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Now, onto Turkey, SDF etc. Chris: “I would not criticise any rebel group that adopted a similar policy. What I am criticising is the fact that some rebel groups have become instruments of a Turkish intervention that is directed against the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria.” Elsewhere, Chris disputes my statement that rebels were transferred north to Euphrates Shield to fight ISIS, claiming they went to fight the SDF. He claims that Turkey’s claim that its intervention was directed against both ISIS and the YPG “was a smokescreen,” because, he claims, Turkey had previously collaborated with ISIS against the YPG in the northeast. This seems strange logic. I will leave aside whether or not Turkey “supported ISIS” in the past - Turkey heavily supported anti-ISIS rebels, but at a certain point may have maneuvered with ISIS against the YPG in Kobani, as any self-respecting Machiavellian regime might do to look after its interests. Such tactical preferencing of one enemy over another should not be confused with actually “supporting” ISIS. But regardless, even if in the past Turkey “supported” ISIS, how is that an argument against what it was doing now? As I pointed out in my previous post, which Chris has not really answered, the Turkey/FSA/rebel action under Euphrates Shield cleared ISIS out of a vast swathe of territory, bordered by Azaz, Jarablus and al-Bab. The SDF was not present in any of these areas. The only FSA-SDF clashes were some brief “border” clashes in the region between Manbij and Jarablus, near the outset of the operation, which the US put a stop to. How anyone can describe this as an attack on the SDF while just using “fighting ISIS” as a “smokescreen” I have no idea; it defies reality. Try to remember the Stalinist origins of the PKK, comrades - they may have moved on, but some of their propaganda style reflects old habits. I recommend we be aware of this and try not to repeat it. Of course it is true that one of the motivations of the Turkish regime in helping the FSA drive ISIS from this region was to prevent the YPG from carrying out its potentially catastrophic irredentist plan to “link” Kurdish Afrin with Kurdish Kobani by seizing this 6 thousand square mile stretch of non-Kurdish territory. But in taking part, the FSA/rebels were not carrying out Turkish orders, as they were acting entirely in their own interests in recovering this Arab- and Turkmen-majority territory from ISIS, which had conquered it from these same rebels earlier. It had never before been controlled by the YPG, and the YPG had no special “right” to take it. Finally, Chris rejects my description of the Menagh-Tal Rifaat region as "occupied Arab territory" which "The rebels [by which he means the groups allied to Turkey] have the right to re-take [their territory] from the YPG-SDF". This is the Arab/Turkmen-majority region of northern Aleppo that was violently conquered from the rebels by the YPG in February 2016, with the invading Russian imperialist airforce, when it wasn’t slaughtering the length and breadth of Syria, bloodily softening up these rebel towns for the YPG to seize. On reflection, calling them occupied “Arab” territory, on account of their Arab majority, was a mistake, Just as Kurdish-majority territory is not “Kurdish.” In both cases, it is Syrian territory, and it is up to the locals, of whatever ethnic majority, to decide who runs the place, and how. But apart from the word “Arab”, everything else I wrote about this occupied territory was correct. Chris does not address the bloody conquest, the role of Russian imperialism in this conquest, the resistance of the FSA/rebels in these towns, the expulsion of the populations, the demands of the expelled populations for return, the YPG gloating over FSA corpses in Tal Rifaat during the conquest, etc etc. Rather, he claims: “This ignores the fact that the SDF has a strong Arab component, and that many of its Arab members come from a Free Syrian Army background.” To back this, he notes my discussion in my MLR article of Nusra’s suppression of two large FSA coalitions, the Syrian Revolutionaries Front and Harakat Hazm, and notes that I do not “mention that some of the survivors of Nusra's attacks fled to Afrin, where they helped form a new, predominantly Arab, group called Jaysh al-Thuwar (Revolutionary Army), which later combined with the mainly Kurdish YPG/YPJ to form the Syrian Democratic Forces.” Therefore, he concludes: “Thus the "rebel" groups allied to Turkey cannot be considered the sole representatives of Arab people in northern Syria. Tal Rifaat is not "their territory", which they are entitled to "re-take".” This is actually quite appalling Chris, on many levels. Before I get to what is wrong with the “facts” and assumptions here, what stands out again is the refusal to deal with the real world. The role of the bloody Russian airforce in helping the YPG violently conquer this region remains unmentioned; Chris thinks the Arabic ethnicity of a fraction of the SDF means the actual populations who lived there and the actual rebel formations that were based there, based among those populations, who now live