Aleppo is the solution

Despite the much ado about Turkey's pursuit of reconciliation with the Assad regime and the return of the displaced Syrians to their country, within an understanding between the two parties sponsored by Russia, the practical view indicates that this matter is far-fetched in the short term, and that it is not in Turkey's long-term interest.

This article argues for the existence of a solution to the issue of the displaced Syrians to Turkey, which does not include reconciliation with Assad, nor the forced return of Syrians to their country, nor their stay in Turkey, but rather their return to Syria with dignity, in parallel with achieving a fundamental strategic gain for them and for Turkey.

This solution is to recover the city of Aleppo from the hands of the Syrian regime through Turkish pressure on Russia.

The Syrian revolution has linked the fate of the Syrian people and the Turkish people with a close bond, as blood has mixed in the field, and human, economic and cultural ties have deepened.

We do not underestimate the difficulties and obstacles that stand in the way of this solution, but it remains the most practical solution in line with the interest of the Syrian people and with the Turkish strategic interest, and it is not an impossible solution, if it has political will and a strategic vision that seizes the opportunities for international polarization resulting from the Ukraine war. .

The Syrian revolution has linked the fate of the Syrian people and the Turkish people with a close bond, as blood has mixed in the field, and human, economic and cultural ties have deepened.

They are ties that have historical roots in history, as Aleppo was - just a century ago - the second largest metropolis in the Ottoman Empire after the capital, Istanbul.

Aleppo is still a "political city" and a "sensitive city", as Abbas Mahmoud al-Akkad described it in his book on the Aleppo thinker Abd al-Rahman al-Kawakibi.

It is true that the era of empires has passed irreversibly, and it is no longer possible for the Arab Turks to rule, nor the Turkish Arabs, but close human wombs, deep cultural kinship, and solid strategic interests remained between the two peoples, and this complex fabric defines the parameters of the common destiny between the two parties.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is not a suspect in the Syrian people, nor in the Syrian revolution.

He stood with the Syrian revolution and with the Arab revolutions at a time of difficulty, and Turkey, under his leadership, paid a heavy political, economic and diplomatic price for this principled and strategic position that favored the freedom and dignity of the Arab peoples.

Turkey provided a lot in supporting the rebellious Arab peoples, and received millions of Arabs who were displaced from their homelands unjustly and aggressively, and guaranteed them a life in safety and freedom, after their countries narrowed them down, and the leaders of their countries persecuted them.

It is not possible for the Turkish leadership to waste this strategic investment in the Syrian revolution, or to waste the moral capital that Turkey has built among the Arab peoples during the past decade.

Seeking to forcibly return the Syrians to the arms of a murderous ruler, and with the guarantee of a superstate led by another murderous ruler, is pushing millions of Syrians inside Turkey and in northern Syria to the brink of despair, which contradicts political wisdom.

It is true that Turkey is not a superpower like the United States, China, and Russia, and it does not have the human, military, and financial resources that America had when it came to save Europe from Nazism, for example, just as it cannot stand alone in the face of international forces collaborating to deprive the Arab peoples of freedom and independence of decision. In addition, the struggle for freedom in the Arab countries will only succeed due to self-power, no matter how much support Turkey provides to it, and it is true that Turkey - by virtue of its location - has strategic interests with various parties, including those involved in supporting the bloody regime in Damascus, but Turkey A rising regional power, and its leadership possesses political insight and a strategic sense. It still has a lot that it can do in the Syrian file, within the limits of time, space, and possibility.

The issue of returning Syrians residing in Turkey to their country may not go beyond media leaks and political statements with an electoral connotation. Those who look at the issue with a political sense and a practical spirit realize that the matter is not as easy as the media talks about, or the politicians claim.

Returning a few citizens to any country in the world forcibly and coercively is a complex matter in all respects: moral, humanitarian and legal, in addition to its effects on the image of the country that does this, and on its reputation and status in the hearts of peoples and the world at large.

The Turkish leadership has a keen strategic sense, great political ambition, and great self-esteem. It seeks to transform its country from a regional power to a global power, according to the popular slogan of President Erdogan: "The world is greater than five."

This leadership will not involve itself in the adventure of forcibly returning more than 3 million Syrians to Syria, and it is aware more than others that the matter is practically impossible.

Even if we assume that it is feasible - which is a wrong assumption - it will have huge negative effects that Turkey cannot bear: humanitarian, legal, security and moral.

Seeking to forcibly return the Syrians to the arms of a murderous ruler, and with the guarantee of a major state led by another murderous ruler, is pushing millions of Syrians inside Turkey and in northern Syria to the brink of despair, which contradicts the political wisdom that says not to push the opponent into a corner, or push him to a "desperate fight." ".

This is about the opponent and the enemy, so how about the friend and ally!

In Syria today, there are tens of thousands who have combat experience and their hands are full of weapons, just as there are millions of those who have experience of civil struggle confrontation with the Syrian regime, and they have nothing to lose after they lost everything.

Pushing them to desperate choices is not in Turkey's political and security interest, nor is it in the interest of the Syrian people, of course.

