no heavy weapons. The proposal has not yet been presented for a decision and White House officials declined to comment.
The Americans’ chief desire is to see all parties focused on fighting ISIS, rather than pointing their guns at each other. “What we have made clear is that our support to all parties is contingent upon the focus on ISIL,” a Department of Defense spokesperson told Rudaw earlier this month. “And that will be how we will continue to do this.”
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