The Trump administration is wisely increasing its support for Turkey, taking a far harsher line than the Obama administration ever did toward Russia in Syria.
Speaking in Turkey on Tuesday, James Jeffrey, the excellent U.S. special representative for Syria, warned that Washington will take increased action against Russia and Bashar Assad over their offensive in Idlib governate. The specifics stand out.
Jeffrey explained that the United States is ready to resupply Turkish ammunition stocks and is pushing for increased NATO support to Turkey. This includes the possible provision of Patriot air defense missile systems. In another notable development, Jeffrey suggested that the U.S. is preparing sanctions against certain Russian officials.
These are positive developments.
For a start, the Assad-Russian-Iranian axis offensive in Idlib is a humanitarian outrage. Tens of thousands of civilians have been killed, and millions of refugees are suffering terribly. Turkey is rightly confronting this deliberate atrocity. And it is an atrocity: For all of Vladimir Putin’s claims to the contrary, the axis campaign is defined by the deliberate and relentless targeting of civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, schools, and markets.
The intent is twofold: to fuel a humanitarian catastrophe that forces rebel formations in Idlib to surrender for fear of losing their families, and to funnel refugees against European borders, thereby encouraging the international community to accept an end to the war on Russia’s desired terms — Assad’s dictatorial control over all Syrian territory.
Still, this isn’t just about morality. It’s in our strategic interest to resist what’s happening in Idlib.
After all, Assad’s domination of Syria will lead to his sustained oppression of Sunni Syrian civilians — a means of Islamic State recruitment, the enabling of an Iranian terrorist corridor from Tehran to the Israeli border, and the strengthening of Putin’s negative influence in the broader Middle East. None of those outcomes is in America’s interest — something rightly reflected by U.S. resistance of Russian military harassment tactics in eastern Syria.
In turn, we should welcome increased armament support to Turkey and sanctions pressure on Assad and Russia. Undermined by declining oil prices, which are the foundation of Putin’s revenue, the Russian economy is newly vulnerable. Assad’s economy is already a basket case.
The imposition of economic costs for the willful massacre of civilian lives is positive in itself. But it would also achieve another objective: consolidating Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan against Putin’s pressure and encouraging him to recenter away from Russia and back into the U.S.-NATO orbit. And with Erdogan meeting Putin in Moscow on Thursday, any U.S. action is welcome which strengthens Erdogan’s position before then.
In short, we have cards to play here. The Trump administration is right to go eyeball to eyeball with the axis and play them.
