ISIS: so the Kurds are fighting like mad to stop them taking the town of Kobane

[winkywinkola]

and Turkey is doing nothing to help.

Am I being naive and uneducated but goodness me, why isn't the Turkish government doing anything? This is right on their border.

I realise the conflict with the Kurds and Turkey re: independence but surely this is another issue altogether.

Please someone enlighten me.

First you have to understand how Isis was created, who funded it and who aided it and you have to understand why.

But if you ignore all that, Turkey is not prepared to enter Syria by itself because it would be an invasion of a sovereign state. They are saying that they will only do so as part of a United Nations approved international coordinated agreed effort.

We have not approved or voted for airstrikes in Syria.

Turkey allegedly has also said that it will only do so if the agreed goal is to topple Assad. The vultures are all ganging up on Assad who is the only person fighting Al Qaeda, Isis, Al Nusra and all the rest of the Jihadis.

There was a stomach-churning article in the Guardian about the atrocities being committed against the Kurds in Kobani/e (think in that it was being spelt with an I) which brought me off the fence about the bombing - I only wish it would wipe out the ISIS forces. Not sure how likely that is. I can't bring myself to go back to the article because it was awful. The Kurds seem to have got a raw deal time and again now, although I am far from expert on all the complexities of the region. I get that Turkey is incredibly jumpy about it but wants to stay out. I wonder how sure they can be that ISIS won't try anything across their border.

'I wonder how sure they can be that ISIS won't try anything across their border.'

100% sure. Turkey has turned a blind eye to Isis for years and allowed them to cross the Turkish border. They have been supplied via Turkey and some of their oil is being sold in Turkey with a blind eye being turned.

The Turkish government might well be forced to do something very soon. There are already Turkish Military in Syria, if they are threatened by ISIL, then they will have no choice but to back them up. They are already having problems resupplying them, so it's only a matter of time.

They may have their hands forced should the kurds be beaten. Turkey has no truck with the kurds and could be seen to be waiting for IS to defeat them (thus solving one problem) then deciding to strike at IS should they become a threat to Turkey. That's one theory anyway.

An article in the Mail explains it quite well. As always, Assad features big in what is happening. A lot of countries in the region want the secular Assad regime gone, to be replaced by a government more favourable for the Sunni countries in the region and the majority Sunni population of Syria. That is why Turkey turned a blind eye to Isis who are fighting Assad along with funded Jihadis from Chechnya and other countries.

Some of our top former military leaders have said that Isis cannot be defeated by airstrikes and that boots on the ground will be needed. So you have to winder why there are no boots on the ground.

"With his ambition to revive of Turkey’s once-great power status, Erdogan has allied the country not only with the conservative Sunni Muslims of Saudi Arabia, but with the Muslim Brotherhood regime of former President Morsi in Egypt, and with the Sunni militant Palestinian group Hamas.

In doing so, he destroyed Turkey’s good relations with Israel, a staunch ally of the Kurds.
It is wrong to view them differently, we need to deal with them jointly
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkish president, speaking of the Kurds in Kobane and Islamic State

Relations with the newly elected military regime in Egypt are grim, too. Erdogan’s emotional pull towards Sunni Arabs means he is implacably opposed to Syria’s President Assad, who is an ally of Shia Iran, and explains why he is so keen to back Assad’s enemies, even if that means backing IS.

That is why he is telling the U.S. that only if America extends its intervention in Syria to toppling Assad will he move a muscle to help the Kurds in Kobane.

Erdogan will drive a very hard bargain before he contemplates any military action, not least because the Turks realise that while Western intervention comes and goes in the Middle East, Turkish intervention in Syria could involve the country in an intractable war that lasts decades.

This, then, is the country which the West hopes will put men on the ground to repulse IS.

Some hope. For as well as supporting the terrorists, Turkey has been allowing British jihadis to cross its borders, while simultaneously claiming to join the anti-IS coalition."

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2787303/Prejudice-hatred-Turkey-won-t-barbarians-border.html