Why does Turkey want to take Tal Rifaat?

The small but strategically important town of Tal Rifaat has become an urgent demand for Turkey and, if diplomacy fails, a target. Turkey’s threat to launch a new offensive into northwest Syria followed widely circulated, though unconfirmed, reports of the Russian withdrawals of troops from Syria, needed elsewhere in Ukraine.

Last week, Russia urged Turkey not to carry out any further incursion into northern Syria. ''We hope that Ankara will refrain from actions that could lead to a dangerous deterioration of the already difficult situation in Syria.'' Maria Zakharova, spokeswoman for Russia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said in a statement. 

''We understand Turkey's concerns about threats to national security emanating from the border regions,'' Zakharova said, adding that the problem could only be solved if Syrian troops are deployed to the area. 

''Such a move, in the absence of the agreement of the legitimate government of the Syrian Arab Republic, would be a direct violation of Syria's sovereignty and territorial integrity,'' she continued. 

Article six of the October 2019 Sochi Agreement signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan stipulates that 'All YPG elements with their weapons will be removed from Manbij and Tal Rifaat.' However, Ankara maintains that this undertaking has never been materialized on the ground, claiming it provides impetus and justification to advance further south. 

Erdogan reiterated his country's intention of carrying out another offensive into northwest Syria at the beginning of June. ''We are taking another step in establishing a 30 km (19-mile) security zone along our southern border,' he said.

The US-backed Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and its political umbrella, the Syrian Democratic Council (SDC), voiced their concerns regarding Turkey's 'serious' threats against the region. 

However, most significantly, this is the first time that Erdogan has explicitly mentioned the target(s) of his country's alleged operation. "We will clean up Tal Rifaat and Manbij," the president openly said.

Balancing both cities, Tal Rifaat seems to be the lower of the two hanging fruits. While there are no US military troops in Manbij, however, it is virtually under its surveillance. 

In the eastern Euphrates, Turkey would have to compromise both the United States and the Russian Federation, while in the western Euphrates the case appertains to Russia alone with Iran not to be disregarded or ignored. 

Turkish armed forces have already launched three incursions into northern Syria. However, Peace Spring in 2019 drew much international condemnation notably from Finland and Sweden who (among many others) restricted arms sales to Turkey. Now, Turkey is blocking both Nordic countries to join NATO because of the weapon ban and their alleged support for the Kurds.

Time and again, Erdogan has said he would take the town sooner or later, and his forces have recently stepped up its military operations against the Kurdish forces. But why the town is so important for Turkey? 

Tal Rifaat is located roughly some 35 km to the north of Aleppo and some 15 km from the Turkish border, functioning as a slip ring that commands Afrin, Azaz, Marea and al-Bab, surrounding the city of Aleppo. 

The Kurdish fighters of the Peoples' Protection Units (YPG) took the town in February 2016 with support provided by the Russian air force. 

Strategically, Tal Rifaat is the juncture that connects different areas run by different forces representing separate ideologies; Syrian regime forces, the Kurds, and Syrian opposition factions affiliated to the Syrian National Army. 

US troops have no zones of influence in northern Aleppo or elsewhere nearby. However, the United States has expressed concerns in reference to such a move by the NATO ally. US officials believe that any new Turkish military operation in northern Syria would hamper the efforts exerted in the fight against the Islamic State (ISIS) and would result in further displacements and humanitarian catastrophes, providing malign actors with agency to destabilize the region already agonizing under harsh living conditions.

In a joint news conference with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg last week, US Secretary Of State Antony Blinken warned Turkey against such a step, ''It is something that we would oppose. The concern is that we have is that any new offensive would undermine regional stability (and) provide malign actors with opportunities to exploit instability,'' he said.

However, since Turkey holds the NATO line against Russia in Ukraine, the US may turn a blind eye to the planned Turkish military operation.

The Minnigh airspace in northern Tal Rifaat, run by Russian troops, is a huge stumbling stone in the face of the Turkish operation receiving a green light. Russian forces at Minnigh would either have to withdraw, or be left isolated.

In 2018, Russia gave a green light to Turkish armed forces to advance to Afrin, however, a red light was drawn in front of Tal Rifaat where Syrian regime forces were deployed. 

Ankara claims that Kurdish forces stationed in Tal Rifaat and nearby villages shell areas under its control on a constant bases. 

Russian troops are stationed in the strategically important Minnigh military airbase. The operation - if carried out - would isolate the airbase. Hence, it would lose its strategic value and be surrounded by hostile elements. Nonetheless, it is unlikely that Turkey would launch any operation into Tal Rifaat without the prior knowledge - if not the expressed permission - of the Russian Federation. 

Sinan Ulgen, a former Turkish diplomat and current visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe, told Newsweek that ''there is a calculation in Ankara that Russia will not anymore oppose such an intervention, and will not want to oppose such an intervention because Russia now is more in need of retaining Turkey as a diplomatic partner in Ukraine.''

Tal Rifaat could, observers say, be a part of a land swap; it could be exchanged for areas under Turkish Observation Posts in north Hama or in south Idlib.

By taking the town, Turkey would facilitate the move of troops extending from Jarablus to the west of the Euphrates up to Hatay, which would drive an everlasting wedge between Afrin and other Kurdish regions in the east.

''Tehran views such military actions as a violation of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of those countries and believes this will only further complicate the situation and intensify tensions,'' Saeed Khatibzadeh, spokesperson for the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, commented on the potential Turkish incursion. 

Appeasing the Iranians will not be an easy task, as Iran was adamant not to lose either Nubul or Zahraa, both lying to the southwest of Tal Rifaat, and the Syrian regime forces in the south, that were laid to siege in the first years of the crisis in Syria. Iranians were determined not to relinquish the two predominant Shiite towns.

Considering the presence of Russian troops nearby, and the Iranian backed Shiite factions in Nubul and Zahraa, combined with the Syrian regime forces in the south, a Turkish military operation faces a host of complications.

Lazghine Ya'qoube is a translator and researcher focusing on the modern history of Mesopotamia, with a special focus on Yazidi and Assyrian affairs in Turkey, Syria and Iraq. 

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