This path - if it is to be imposed by force - may end in pushing thousands of young people to return to the paths of extremism and extremism, which receded a lot after the Turkish intervention in northern Syria.

Worse than that - from the perspective of Turkish national security - is pushing some Syrian revolutionary factions to align themselves with the separatist militias in northeastern Syria, which means a growing security threat to the Turkish state, its unity and social harmony.

In addition, this option leads to Turkey's negligence of all political and economic investment in northern Syria, and this is unlikely. A close follower of Turkish foreign policy will find that it may lack initiative and risk sometimes, and that it often moves with great caution and extra caution, but it does not neglect the gains it has gained. It can be obtained with a lot of strategic patience, as Turkey's negligence in what it has achieved in northern Syria is out of the question.

The most that Turkey can achieve from reconciliation with al-Assad, and handing him over the Syrian areas that are now under the control of Turkey and its allies of the rebels, is for al-Assad to control security in the areas controlled today by the separatist militias in northeastern Syria, thus exempting Turkey from facing security threats emanating from from those areas.

However, any Turkish reliance on the commitment of the Syrian regime or the Russian guarantee in this regard will not be correct.

The Americans have gained the upper hand in those regions, and they are keen - as part of the game of tearing the region apart and draining it - to prevent any force from liquidating the separatist militias, bearing in mind that America's support for the separatist militias is just a dirty game to tear the region apart and destroy its immunity, and the illusion of those who think that the Americans will build a nation-state for him Independent. If they really intended to do so, they would have established a Kurdish state in Iraq when they were completely occupying it.

And if Turkey, with its striking military force and its old strategic alliance with the United States, was unable to pass this impenetrable American barrier, and was unable to liquidate the separatist militias in northeastern Syria because of the American sponsorship, then the Syrian regime is not expected to be able or dare to do so.

This is if we assume that the Syrian regime will be sincere in its reconciliation with the Turks, which is absolutely out of the question, due to its Baathist ideology, its sectarian fanaticism, its dependence on Iran's aims, and its deep hatred of Turkey because of its decade-long support for the Syrian revolution.

The strategy that the Syrian opposition and the Turkish ally must unite to achieve, we believe, is to liberate Aleppo from the crumbling regime, and make it a prosperous center, a region of polarization and absorption for the displaced Syrians, and a political and economic model that distinguishes itself from the area of ​​control of the crumbling regime, and shows all Syrians the difference between freedom and slavery.

Perhaps a questioner will ask: What is to be done?

If reconciliation with Assad does not benefit Turkey, and it is unfair to the Syrian people, and forcibly returning Syrians to their country is morally and politically impossible, then what can Turkey do?

And what should the Syrian revolutionaries bet on?

In answer to this fundamental question, we can summarize the envisaged strategic paths in 3 paths: lower, upper, and middle:

minimal path

As for the path of the minimum, it is prevailing now, which is the control of Turkey and its allies among the Syrian rebels on a narrow border strip inside the Syrian lands, especially in the countryside of Aleppo, and in Idlib, which has a large population density.

A lot has been achieved on this path, as the revolutionary factions and their Turkish allies control about 11% of the Syrian geography in northern Syria, with a large population density of about a third of Syria's citizens, according to the estimates of the "Jusour" Center for Studies.

Turkey was able to extract an understanding from the Russians on this issue since 2020, which protected Turkey from attacks by separatist militias to a large extent, and stabilized millions of Syrians in northern Syria adjacent to the Turkish border, and provided the revolutionary factions with a strategic base and a strong negotiating card.

This path has been achieved with success to a large extent, but it is merely a freeze of the conflict, without opening serious prospects for a satisfactory solution for the Syrian people, and in achieving the Turkish strategic interest.

upper limit path

As for the path of the upper limit, it is Turkey's support for the Syrian revolutionaries in achieving a decisive victory that will lead to the overthrow of the Assad regime, and the establishment of a democratic authority in Damascus allied with Turkey, making Syria Turkey's gateway to the entire Arab East, with all its strategic and economic capabilities.

This is the strategic path that should not be given up in the long term, while recognizing that it is practically unthinkable in the foreseeable term for many reasons, the most important of which are the Russian, Iranian and American objections to this path, because it deprives the Russians and Iranians of their influence inside Syria, and prevents America from continuing the game. Giving war a chance" that it pursues, to destroy the Arab revolutions, and turn them into a bloody fusion of nihilism, within tampering with the destinies of the revolting peoples.

Middle track

Finally, the path of the middle term remains, which we see as the optimal and most realistic path.

This path requires that Turkey and its Syrian rebel allies seek to expand and deepen the border belt in northern Syria, to include the entire province of Aleppo (including Aleppo city), and parts of the provinces of Hasakah and Raqqa, to build an absorption area for the displaced Syrians, and to give the Syrian opposition a strategic card in the negotiations for a solution. final, ensuring deep security for the Turkish borders, and strangling the separatist militias.

At the heart of this path is the recovery of the city of Aleppo, because it is capable of absorbing a large number of displaced Syrians, who will return to it voluntarily, due to its size, centrality and economic capabilities.

