Operation Featherweight: Month 20, Week 4, Day 3

On Thursday (17/3/16) the Syrian Kurdish political parties led by the largest - the Democratic Union Party (PYD) - announced their intention to form a Kurdish region as part of a Syria united under a federal system.

As Syria began to collapse back in 2011 the Kurds established three autonomous Cantons in the north of the country. The Afrin Canton in the west, the Kobane Canton in the centre and the Cizre Canton in the east. Although they did lose control of part of Afrin Canton they did succeed in linking the Kobane and Cizre Cantons creating a de facto Kurdish state along a 400km (240 mile) stretch of the border with Turkey.

As such to give up this Kurdish state by allowing it to become a federal region of Syria would be a massive step backwards in the quest for Kurdish nationhood.

Fortunately rather than being a legitimate suggestion the announcement which came under Russian advice was intended to influence the United Nations (UN) sponsored negotiations on Syria's future that are currently taking place in Geneva, Switzerland.

As I said when these talks opened on Monday (14/3/16) they are the absolute last thing that anybody who wants to bring peace and stability to Syria would involve themselves in. I was particularly surprised by the speed at which the Saudi drawn up list of the "Syrian Opposition" accredited to participate in the negotiations - known as the "High Negotiations Committee (HNC)" - was accepted as legitimate.

Long before you get into the dark arts of diplomatic delaying tactics there are very serious and legitimate problems with the membership of the HNC. Amongst the most serious of these is that it contains a group called the Army of Islam/Jaish al-Islam (JAI).

Although small the JAI is an extremely nasty Sunni extremist group. Back at the start of July 2015 JAI released a propaganda video in which they beheaded 12 prisoners. Those prisoners were members of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). JAI justified their execution on the grounds that ISIL was not extreme enough and should be doing more to violently cleanse the Levant region of all other ethnic/religious groups - particularly Shia Muslims.

Another significant problem with the HNC is that no Kurdish group is represented by it. This is a problem because Syria's Kurds are the nation's largest minority group making up around 10% of the population. By excluding this group you can't help but wonder whether the HNC's true purpose is in fact to continue ISIL's crimes against humanity by cleansing the Levant region of minority ethnic/religious groups such as the Yezidi Kurds.

To my mind Russia's attempts to participate in the Geneva talks albeit from the sidelines rather than blocking them entirely underline the critical flaw in Russia's approach to the Syria conflict. Despite all the smear stories in the western press it is clear that Russian President Vladimir Putin has fallen down the same strategic rabbit hole as US President Barack Obama by thinking that the Geneva talks are in any way the solution to Syria's problems.

Instead Syria first needs to be liberated from the foreign forces that have occupied the nation these past five years. Then and only then can the UN begin to broker an end to hostilities and possible political reforms amongst the Syrian population and only the Syrian population.

One of the key tasks that must be completed in order to liberate Syria from the foreign occupying forces such as ISIL, the Al Qaeda affiliated Al Nusra Front (ANF) and the Islamic Movement of the Freemen of the Levant (FML)/Harakat Ahrar ash-Sham al-Islamiyya (Ahrar al-Sham) is the cutting of the supply lines of these groups.

Particularly the roughly 100km (60 mile) corridor between Azaz and the Euphrates River along Syria's border with Turkey that has become known as "Erdogan's Pocket."


Obviously Turkish President/Prime Minister/Emperor Recep Tayyip Erdogan wants to keep this pocket open so he can continue to supply ISIL, ANF and Ahrar al-Sham. The flow of cheap oil from ISIL controlled territory into Turkish oil refineries is said to be particularly profitable for Berat Albayrak - Erdogan's son-in-law.

Equally obviously though Erdogan cannot publicly say that he wants to keep this supply line open because he is sponsoring terrorism and genocide. So instead he's made up this very elaborate conspiracy theory whereby allowing Kurds to control territory they've controlled for hundreds of years would suddenly pose a threat to Turkey's national security. 

