Questions over Freed Hostages and Turkey’s Next Move

Forty-nine hostages captured by the Islamic State (IS) were returned to Turkey on Saturday after spending more than three months in captivity, ending a crisis that restricted Ankara's ability to curb the rise of jihadism along its borders.

In a statement issued shortly after the hostages were released, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said, “The Turkish intelligence agency (MIT) has followed the situation very sensitively and patiently since the beginning and, as a result, conducted a successful rescue operation.”

The government did not reveal any further details, sparking rampant speculation about the negotiations and what Turkey may have done to secure the hostages’ release.

Some, including Samil Tayyar, an MP from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), argue that what brought home the hostages was a CIA operation aimed at convincing Turkey, a reluctant NATO partner, to join the US-led military coalition against IS. Others argue that IS agreed to release the hostages in a prisoner swap.

The circumstances surrounding the release raise many questions: How was the operation conducted? Was western intelligence involved? What has Turkey given IS in return? What will Turkey do now that the hostage crisis that curbed Ankara’s ability to join the US-led military coalition ended?

Let’s try to tackle these issues.

Erdogan insists that the operation was carried out by Turkish intelligence without any help from foreign intelligence services. The mission was reportedly executed using Turkish intelligence equipment, unmanned drones and local contacts in Sunni tribes in northern Iraq; it involved no ransom and no negotiations with the captors.

It’s not difficult to buy the government’s argument that the mission was the work of the country's intelligence agency rather than a special forces operation, and that Turkey might have carried out the operation without help from western intelligence services.

In a recent New York Times piece, an unnamed US official confirmed that the CIA was not involved. Turkey has established close contacts with Sunni tribes in Mosul since 2003 and reportedly used those contacts as interlocutors with IS.

The latter part of the story, however, remains shaky. After all, this was not a military operation. There were no clashes between Turkish forces and the IS.

The organization agreed to release the hostages. The bus carrying the hostages took a road through IS-controlled territory to Tal Abayad, where the hostages were handed over to Turkish officials.

Turkey must have given something in return for a ruthless militant group like IS to relinquish such a big bargaining chip.

A website affiliated with IS confirms that Turkey did not pay ransom to the organization to secure the release of hostages. A more likely explanation for the release emerged on the same website, which suggested that the hostage release was a quid pro quo for Turkey’s refusal to join the international anti-IS military coalition.

The possibility that IS and Turkey struck a deal has become the subject of heated debate in Washington. Some argue that Turkey might adopt a more aggressive posture now that the hostage crisis is over, given that Ankara cited the hostages as the key factor behind its reluctance to join the US-led military coalition.

There is, however, little reason to believe that Turkey would be willing to take a more aggressive stance against IS. The hostage crisis was just one of Turkey’s many concerns and the Turkish government is unlikely to reconsider its cautious approach.

Ankara will not help with the military coalition and won’t allow the US to use Incirlik airbase to stage attacks against IS. Ankara instead believes it has a better plan to address its immediate security concerns: a militarized buffer zone along its border with Syria, which Turkey is proposing at the United National General Assembly this week.

Gonul Tol is Executive Director of the Center for Turkish Studies at the Middle East Institute.