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Security policy, counter-terrorism, intelligence and defence in Europe and Turkey, from the individual’s sense of security to the strategies of states.
Operation Peace Spring, launched in October 2019, followed the US withdrawal from the region. Trump’s threatening letter to Ankara became one of the rare documents in the history of diplomacy.
One week after the coalition announced it would form a YPG-dominated border force, Turkey launched Operation Olive Branch against Afrin. The story of the most extensive operation in Syria.
The Idlib operation that began with the Astana process, and Spring Shield, which followed the deaths of Turkish soldiers in February 2020: Turkey’s hard test in Idlib.
Euphrates Shield, which began with Jarablus in August 2016, was the TSK’s first comprehensive operation against ISIS. The operation ended ISIS’s presence on the border.
In February 2015 the TSK carried out an operation without fighting to bring back the soldiers at the Tomb of Süleyman Shah. According to the author, it was the only and most measured cross-border operation before 15 July.
Turkey’s cross-border operations in Syria, from Shah Euphrates to Claw-Sword. The introductory article of the series examines what the operations have in common, above all their timing.
The parameters of Turkey’s Syria policy raise serious concerns: the use of intelligence as a political tool, relations with jihadist groups and weaknesses in border security.
From brother Assad to Assad the murderer: Turkish–Syrian relations have never followed a straight line since the 1980s. This part examines the parameters that shape the relationship.
There are no winners in the war that has raged in Syria since 2011. Policies that misread the Arab Spring brought Turkey to a point where it contributes neither to ending the bloodshed nor to border security.
In 2022 signals of a meeting with Assad began to come from Ankara. At the same time, preparations for a new cross-border operation were being made in full public view.
Shells landing in Akçakale in 2012, Patriot missiles and allegations of support for the opposition: the period in which tension between Turkey and Syria escalated.
With the Arab Spring reaching Syria, Turkish–Syrian relations broke down. The years 2011–2022 were a period in which Turkey became isolated in the region.
Relations that improved with the 1998 Adana Agreement rose to the level of “brotherhood” after 2002. The zero-problems policy and the 1 March motion prepared the ground for this rapprochement.
A 911-kilometre border, family ties and chronic crises: before 2002 Turkish–Syrian relations were shaped by the issues of Hatay, water and the PKK.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has again brought to the fore the inadequacy of the UN, and especially the Security Council, in preventing conflicts. Pope Francis’s call stood out in the reform debate.
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