You Will Anyway: Erdoğan backing over Trump

Tuesday, October 22, 2019

Erdoğan backing over Trump

He drove over Trump forward, now he's backing over him to make sure he stays down.

The Turkish president has threatened to press ahead with an operation against Kurdish-led forces in Syria “even more strongly” if promises made by the US regarding the withdrawal of Kurdish fighters have not been met by the time a five-day ceasefire expires.

[...]

Ankara has stuck to its original proposal of a 270-mile long (440km), 20-mile deep buffer zone, but the SDF has only acknowledged the 75-mile area between Ras al-Ayn and Tel Abyad.

[...]

Up to 1,300 fighters from the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) are yet to vacate Ankara’s proposed border “safe zone”, as per the terms of a ceasefire announced by the US vice-president, Mike Pence, in Ankara last week, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan told reporters before flying to Russia.

Erdoğan is meeting Vladimir Putin in Sochi on Tuesday for talks expected to focus on the size and scope of the planned buffer zone before the pause in fighting ends at 10pm local time (1900 GMT).

[...]

As a result of the Turkish offensive, Syria’s Kurdish officials struck a deal with Assad, their former enemy, for military reinforcements in the border area.

[...]

Despite the ceasefire, intermittent fighting between the SDF and Ankara’s Syrian rebel proxies has continued.

The Guardian

So, not a ceasefire.

Kino Gabriel, the SDF spokesman, confirmed over the weekend that all its fighters had evacuated the town of Ras al-Ayn, one of the two border towns bearing the brunt of the Turkish attack, as part of the US-brokered pause.

Redur Khalil, a senior SDF official, also said that following the evacuation of the remaining civilians and fighters from Ras al-Ayn, his fighters would pull back from the strip of land between the town and Tel Abyad, which is also under Turkish attack.

[...]

The US-brokered agreement struck last Thursday did not specify the zone’s size. Previous agreements between Washington and Ankara over a “safe zone” along the Syria-Turkish border have floundered over diverging definitions of the area.

So, not really a deal.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

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Life, as Explained in "Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead"

GUILDENSTERN: What a fine persecution---to be kept intrigued without ever quite being enlightened.

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ROSENCRANTZ : The only thing that makes it bearable is the irrational belief that somebody interesting will come on in a minute.

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GUILDENSTERN: But for God's sake what are we supposed to do?!

PLAYER: Relax. Respond. That's what people do. You can't go through life questioning your situation at every turn.

GUILDENSTERN: But we don't know what's going on, or what to do with ourselves. We don't know how to act.

PLAYER: Act natural. You know why you're here at least.

GUILDENSTERN: We only know what we're told, and that's little enough. And for all we know it isn't even true.

PLAYER: For all anyone knows, nothing is. Everything has to be taken on trust; truth is only that which is taken to be true. It's the currency of living. There may be nothing behind it, but it doesn't make any difference so long as it is honoured. One acts on assumptions.

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GUILDENSTERN : We act on scraps of information... sifting half-remembered directions that we can hardly separate from instinct.

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PLAYER: Life is a gamble, at terrible odds-if it was a bet you wouldn't take it.