A US soldier walks past a Turkish armored vehicle during the first joint ground patrol of America and Turkish forces in the safe zone on the Syrian side near Tel Abyad, Syrian Kurdistan (Rojava), September 8, 2019. Photo: AP
ISTANBUL,— The United States informed the commander of the Kurdish-led SDF forces in Syrian Kurdistan (Rojava) on Monday morning that U.S. forces will not defend them from Turkish attacks anywhere, a U.S. official told Reuters ahead of an expected Turkish offensive.
The official said U.S. forces had evacuated two observation posts at Serêkaniye (Ras al-Ain) and Gire Spi (Tel Abyad) in northeast Syria, along the Turkish border. The other U.S. forces in the region were still in position for now, the official said.
The United States views the Kurdish YPG as a close ally in the fight against the Islamic State (IS) group. Washington has for years supported the Kurdish forces in the fight against the Islamic State in Syria. But in December 2018 U.S. President Donald Trump abruptly announced the pullout from Syria.
The Kurdish PYD and its powerful military wing YPG/YPJ, considered the most effective fighting force against IS in Syria and U.S. has provided them with arms. The YPG, which is the backbone of the SDF forces, has seized swathes of Syria from Islamic State.
The Kurdish forces expelled the Islamic State from its last patch of territory in the eastern Syrian village of Baghouz in March 2019. But in December 2018 U.S. President Donald Trump abruptly announced the pullout from Syria.
The withdrawal from key positions along Syria’s Kurdish northern border came after the White House said it would step aside to allow for a Turkish operation President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said could come at any moment.
Turkey has sent reinforcements to the border in recent weeks, and Erdogan said Monday in televised remarks the long-threatened offensive could “come any night without warning”.
The Kurdish-dominated group said that the US pullback threatened to create a security vacuum that would “reverse the successful effort to defeat ISIS”.
It highlighted that 11,000 Kurdish fighters had been killed in five years of war to eliminate a “caliphate” that once covered an area the size of Great Britain in Syria and Iraq.
The Kurds also warned that the US withdrawal and imminent Turkish attack risked leading to the “return of leaders of ISIS who are hidden in the desert” and other areas.
The Kurds have consistently warned that they would be unable to keep captured IS fighters behind bars if they had to dedicate the bulk of their forces to fighting back a Turkish offensive.
The Kurdish SDF said in its statement that IS cells would break out detained jihadists from Kurdish prisons and take over camps where their relatives are held, “which is a threat to local and international security.”
Turkey has already launched two military incursions into northern Syria in the last three years and has stationed troops into the rebel-held Idlib region. It says preparations for another operation are complete.
In 2016, the Turkish troops entered northern Syria in an area some 100 km east of Afrin to stop the Kurdish YPG forces from extending areas under their control and connecting Syrian Kurdistan’s Kobani and Hasaka in the east with Afrin canton in the west.
In January 2018, Turkish military forces backed pro-Ankara Syrian mercenary fighters to clear the YPG from its northwestern enclave of Afrin. In March 2018, the operation was completed with the capture of the Kurdish city of Afrin.
The flags of Turkey and Syrian rebel groups were raised in the Kurdish Afrin city and a statue of Kurdish hero Kawa, a symbol of resistance against oppressors, was torn down.
Residents of the Kurdish city and Human right groups accuse Turkey and pro-Ankara mercenary fighters of ethnic cleansing, kidnappings for ransom, armed robberies and torture.
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