Turkish military vehicles transporting tanks en route to northern Syria. | Sedat Suna/EPA.
The neo-Ottoman policy has been one of the main reasons for the destabilization of West Asia in recent years. As long as Turkey does not give up its territorial claims based on the Missak-i Milli, the region will not come to rest. Part II of the three-part series on the Kurds.
TURKEY USES NUMEROUS PROXY FORCES TO IMPLEMENT ITS NEO-OTTOMAN POLICY
During the more than two decades that Erdogan has been in power, Turkey has completely abandoned its pragmatic restraint with regard to its neo-Ottoman expansionist plans. In particular, it interpreted the beginning of the so-called ‘Arab Spring’ in 2010 as a green light to actively participate in the transformation of West Asia and to lay claim to large parts of its neighboring countries. While Turkey initially relied almost exclusively on Islamist proxy forces, in recent years the deployment of Turkish troops to enforce the Missak-i Milli has become increasingly common. Despite the clear failures of this policy, Turkey continues to use the political and military chaos in the region to annex northern Syria and northern Iraq in particular.
Turkish Interest in Syria
After the regional upheavals reached Syria in 2011, Turkey quickly became active in the neighboring country. The al-Nusra Front and the so-called ‘Free Syrian Army’ (FSA) were suitable partners for Turkey’s ambitions there. At the end of 2012, fighters from the al-Nusra Front and the FSA attempted to occupy the northern Syrian city of Serêkanîyê (Arabic: Ras al-Ayn). The Kurdish self-defense forces in the city put up resistance, whereupon heavy fighting broke out. Fighters from the al-Nusra Front and the FSA had advanced into the city, in some cases from Turkish territory, as it is located directly on the Syrian-Turkish border. After intense fighting, the Kurdish self-defense forces succeeded in pushing the two groups back from Serêkanîyê. Turkey’s cooperation with the al-Nusra Front in particular continued in the following years. For example, in Idlib, whose border with Turkey represented a vital supply line for the otherwise largely isolated area. This cooperation has continued since the al-Nusra Front took over power in Syria in December last year.
As the al-Nusra Front had not succeeded in ending the Kurdish self-administration efforts in northern Syria despite intensive Turkish support in 2012 and 2013, Turkey began to look for a more effective alternative. It quickly found what it was looking for in the form of the Islamic State (IS).
The Turkey-Islamic State Partnership
In return for considerable influence over the IS leadership, Turkey allowed tens of thousands of radical Islamists from all over the world to travel to Syria and Iraq via its territory to join IS there.
The group quickly gained strength in Iraq in 2013 and shifted its focus to the Kurdish regions in northern Syria the following year. In its attacks on the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI), the Kurdish-Ezidi region of Shengal in western Iraq, and the northern Syrian city of Kobanê in the summer of 2014, IS was able to rely on extensive support from Turkey. Injured IS fighters were treated in Turkish hospitals, IS logistics were handled via the Turkish-Syrian border, oil from IS territories was sold via Turkish territory, and IS organizational centers were set up in cities close to the border such as Gaziantep. Once again, however, Turkey’s enormous support for an Islamist proxy force such as IS was not enough to defeat the Kurdish self-defense forces YPG (People’s Defense Forces), YPJ (Women’s Defense Forces) and HPG (People’s Defense Forces), and drive the Kurdish population out of northern Syria. Following the victory over IS in Kobanê at the end of January 2015 and in Shengal at the end of 2015, IS had also become much less attractive to Turkey.
Despite the defeats of the al-Nusra Front, the FSA, and IS, Turkey did not abandon its neo-Ottoman ambitions in its neighboring countries. In 2017, a new military umbrella organization for numerous groups active in Syria emerged under Turkish leadership in the form of the so-called ‘Syrian National Army’ (SNA). These included numerous former members of the al-Nusra Front, the FSA, and IS. Initially, the SNA was dominated by Turkmen groups such as the Sultan Murad Division and the Hamza Division. In 2018, Turkey persuaded numerous other Islamist proxy forces to unite under the umbrella of the SNA. Turkey relied heavily on SNA forces in its occupation operations in Efrîn (2018) in north-western Syria and the northern Syrian cities of Girê Spî and Serêkanîyê (2019). Until the end of 2024, these Islamist proxy forces were concentrated in the Turkish-occupied areas of northern Syria. Since the fall of the Assad government, Turkey has used the SNA to attack the Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (DAANES), to prevent the stabilization of Syria by instigating religious and ethnic conflicts, especially with the Alevis and Druze, and to pressure the Syrian interim government to pursue policies in line with Turkish interests.