Under no interpretation of international law does any country - including Turkey - have the authority to dictate what happens in the internal politics of a neighbouring country. Despite this though the US is continuing to indulge Erdogan and not making any effort to close this terrorist supply line.

Therefore Thursday's announcement by Syria's Kurds was extremely counter-productive. As it has been widely misundersood it makes it much harder to argue that the closing of Erdogan's pocket would not lead to the establishment of a Kurdish state at a time when the US in particular is showing very little will to argue for the closing of Erdogan's pocket.

That said on Thursday (17/3/16) the US-led coalition - Combined Joint Task Force: Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTFOIR) - did carry out limited air-strikes against ISIL positions in the town of Marea. This is very much the spiritual heart of Erdogan's Pocket sitting just 20km (12 miles) south-east of Azaz on the western boundary. 

Obviously this could interpreted as the US sending the message to Turkey that it is not happy about Erdogan's Pocket remaining open and could be open to the idea of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) moving in from their current positions a few kilometres to the west to seal it. 

So today Turkey has decided to send back a message of its own with a suicide bombing in Istanbul that so far appears to have killed 5 people and wounded 30 more - mainly foreign tourists. 

This bombing will inevitably be blamed on the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Despite all evidence to the contrary - such as the four month Battle of Kobane - in Erdogan's grand conspiracy theory the PKK, the PYD, the YPG, ISIL, the People's Democratic Party (HDP), the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party–Front (DHKP-C) and the Gulen movement are all the same organisation. In more recent incarnations of the conspiracy they are all being backed by Russia in an effort to destroy Turkey.

Therefore as with last Sunday's (13/3/16) suicide bombing in Ankara, the grenade & gun attack on a police bus in Istanbul on March 3rd (3/3/16), the February 17th (17/2/16) bombings in Ankara and Stockholm, Sweden and the February 18th (18/2/16) bombing in Diyarbakir the primary intention was to force the Turkish population and the international community to unite behind Erdogan and keep Erdogan's Pocket open as Turkey battles Russian terrorism.

The attack appears to have specifically targeted nationals of the Republic of Ireland with at least two of its citizens being killed. 

As I've mentioned before during the Cold War the PKK existed as part of a sort of arc of resistance including the African National Congress (ANC) in South Africa, the Black Panther Party (BPP) in the US, the Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) in Spain & France, the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) in Palestine and the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) in Northern Ireland. 

As such the history of these movements - particularly the Irish Republican movement - has become a convenient, coded way for people to talk about Turkey's role in the Syria conflict. For example I have on occasion also referred to Erdogan's Pocket as "Garvaghy Road" after the street in Belfast famously at the centre of the "Drumcree Stand-off (2000)."

It would appear that Turkey is not as knowledgeable on the history of Irish Republicanism as the people who participated in it. By forcing the Republic of Ireland into a discussion over repatriation of the dead and injured along with the investigation Turkey appears to be trying to find out some the details that maybe aren't on the Wikipedia pages.

The history of particularly the Irish Republican movement is being used as a metaphor for Turkey's role in the Syria conflict. Turkey is also struggling with that metaphor. However I included this information here based on an early report that 2 of the 5 dead were Irish citizens. Now the dust has settled it's emerged that report was incorrect.

It now turns out that only 4 people were killed in the attack. Of those 4 one is an Iranian national. The other 3 are Israeli nationals. They were touring the city as part of an Israeli organised, Hebrew speaking tour party. The other 12 people in that party have been seriously wounded in the attack. As such it appears that it was this Israeli group had been targeted by the bomber.

Although they have a long-standing alliance with the PLO the PKK don't really consider Israel or Jews to be their enemy per se. Turkey's ruling Justice & Development Party (AKP) however is very anti-Semitic and has very real problems with Israel.

Things really began to deteriorate on May 31st 2010 (31/5/10) when a flotilla set sail from Turkey in an effort to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza. The Israelis stopped this flotilla with the boarding of the MV Mavi Mamara being particularly controversial.