Thus, about half of the population of Syria will be within the liberated areas.

This path is what we see as the most correct option, and the one that most achieves the Turkish interest, and the interest of the Syrian people, within the current power equations, until the overthrow or downfall of the bloody regime in Damascus is achieved.

The strategy that the efforts of the Syrian opposition and the Turkish ally must unite to achieve, we believe, is to liberate Aleppo from the crumbling regime, and make it a prosperous center, a region of polarization and absorption for the displaced Syrians, and a political and economic model that distinguishes itself from the area of ​​control of the crumbling regime, and shows all Syrians the difference between freedom and slavery. between justice and injustice.

The key to achieving this strategy today is Turkey's investment in the Russian impasse in Ukraine, and its exploitation of Russia's need for a Turkish outlet in the face of Western encirclement, in order to extract a serious concession from the Russians on the issue of Aleppo.

This strategy is not easy, and its achievement will not be without obstacles, but some encouraging indicators make it more likely than others.

Let us review the most important of these indicators and obstacles.

The encouraging indicators are:

• First: Turkey has greatly increased its strategic shares after the Ukraine war

  , due to the need of the Russian and American sides in the conflict, and this is an opportunity that Turkey can invest in putting pressure on the Russians to accept its control and its revolutionary allies over Aleppo, so that a radical solution to the Syrian refugee issue will be achieved.

• Second:

  Russia is facing an existential threat in Ukraine

  , after the Americans and Europeans turned it into a trap to deplete Russian power. Russia does not currently have the ability and will to resist the Turkish push into northern Syria, even though confrontation between the two countries is not originally possible, and it is Serve neither.

• Third: Although the American strategy has always pushed for the continuation of the war, according to the theory of "giving war a chance" formulated by the American Zionist Edward Lutwak, and to which we devoted a previous article on this site, the

  Ukraine war brings the Americans closer to accepting pressure on the Syrian regime affiliated with Russia.

As for the obstacles that may hinder the option of liberating Aleppo, and making it a new strategic base for the Syrian revolution, and for the Turkish strategic influence, they include:

• The continuous fragmentation of the forces of the Syrian revolution, even in the areas of Turkish control, and the latest of that was the fighting last October between Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the Ahrar al-Sham Corps, the Hamzah Group, and the Sultan Shah Group.

  It is difficult to count on warring factions to achieve a major military and political achievement such as the liberation of Aleppo.

• The possibility of the Russian rejection of any concession to Turkey regarding Aleppo, and even a confrontation with the Russian, Iranian or American forces;

  This is a major risk that is neither in the interest of Turkey nor the Syrian people to take.

  If this confrontation takes place on Syrian soil, the situation will become more complicated, and the revolution may lose its current areas in Idlib.

• The traditional strategic relations between Turkey and the United States are witnessing an unprecedented decline, after the Americans began to encircle Turkey with military bases in Greece, similar to the traditional encirclement that America strikes against Russia and China.

  And in light of the collapse of trust with the United States, Turkey cannot risk losing Russia.

Despite all these obstacles, controlling Aleppo remains a strategic horizon fraught with potential, whether in relation to the Syrian revolution or in relation to the Turkish interest.

It is on this horizon that we should focus in the future, not on reconciliation with Assad, or returning the Syrians to their country, under a bloody regime, sponsored by bloody allies who have experienced the Syrian people’s atrocities over more than a decade.

What the Syrians need to take into account today is that the Syrian issue is just one of the challenges that Turkey faces as a state and an entity, as Turkey today faces from the north the dangers of the Ukrainian fire spreading to its regional and economic waters in the Black Sea, a sea from which the first signs of Turkish gas began to bear fruit. .

Turkey is also facing from the West the American drift towards Greece at its expense, and the building of American military bases that surround it and almost suffocate it in the Aegean Sea.

And to the south in the Mediterranean, Turkey faces the legacy of the traditional crisis in Cyprus, the challenge of drawing maritime borders with Libya and Egypt, and the efforts of France and Israel to surround it from that side.

And this is without forgetting the major internal challenges in light of a sensitive election season: the political division, the economic decline resulting from the Corona epidemic, and the financial sanctions imposed by Turkey’s supposed Western allies, seeking to overthrow President Erdogan, and return Turkey to a house of obedience and a state of dependence.

Nevertheless, it is not possible, in my estimation, for Turkey to abandon the cause of the Syrian people, which is also a Turkish strategic issue.

Turkey, despite all these challenges and risks, will remain the lung of the Syrian people and the strategic depth of the Syrian revolution, and there will be no place and possibility for the Syrians to have an ally like Turkey.

The Syrian masses have expressed their refusal to reconcile with al-Assad without any fuss during the demonstrations of the past days, and this is required and desirable unless it reaches the point of aggravation with the Turkish political leadership, because this aggravation may fuel the sharp polarization inside Turkey ahead of the elections, and further ignite the political and media bidding between Turkish parties at the expense of the Syrians.

It would be more correct for the efforts of the forces of the Syrian revolution to focus on marketing practical strategies that serve both sides, the most important of which today is the recovery of Aleppo from the hands of the butcher.