диссертация (1169605), страница 24
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2016. Web. 24 January 2018.https://www.rt.com/news/361242-interview-lavrov-bbc-syria/.214Al-Khalidi S., Perry T. New Syrian rebel alliance formed, says weapons on the way. Reuters. 12 Oct. 2015. Web.24 January 2018. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-kurds-idUSKCN0S60BD20151012.97popularly known in the global Mainstream Media by its Kurdish name “Kobani”.The US rightly figured that Russia’s anti-terrorist moves in Syria were a goodopportunity for Washington to abandon (though not completely) its previouslyovert support for radical Islamic “rebels” and transition to more openly supportingthe secular Kurdish fighters for reasons of practical military relevance andinternational image and to further implement their de-centralization project inSyria.Aside from these two reasons, however, is also a more ulterior one whichcorrelates to the US long-standing geostrategic designs in Syria and the broaderMiddle East, and that’s to reengineer the region’s borders via a divide-and-rulescenario which sees the emergence of a transnational “Kurdistan” right in the heartof West Asia (this plan will be quite visible during discussion of the federalizationplan for Syria).
At that moment the Kurds were anticipated to play a leading role inexecuting Ralph Peters’ “Blood Borders” plans, and the consolidation of the SDFwas intended to provide a cover for their scheme. The SDF – especially its KurdishPYD-YPG core – must be seen as being equally under the American influence, ifnot more, than the jihadist proxies that had hitherto been operating inside of thecountry, but it’s just that the US obtained ‘plausibly acceptable’ reasons to supportthe anti-terrorist secularists and thereby has been able to sustain their advancesthrough the insertion of conventional Marine forces.Roughly two months after the start of Russia’s anti-terrorist operation inSyria, Turkey shot down a Su-24 which it claimed had illegally ventured into itsairspace.
Moscow vehemently denied this charge and produced radar reports fromthe time which disproved Ankara’s allegations, but the incident nearly brought thetwo neighboring states and former partners to the brink of war with one another. Itwas later officially revealed that the shadowy Fethullah Terrorist Organization(FETO) was behind this provocation in order to sabotage the Russian-Turkish98relationship215, but even to this day there are reasonable doubts about whether ornot this is what really happened.Yuri Barmin remarked how the incident “changed the rules of the game inSyria” by giving Moscow a reason “to further beef up its military presence inSyria”216. Kerim Has, also observed how the event surely impacted in the mostnegative way possible on bilateral relations between both sides, thoughoptimistically writing that “both Ankara and Moscow are of course aware of thelong-term consequences of their actions, which is why there is still hope that theparties will be able to sit down at the negotiating table and arrive at the necessaryconsensus”217.
His commentary was proven to be apt when by-then PresidentErdogan sent his Russian counterpart a letter in June 2016 apologizing for whathappened during that time. Ilshat Saetov from the Institute of Oriental Studies oftheRussianAcademyofSciencesnotedhowthisrepresented“anacknowledgement that the attack on SU-24 failed to achieve its goals” 218, therebysetting both sides up for their eventual rapprochement through the forthcomingTripartite arrangement between them and Iran.The shooting down of Russia’s anti-terrorist Su-24 jet was probably theclosest that Moscow had ever come to war with a NATO country in the post-ColdWar period, but the tensions were thankfully able to be surmounted due to the coolthinking of President Putin. Erdogan’s refusal to further escalate the matter alsocontributed to a peaceful resolution of this matter, and helped lay the groundworkfor his eventual apology and the subsequent rapprochement between the two sides.It was this fast-moving restoration of relations which is thought to have scared the215Erdogan: Link Between Pilots Who Shot Down Russian Su-24 and Gulen Movement.
Sputnik. 20 July 2016.Web. 24 January 2018. https://sputniknews.com/europe/201607201043366406-erdogan-russian-jet-gulen/.216Barmin Y. Following the Downing of its Su-24 Russia Changes the Rules of the Game in Syria. RussianInternational Affairs Council. 30 Nov. 2015. Web. 24 January 2017. http://russiancouncil.ru/en/analytics-andcomments/analytics/posle-ataki-na-su-24-rossiya-menyaet-pravila-igry-v-sirii/.217Has K. Post Mortem by the Turkish Side: Relations between Moscow and Ankara Worsen.