Interestingly a number of the Turkish activists aboard the Mavi Marmara have since gone on to join ISIL. This includes Yakup Bulent Alniak who was killed by a US strike in Syria's Idlib province in September 2014.

Recently Turkey has been moving to try and repair its relationship with Turkey. As such this attack could have been an attempt to establish a channel of communication. However I think it's much more likely that the AKP nutbag who carried out the attack was just really, really anti-Semitic.

This latest bombing comes of course just after a big summit between the European Union (EU) and Turkey to try to solve the irregular migrant crisis that has been caused by Turkey's attacks on Syria and its attempts to weaponise the refugee crisis that it has in turn created.

The UK's big contribution to this summit was the publication on Wednesday's (16/3/16) of the new national budget. This is obviously a large topic that I was hoping to deal with separately today. However the part that is relevant to the EU meeting was the proposed cuts to disability benefit payments that have since led to a highly stage-managed scrapping of the policy and the resignation of the relevant senior minister - Ian Duncan Smith.

From 2004 to roughly 2013 this type of benefit was my sole source of income. Then in 2013 the UK government re-wrote the rules almost specifically to exclude me. Since then I've been surviving on charm, luck and forward planning. The UK's behaviour towards me has long been a source of tension between the UK and other EU member states.

A particularly contentious incident occurred during 2013. Here a local property development firm tried to have me jailed for life by framing me a charge equivalent to attempted murder relating to some minor damage to one of their properties. In order to show his support for the property development firm Erdogan rushed ahead with plans to develop a shopping mall where Istanbul's Gezi Park meets Taksim Square.

This was obviously intended to trigger protests which Erdogan could then condemn. However what were intended as small protests rapidly became a lighting rod for all those in Turkey opposed to Erdogan growing into several months of unrest. By some estimates roughly 6% of Turkey's population were prepared to put themselves at risk of arrest and serious injury by participating in the protests.

Today's bombing occurred in Taksim Square where most of the protests were centred.

Erdogan may also have been tempted to go ahead with today's bombing by the crash earlier today by the crash of a "Fly Dubai" civilian passenger jet in Rostov-on-Don Airport on the Black Sea coast of Russia. I will be back to deal with that after dinner.

17:45 on 19/3/16 (UK date).

Edited at around 20:05 on 19/3/16 (UK date) to alter the above and add;

When it comes to Russia's longstanding opposition to ISIL civilian plane crashes are of course a very sensitive topic.

Things began with the mysterious disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 on March 8th 2014 (8/3/14). This took place during the 2014 Winter Olympics/Para-Olympics being held in Sochi, Russia. It was an attempt to disrupt the Olympics after ISIL's supporters were denied US permission to launch direct mass casualty terror attacks against the Olympics itself.

Then of course there was the July 17th 2014 (17/7/14) crash of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over the self-declared autonomous region of Ukraine. Despite the fact the investigation found the Ukrainian government was to blame by allowing a civilian aircraft to fly into an area where an air-war was taking place this led to sanctions being placed on Russia that remain in place to this day.

Over the last month or so the Netherlands have indicated that they have come under renewed pressure from the US to ignore Ukraine's - at best - criminal negligence and continue with attempts to prosecute Russia over the crash. That is despite there being absolutely no evidence of Russian responsibility.

Then on October 31st 2015 (31/10/15) Russian Kogalymavia flight 7K9268 was bombed out of the skies over Egypt killing all 224 Russian civilians onboard. Although it is subject to debate ISIL claimed to have carried out the bombing in order to punish Russia for its air campaign in Syria. Curiously no-one seems to be anywhere near as interested in bringing justice to the victims of this crash as they are over MH17.

Therefore it is possible that Russia brought down FlyDubai flight B738 in order to force the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to feel its pain over 7K9268 and rumours to that effect have certainly begun to circulate on the Internet. Obviously this is the sort of thing that would tempt Erdogan into thinking that today's bombing in Istanbul could be used as evidence of "Russian Aggression!"

