Turkey’s ISIL crisis is worse than you think

[flamingdem]

http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/9/turkey-islamic-stateofiraqandthelevantisil.html

On Sept. 20, Turkey secured the release of dozens of its citizens who had been held captive by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) since June. In an effort to not jeopardize the lives of the hostages, Turkish leaders have been reluctant to publicly condemn the group. In June, the famously bullish Recep Tayyip Erdogan even said, “no one should expect me to provoke ISIS,” responding to accusations that his government has been passive in dealing with ISIL. Ankara has also refused to allow the United States, its closest military ally since 1947, to launch airstrikes from U.S. bases in Turkey. Now that the hostages are freed, Ankara should openly join the U.S.-led coalition against ISIL.

After two years of tolerating the group as it funneled recruits and supplies into Syria, Turkey has come to the realization that the group represents a serious threat to its national security. How did Turkey get into such a predicament?

When the Syrian crisis began in 2011, Turkey doubled down on its ideological, financial and material support for the armed Syrian opposition with the hope that the U.S. would enter the fight. As the crackdown on Syria’s Sunni protesters mounted, Erdogan (at the time Turkey’s prime minister and now its president) and Ahmet Davutoglu (then its foreign minister and now its prime minister) endorsed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s ouster. After all, U.S. President Barack Obama said that Assad had lost legitimacy and that it was time for the Syrian leader to go. Besides, the idea of an Islamist-aligned government in Syria resonated with Erdogan’s neo-Ottoman ambitions to see Turkey as a key player and tutor in the region.

Turkey then began lobbying Washington for intervention (PDF) while opening its borders to any and all Syrian rebel groups. The trickle of money, supplies and weapons flowing through Turkey eventually became a torrent. However, the Obama administration continued to pursue a policy of nonintervention in perhaps the most damaging way possible, calling for Assad’s ouster and setting red lines without following through. Meanwhile, the jihadist networks in Turkey ballooned.

‘A terrible bind’

Turkey realized that its interests were compromised only after the split between Al-Qaeda and ISIL became clear in February. When ISIL launched a series of attacks and threats against other rebels, it slowly dawned on Turkey that the extremist group could not be controlled or counted on in a campaign to remove Assad from power. ISIL’s threat to Turkey became crystal clear in June when ISIL fighters seized the Turkish consulate in the Iraqi city of Mosul and took 49 Turkish citizens hostage, including diplomats, women, children and special forces personnel.