Aleppo and trading in roubles

The Syrians have paid the price. The country is ruined, the people are ruined and the towns are in rubble. Aleppo is in rubble. Everything started with the USA’s policy of supporting regime change in Syria. On the pretext that, “The regime opened fire on peaceful protesters,” radical Islamist groups and arms were dispatched to the country. Sham opposition meetings were held and the “Free Syrian Army” of doubtful composition was established. Meanwhile, nobody paid any attention or held out a hand to the genuine moderate opposition that favoured unarmed struggle. More than that, they were written off. Those to embark on this task with the greatest enthusiasm were the anti-Iranian, pro-Western regimes in the region, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the other Gulf emirates. And also Turkey – the people in charge of Turkey!

Certainly, when it came to the policy being followed by Turkey, the days passed and the times changed and everybody at home and abroad began to oppose the AK Party government’s Syria policy. But, wait a minute! Not so many moons - five and a half years to be precise - ago when everything started, those who now stand in opposition were at that time criticising the government saying, “Turkey is not acting decisively” and “it is late in reacting.” As time passed, they grew even more insistent and our liberal, democratic friends were seemingly on the verge of signing up to serve in the Free Syrian Army. Those who said, “Stop, what are you doing?” were virtually branded as being part of a ‘fifth column’. One of those to accompany us to Syria along with the Eastern Conference acted like one of those young girls whose drink has been drugged and said, “They have thrown us into Assad’s lap.” It was if everybody had just noticed how despotic the Syrian regime was and was on the verge of signing up as volunteers in the fight. As to our rulers, following some initial hesitation, they speedily embroiled themselves in the affair. All Syrian opposition meetings were held in Turkey and the Free Syrian Army was established in Turkey. The liberal, democratic opposition, noticing a change in US policy, steered in a different direction, but our rulers did not waver over regime change; that was what set them apart.

In Syria, no effort was spared to bring a friendly and allied Muslim Brotherhood regime to power. Then, when the Kurds in North Syria proclaimed autonomy, things flared up even more. With “sensitive issues” such as the Bayirbucak Turkmen presenting themselves, Turkey strove to become even more deeply embroiled in the Syrian. Even so, the days passed and the times changed, and the Westerners, led by the USA, which had facilitated the organisation of the opposition in Turkey and had dispatched ‘jihadists’ to Syria through Turkey, started to blame Turkey and call it the ‘jihadist’s motorway.’ The Westerners stoked up conflict in Syria to overthrow the regime in Syria, the centre of the anti-Western camp, Saudi Arabia and its allies did so to smash the Iranian axis, and Turkey did so to be the patron of Sunni advancement in the reason, and then over concerns that the Kurds were gaining territory. The country was destroyed and the people ruined. They were the ones to pay the price.

The outcome was that nobody quite got what they were gunning for and all attention turned to the enigma called ISIL, and Russia’s entry onto the scene came against such a backdrop. With the West subsequently forced to go to war against the armed, radical Islamist groups that they had once tried to pass off as the ‘moderate opposition’, nobody raised their voices at the Russians doing precisely this alongside the Syrian regime and, so, the country entered an even more bloody process. Nowadays, Aleppo is being retaken from the ‘moderates’. It is once more civilians, the poor Syrian people, who are paying the price.

Apart from a few laments, there has not been a peep from ruling circles in Turkey, who until yesterday appeared to be on the verge of launching an Aleppo campaign. After all, we all know what is going on in the world and Turkey is trying to make amends with Russia these days. The joy over the prospect of trading in roubles and the economy perking up are enough to drown out the laments over Aleppo. It is not for nothing that they say money has no religion or faith, but is one not to feel any disquiet at all about what one said yesterday? Is one to feel no pangs of conscience over the role one played in the destruction of a neighbouring country out of aspirations to be a regional power. Certainly, their Ottoman forefathers, for whom they have no end of praise, found salvation by coming to terms with the Russians at a time when their own governor Mehmed Ali Pasha’s forces were advancing on Kütahya, and it was the British above all who intervened for fear that the Russians’ would gain extra weight in the European balance of powers of the time.

No, I am not saying that Turkey should intervene and save Aleppo. I have at no time supported Turkey’s intervention in Syria. There is nothing that it can do now, anyway, even if it wanted to. No, but, after all that has passed, what can you say about forgetting Syria and mouthing a few hollow laments in the interests of trading in roubles and to moving close to Russia as a trump card against the West as if nothing had happened. What kind of humans are you?