Russian InternationalAffairs Council. 30 Nov. 2015. Web. 24 January 2017. http://russiancouncil.ru/en/analytics-andcomments/analytics/razbor-poletov-po-turetski-obostrenie-otnosheniy-moskvy-i-an/?sphrase_id=82829.218Saetov I. RecepErdogan’s Letter Is an Acknowledgement that the Attack on SU-24 Failed to Achieve itsGoals. RussianInternationalAffairsCouncil.29June2016.Web.24January2017.http://russiancouncil.ru/en/analytics-and-comments/analytics/pismo-redzhepa-erdogana-priznanie-provala-tseleyataki-na-su/?sphrase_id=82829.99US and its allies and prompted them to move forward with their coup againstErdogan, but it’s failure actually solidified the Russian-Turkish partnership evenmore and inadvertently accelerated the very same process that the West might havebeen aiming to avoid through its speculated regime change attempt 219.Within around a month after the Su-24 incident and nearly half a year beforethe Russian-Turkish rapprochement began to unfold, the UNSC passed Resolution2254 which outlined the international community’s envisioned peace plan forSyria220.
The document is full of many details, but the general idea is thatconstitutional reform, new elections, and political talks would have to be heldwithin 18 months, thereby setting a deadline of June 2017 for compliance.Importantly, all sides also vowed to uphold Syria’s territorial integrity, whichtherefore ruled out the possibility of the US immediately using its SDF Kurdishallies to formally divide Syria. However, this only advanced the case for the US toinstead employ its proxies for internal partition purposes under the guise of“federalization”, which is exactly what would begin to progressively unfold in theyear and a half afterwards.It is important to mention that this was an imperfect document which had theunintended consequence of still contributing to Syria’s de-facto geopoliticalfragmentation. Nevertheless, it had somewhat of a positive effect in setting atimetable for certain conflict resolution benchmarks and fostering a sense ofurgency in reaching these deadlines, though it’s still controversial in having forcedthe Syrian government to hold new elections and reform the country’s constitutionafter having already done both in the couple of years preceding the decree’spromulgation.
Russia’s acceptance of the document’s dictates created a situationwhereby Syria was compelled to go along with the motions of the resolution (dueto it being passed in the UNSC) in making an effort to comply with what was219Arango T., Yeginsu C. Turks Can Agree on One Thing: U.S. Was Behind Failed Coup.
The New York Times. 2Aug. 2016. Web. 24 January 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/03/world/europe/turkey-coup-erdoganfethullah-gulen-united-states.html.220Security Council Unanimously Adopts Resolution 2254 (2015), Endorsing Road Map for Peace Process in Syria,SettingTimetableforTalks.
UnitedNations.18Dec.2015.Web.24May2018.https://www.un.org/press/en/2015/sc12171.doc.htm.100expected of it, so it’s in hindsight a moot point whether or not such demandsshould have been made in the first place.The passages pertaining to Syria’s territorial integrity would be abused byboth the Kurds and Turks for contradictory purposes in complicating the conflict –the former to argue that “federalization” doesn’t violate the country’s borders, andthe latter to assert the opposite in justifying its conventional invasion of northernSyria in response to the PYD-YPG “federalization” plans.
Neither of theseoutcomes were intended by Russia when Moscow agreed to the document inDecember 2015, though this goes to show that the US and its allies will alwaysseek to exploit international legal documents just like they did with UNSC 1973 inmaking the case for waging the War on Libya. The lesson here is thatunpredictable outcomes often result from UNSC Resolutions pertaining to any ofthe US given proxy wars, and that for as difficult as it may be to foresee a certainchain of events in advance, a shrewd assessment of the battlespace and all of thestrategic factors influencing it could in hindsight have provided the Russians with amore accurate idea of what they could have possibly expected in the comingfuture.Diplomacy is just another avenue for advancing the US subjectively definednational interests, whether in Syria, Libya, or elsewhere, and that it will resort tosubterfuge in promoting its international agenda if it believes that certain legalclauses stand in its way.
The differing understandings of what exactly constitutes“territorial integrity” lay at the heart of the controversy over UNSC Res. 2254,with Russia likely having initially assumed that this meant the retention of Syria’sinternal and external borders while the US already intended for this to refer solelyto the latter.One of the most surprising events to occur during the War on Syria wasTurkey’s conventional invasion of the country under “Operation: EuphratesShield”, which it officially said was launched on the basis of both combatingDaesh and stopping the unification of the PYD-YPG “federal” “cantons” across theentire Syrian-Turkish borderland region.
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