in Azaz or Turkey, are not entitled to re-take their own towns from an occupying force that was imposed by an invading imperialist airforce. Let’s reverse that: seeing as some of the FSA/rebels are of Kurdish ethnicity, if they invaded Afrin (not occupied Tal Rifaat, but actual Afrin) with the direct participation of the invading Turkish army and airforce, and the populations and SDF fighters were pushed out, then according to Chris’ logic, they would not be entitled to re-take Afrin, as long as there is a sprinkling of Kurds among the rebel forces. Anyway now to the specifics. Chris is correct that *some* of the former SRF/Hazm cadre joined the infamous Jaysh al-Thuwar militia, which allied to the YPG and often spearheaded Russian-backed attacks on the rebels in late 2015. Their hard line (at one point, when the YPG and FSA drew up a truce in December, JaT rejected the truce signed by its own YPG allies) may have been related to a vengeful streak among these folk. While many FSA cadre do not like the YPG, they tend to respect them as fighters for their own cause, whereas they have a rather lower opinion of JaT. However, *other* former SRF/Hazm cadre, who had taken refuge in Turkey, joined the Euphrates Shield operation (the official bodies of these groups did). But a great many, probably majority, simply stayed in Idlib or Aleppo and joined other FSA or rebel formations. Jamal Maarouf himself, the former SRF leader and long-tome chief rebel leader in Idlib till expelled by Nusra, openly spoke out against JaT from his Turkish refuge. More generally, Chris has had a tendency in his contributions here (in some cases more blatantly than here), of grouping the entire gamut of non-YPG, non-Nusra rebels into two categories: one he labels “Turkish-backed” rebels, who he thinks are mere puppets of the AKP regime, and the other are those he thinks are still loyal to the original democratic aims of the revolution and so have joined the SDF. There is little in between, and little complexity within, according to this schema. But this is simply a PYD-centred binary view of the world. A relatively few tiny rebel groups have joined the SDF. A majority of rebel groups, including the majority of democratic, non-sectarian rebel groups, have not joined the SDF. Most are loosely allied to Turkey, only to the extent that Turkey continues to provide them a lifeline, as has been the case throughout the conflict; almost none of them have ever picked up arms against the YPG to act as Turkish proxies (though some have fought the YPG at times, where neither side has necessarily had clean hands, for their own reasons). Of these, some are in Euphrates Shield, indicating a closer alliance with Turkey at this point; but even the majority of these are not Turkish pawns, but rather have simply not been forced (yet?) by Turkey to go to war against the YPG/SDF or against HTS. A much smaller group within Euphrates Shield may be described as outright Turkish proxies (eg Sultan Murad). There is also great variation within the ranks of the SDF, of course; the historically most significant FSA ally of the YPG, the Raqqa Revolutionaries Front, has continually had a very up and down relationship with the YPG, but in the Raqqa region there was simply no alternative for them: it was ISIS or Assad or SDF, so they made a logical choice. Now, however, they have almost ben fully sidelined by the Ocalanist clique who effectively run the SDF despite all the local democratic structures (geez, when haven’t we seen that kind of structure before?): “The same is true when it comes to the liberation of Raqqa: Only those who display obedience are allowed to take part. The result is that one rebel group -- which has fought against IS longer than any other, doesn't belong to the Islamist camp and took part in extended negotiations for American support -- is being kept away from the fighting by force of arms. "Things actually began quite cooperatively," says Abu Isa, a leader of Raqqa Revolutionaries' Brigade who is basically under village arrest in the Kurdish region of Syria. He can receive visitors, but he isn't allowed to leave. "We set up a joint operations headquarters together with the Kurds, just as we had done with the Free Syrian Army. But following the victory in Kobani, everything changed. The YPG officer with whom we had negotiated our cooperation was transferred and his successor said he knew nothing about it and was just following Öcalan's orders. The Americans wanted to support us, but they then changed their minds. Sorry, they told us, but our only allies now are the Kurds." “The final break came when Abu Isa and others demanded that Raqqa be liberated by rebels from the city and that residents be allowed to choose their own city council. "That's why we took to the streets in 2011, for freedom and rights," Abu Isa says. Everybody in Raqqa knows, he adds, that the Arabic-Kurdish military alliance, the SDF, is just a guise for the PKK-allied Syrian Kurdish party and its militia, the YPG. "How do the Kurds hope to control Raqqa? It's an Arab city. It won't go well." (http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/kurdish-pkk-expanding-grip-on-northern-syria-a-1151451-2.html) Anyway, getting