Quote:
Originally Posted by HappyTexan
The US does not want Russia involved in fighting ISIS.
And the US is buddy buddy with Turkey even though Turkey is playing both sides of the fence here.
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Not sure I agree. Here's how I see this.
Every country involved there has it's own little agenda.
The US is interested in fighting ISIS but seems more interested (as far as Syria is concerned) in overthrowing Assad.
The Russians are interested in fighting the rebels (not limited to only ISIS) and helping Assad to stay in power. He's their man.
Erdogan may or may not be interested in fighting ISIS - they're Sunni just like him, I don't know if he sees them as a threat, an ally, or competition. He is however interested in getting rid of Assad who's a Shi'ite.
So all three powers - US, Russia and Turkey - have somewhat competing and somewhat overlapping priorities here.
US and Russia are not on friendly terms, and have different plans for Assad, but Putin is not going to take on the US armed forces and Obama will not attack the Russians. So there will be a lot of posturing and behind the scenes attempts at hurting the other side indirectly, but no open confrontation. And both see ISIS as a threat so while the US is secretly arming the non-ISIS rebels and Russia is secretly killing them, they both bomb ISIS as well.
US and Turkey are NATO allies and seem to have the common goal in overthrowing Assad. At the same time Erdogan has been trying to set himself up as the new Sultan of the Sunni world, he is supporting ISIS financially by buying their oil, and he's been acting pretty independently and often contrary to the US policies. So I doubt that the US would step in to bail him out if he escalates the situation with Russia into a shooting war, at least as long as the very survival of Turkey is not at stake. Although, I really don't know anymore where Obama's sympathies lie. But he's not the only one making decisions, thankfully.
So this leaves Russia and Turkey. They have no common goals and many competing ones.
Russia wants Assad to remain, Turkey wants him gone.
Russia sees Sunni rebels (not only ISIS) as a threat to their interests, Turkey seems to treat them as allies.
Russia and Turkey also have a long history of conflict going back centuries.
Most importantly, Putin and Erdogan had both built reputation for themselves as tough leaders that are striving to restore the former glory of their countries, and they both need to show their subjects that they have the balls to support that reputation. Both countries have powerful, advanced militaries. Russia is stronger than Turkey militarily, but it can't commit all of their air and naval strength to that region, and for Turkey it's home turf, so in case of a shooting war they would be rather evenly matched.
Russia has nukes but is never going to use them in a local conflict - Putin is not dumb.
So the way I see this, neither Russia nor Turkey would want a full scale war, but both Putin and Erdogan could benefit (internally) from a small armed conflict as long as they can spin it as their victory. And they are somewhat evenly matched in the region. So this could go either way.
Do I believe that the Russian planes have been repeatedly violating Turkish air space ? Of course. I've read about this weeks ago.
Do I believe that in this single incident there was no basis for shooting this particular plane down ? Yes. I think Erdogan was ready to show that he won't let Russians ignore him much longer, and used the first opportunity he got, legit or not.
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