Ankara may be counting on US-Russian rivalry in Syria
Unable to make its own mark, Ankara continues to vacillate between Moscow and Washington in an apparent effort to secure support to roll back gains by Syrian Kurds it considers terrorists.
The Syrian crisis has taken many unexpected turns since 2011. The involvement of local and global powers has not only complicated matters but also produced unwanted results for neighboring countries such as Turkey and Iraq.
Ankara, whose own involvement in the crisis is marked mostly by failures due to a series of miscalculations, has found itself forced to engage in delicate balancing acts with the principal players in the crisis.
Turkey has vacillated between the United States and Russia in an attempt to bolster its weak position in Syria. This approach has also been predicated on US-Russian ties being strained — as they were recently after the United States downed a Syrian fighter jet.
Turkey’s problem, however, is that although Washington and Moscow are global rivals, they concur on issues in Syria that Ankara is touchy about. This has raised the specter of an agreement between the United States and Russia that disregards Turkey’s vital interests in Syria.