back to the similarly fraught alliance of sorts the other FSA/rebels have with Turkey, labelling the bulk of rebel groups “Turkish-backed” rebels is crude debating device. The aim is to simplify, and hence slander. What Chris forgets is that if we want to play that game, then every time we refer to the YPG or SDF, we should call them “US-backed” fighters, as the western media now does (at least it is more honest than using that term for the FSA, but still incorrect). The SDF alliance with the US is much tighter than that of other rebels with Turkey; in fact it is probably the tightest relationship of any two forces anywhere in Syria. Yet as a rule, I do not use this debating trick, even if I think it somewhat justified. On Wed, Sep 20, 2017 at 10:09 PM, mkaradjis . <mkarad...@gmail.com> wrote: > Chris: "The US kept sanctions on Iran even after the UN lifted its > sanctions. There are exemptions which have allowed some deals. But > why have sanctions at all if Iran is such a great ally? I think it has > something to do with Iran's support of Hezbollah against Israel." > > My argument was not that the US and Iran were "great allies." It was > that they are, *in practice*, in most of the main theatres of conflict > in the Mideast *at present*, allies, in sharp contrast to Trumpist > rhetoric. > > The reasons for the long-term war of rhetoric, as well as the mild > sanctions that Chris notes, are, as I said, an interesting topic for > research. I'm more than open to suggestions. I have no hard and fast > opinions. > > However, Chris' view, probably a common one, that "it has something to > do with Iran's support of Hezbollah against Israel" only creates more > questions, not answers. That would have been a good answer up till > Hezbollah's liberation of southern Lebanon from Israeli occupation in > 2000. Actually, the Iran-Israel "conflict" is, even much more than the > US-Iran one, a blatant war of rhetoric, mediated by geographic > distance which makes it all the more harmless. It is the Arabic > peoples living in between who get slaughtered by Iran and Israel while > they shout at each other. However, due to the lucky coincidence that > southern Lebanon just happened to be heavily populated by Shia, the > Iranian-backed Shia militia Hezbollah took the lead in the national > liberation struggle. This enabled Iran to appear to be "fighting > Zionism", in an actual hot war, when in fact this was an entirely > rational liberation struggle. Hard to imagine how different history > may have been if southern Lebanon were populated by Sunni, and the > Shia were unaffeced up north somewhere. > > But once Lebanon was liberated in 2000, Iran and Hezbollah itself were > then a a loss as to how to continue to justify the "resistance" > ideology that had grown as a result, which for one thing facilitated > the mullah regime terrorising its own population via the use of > bullshit. The brief and bloody flare-up between Israel and Hezbollah > in 2006, when Hezbollah kidnapped a few Zionist troops and Israel > destroyed half of Lebanon and killed 1500 Lebanese civilians in > response, perhaps briefly gave the rhetoric a bit more "meat," > however, and ironically, but even Nasrallah had to admit that the > punishment meted out on Lebanese civilians was not worth his games. > > But regardless, since 2006, the Israeli-Lebanese border has been > stone-cold quiet (not sure if it was as quiet as the Syria-Israel > "border" on occupied Golan for 40 years under Assad, but almost as > much). No-one claims Hezbollah did jack "against Israel" over the last > 11 years. Instead, since 2011, and especially 2013, Hezbollah has > turned itself into a death squad for Assad engaged in mass murder and > sectarian cleansing of the Syrian Arab population. I'm sure they shout > some "anti-Zionist" slogans while they do this. > > So, given that Hezbollah does nothing against Israel, it is unclear > why Iran's support for Hezbollah "against Israel" would be a reason > for any *real*, as opposed to rhetorical, US hostility to Iran - > except in as much as historical grievances die hard and slow, with > wounded pride and credibility and all that at stake. Therefore, the > case is still wide open for me. > > On Wed, Sep 20, 2017 at 4:21 PM, Chris Slee <chris_w_s...@hotmail.com> wrote: >> >> Michael says: >> >> "But more broadly, what is behind the ongoing “war of rhetoric” between >> the US and Iran that has never led to an actual war is a good question >> for research. I suggest Obama understood the real long-term interests >> of US imperialism much better with his policy of engagement of a major >> regional capitalist power, with a large population/market, a >> relatively developed economy, plenty of oil and plenty of potential as >> a regional killer-cop." >> >> But it is not JUST a war of rhetoric. The US kept sanctions on Iran even >> after the UN lifted its sanctions. >> >> There are exemptions which have allowed some deals. But why have sanctions >> at all if Iran is such a great ally? >> >> I think it has something to do with Iran's support of Hezbollah against >> Israel. >> >> Chris Slee _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