In 2014, Turkey stepped up its efforts to build up armed groups in the oil and gas regions of Kirkuk and Mosul and the strategically important Telafer in order to assert its neo-Ottoman territorial claims in northern Iraq. It took advantage of the chaos caused by IS in the country at the time to arm, train, and finance Turkmen and Sunni Arabs in particular. The Turkish secret service MIT was able to fall back on contacts that it had already established in 2003 after the US invasion of Iraq. In the Kirkuk region, Turkey maintains numerous armed militias under the label ‘Kirkuk Shield’. Similar Turkish-controlled militias operate in the Mosul and Telafer regions under the name ‘Nineveh Guard’. Some of them receive their salaries directly from Turkey. Ankara has also persuaded some of these militias to join the Hashdi Shabi and thus receive salaries from the Iraqi state treasury.
These military and secret service activities are accompanied by the use of cultural means such as the construction of Ottoman-style mosques and the broadcasting of Turkish television series in Iraq.
Turkish soldiers gather close to the Syria-Turkey border. | Zein Al Rifai/AFP via Getty Images.
The danger posed to Iraq by the Turkish-controlled proxy forces is being discussed increasingly critically by the public in the country. Since the takeover by the al-Nusra Front in Syria, numerous voices from Iraq have accused Turkey of wanting to repeat the ‘Idlib scenario’ with the help of the militias in Kirkuk, Mosul, and Telafer.
Syrian and Iraqi Kurds Hold Strong
Since 2012, the Kurdish population of western Kurdistan (northern Syria) and southern Kurdistan (northern Iraq) has managed to repel the heavy attacks by Turkish-controlled Islamist proxy forces. Turkey therefore made a far-reaching decision in the late summer of 2016 and began deploying Turkish troops to occupy parts of its neighboring countries. On August 24, 2016, Turkish President Erdogan ordered the Turkish military to invade northern Syria and northern Iraq.
In Syria, this military operation led to the occupation of the areas of Cerablus, Azaz and al-Bab in the north of the country. This cut off the two DAANES-controlled cantons of Kobanê and Efrîn from each other. On the same day, the Turkish military advanced from the area of Çele (Turkish: Çukurca) into northern Iraqi territory. In Syria, the aforementioned occupations of Efrîn (2018), Girê Spî, and Serêkanîyê (2019) happened in the years that followed. However, the resistance of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), including the Kurdish self-defense forces YPG and YPJ, prevented the Turkish army from advancing further to the Euphrates and to Aleppo.
This brought the Turkish occupation plans in northern Syria to a halt. At the same time, Turkey also expanded the territory it occupied in northern Iraq. Military operations in the northern Iraqi regions of Xakurke (2018), Heftanîn (2020), Metîna, and Avaşîn (2021) have been ongoing ever since. The Turkish army has since established 138 military bases there. Due to the strong resistance of the HPG, a guerrilla organization associated with the PKK, Turkey has not succeeded in bringing these areas under its control. Accordingly, its original goal of occupying the mountainous regions of southern Kurdistan controlled by the HPG and quickly advancing to Mosul and Kirkuk within a few months of its invasion in August 2016 failed.
The list of Islamist proxy forces that Turkey uses to enforce its neo-Ottoman ambitions in West Asia could be extended even further. Ankara also maintains close relations with groups such as Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Many of Hamas’s leading cadres live in Istanbul for most of the year, hold Turkish passports, and conduct their group's financial transactions through Turkish banks. With regard to Hezbollah in Lebanon, Israeli media recently accused Turkey of helping Iran to transport cash for the Shiite organization to Lebanon via Turkish airports and with the help of Turkish airlines. A more detailed discussion of the wide network of Turkish-controlled proxy forces is not possible here.
However, even this brief look at Turkey’s activities in this regard makes it clear that its neo-Ottoman policy has been one of the main reasons for the destabilization of West Asia in recent years. As long as Turkey does not give up its territorial claims based on the Missak-i Milli, the region will not come to rest.
(Exclusive to NatStrat)
End of Part II of the three-part series. Read Part III here.