However that conspiracy theory starts to fall apart when you realise that no Emiratis were killed in the crash. However 44 Russian citizens were killed. Killing 44 of your people and none of enemies people is a very strange way of making your enemy feel your pain.

One of the main things that it crippling the EU's ability to respond to the threat of ISIL and the refugee crisis it has created is the attitudes of the newer member states such as Poland and the Baltic states. They are so blinded by their irrational hatred of Russia that they would prefer to ally themselves with ISIL in the hope of hurting Russia. 

This has been particularly true of the situation in Ukraine where the legitimate government was overthrown during the 2014 Winter Olympics in an effort to support ISIL. Rostov-on-Don is around 100km (60 miles) from the Ukrainian border.

Poland's relationship with the EU is itself mired in a controversial plane crash. 

This one occurred on April 10th (10/4/10) when a Polish Air Force Tu-154 crashed on landing at Smolensk, Russia killing all 96 onboard. The victims included the Polish President, a former Polish President, the head of the Polish military, the head of the Polish central bank, numerous Polish civil servants and 18 Polish Members of Parliament (MP's).

This crash was caused by a mix of bad weather and frankly human stupidity. For example the cockpit voice recorder revealed that the President Chief of Staff who was not a pilot over-ruling the pilots and insisting the weather was safe enough to land in because the President had a schedule to keep. Then of course there is the fact that you just don't put that many important people on the same aircraft. You often think twice about putting them in the same room.

However as often happens with such a shocking national tragedy numerous conspiracy theories about the crash have sprung up over the years. 

The most credible of these centre on the fact that the then Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk was struggling to drive through EU mandated reforms. All those aboard the flight were members of the right-wing Law & Justice Party (PiS) which opposed him. Therefore the conspiracy theory is that Tusk ordered the plane crash in order to kill his political opponents and pass the reforms the EU demanded.

Donald Tusk is currently the President of the EU.

On October 25th 2015 (25/10/15) the PiS were returned to power in the Polish elections. Since then the party has lurched so far to the right it's bordering on the Nazism that is routinely practised in neighbouring Ukraine. 

In the most recent controversy Poland's Constitutional Court - the nation's highest - rejected PiS reforms that would prevent the Court from rejecting unconstitutional legislation introduced by the PiS. As not to make it legally binding the PiS refused to officially publish this ruling. In response around 50,000 Poles took to the streets in protest on March 12th (12/3/16).

In what seems like a transparent attempt to distract the protesters the PiS have now decided that the Smolensk crash was the result of a Russian conspiracy. Of course anyone who criticises the PiS is immediately accused of being a Russian conspirator including legendary anti-Soviet activist and second President of Poland Lech Wałęsa.

Therefore the more reasonable conspiracy theory is that the UAE caused the plane to crash in order to kill Russian citizens as an attack on Russia. However because it is an Emirati operated aircraft people like Erdogan would be able to spin it as "Russian Aggression." After all it was the Ukrainians who caused the MH17 crash. Yet we're still blaming the Russians.

The connections with the 2010 Smolensk crash would of course allow the UAE and their Gulf allies to assess the current mood within the EU vis-a-vis Poland, Ukraine and Russia.

However I think it is vitally important to remember that landing a large passenger jet in bad weather - particularly snow - is extremely difficult. 

B738 had actually aborted an earlier landing attempt and had been circling the airport for some two hours waiting for the weather to clear before running low on fuel. Early indications are that only final approach wind sheer caused the aircraft to flip driving the wing into the ground.

Obviously there will be questions over why the aircraft circled for two hours waiting for the weather to clear rather than diverting to an alternate airport. However I suspect we'll discover that the budget airline was more concerned about having to pay for accommodation and onward travel for the passengers than the safety of the passengers.

As such unless dramatic new information comes to light I'm comfortable to work under the assumption that this was just a plane crash.

21:50 on 19/3/16 (UK date).