Vox - Turkey shoots down Russian plane on Syrian borderhttps://cdn.vox-cdn.com/community_logos/52517/voxv.png2022-07-17T18:38:59-04:00http://www.vox.com/rss/stream/95595352022-07-17T18:38:59-04:002022-07-17T18:38:59-04:00Why the US doesn’t want Turkey to invade Syria
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<img alt="A mother and two children kneel outside an open tent door at a camp on June 22, 2022." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/I9bsSZN-AzAaG_Zow7jv1dyjeQ4=/0x0:4608x3456/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/71144448/1241751332.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>A family takes shelter in a tent on the Turkish boudin in Iblib, Syria on June 22, 2022. | Muhammed Said/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>If Turkey invades northeast Syria, the worst impacts will be local </p> <p id="klBdcT">US officials warned Turkey this week against expanding its so-called buffer zone in northeast Syria, saying such a move would complicate counter-ISIS measures, and would increase the violence that Kurds and Syrians in the region have faced since Turkey’s initial incursion in 2019. </p>
<p id="UirCCq">“We strongly oppose any Turkish operation into northern Syria and have made clear our objections to Turkey,” Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East Dana Stroul said <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJIFqzl3VWM">in a speech at the Middle East Institute Wednesda</a>y. “ISIS is going to take advantage of that campaign, not to mention the humanitarian impact.” </p>
<p id="p4Hzve">As Stroul pointed out, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a group that’s made up largely of Kurds and is critical to the ground battle to recover ISIS-held territory in Iraq and Syria, are responsible for security in the Al-Hol and Azraq camps. Together the camps hold approximately 60,000 vulnerable, displaced people, and serve as prisons for around 10,000 alleged ISIS militants.</p>
<p id="0ItiDr">On May 23, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said his military would launch further offensives, creating a 30-kilometer-deep buffer zone as soon as the military and intelligence and security services had completed their preparations, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/erdogan-says-turkey-launch-military-operations-its-southern-borders-2022-05-23/">Reuters reported</a>. </p>
<p id="qevngx">“The main target of these operations will be areas which are centers of attacks to our country and safe zones,” Erdogan said during a speech at the time, although he didn’t specifically mention where the operations would take place or point to any particular target. </p>
<p id="ekez7Y">Erdogan has repeatedly warned that his military is planning an incursion into northeastern Syria, driving further into territory held by the Kurdish ethnic minority. </p>
<p id="q470qD">“That’s a global problem, it’s not a US problem,” Stroul said of a Turkish attack weakening the security situation in northeastern Syria. “So frankly, the whole world should be a little bit more active at this point in time about the risks, about the second- and third- order effects of renewed operations that detract from security of these detention facilities, security and access to the displaced persons camps, and continued counter-terrorism pressure on ISIS.”</p>
<p id="DdfmNV">While it’s true that a further-regrouped ISIS could constitute a global threat on some scale, the reality is that both an ISIS resurgence and renewed violence by Turkey affect local civilians first, and often in the most devastating ways. </p>
<h3 id="IImkFB">Turkey’s pushed into Syrian territory before</h3>
<p id="woguhk">Turkey mounted Operation Peace Spring in 2019, its third push into Syrian territory since 2016, to “neutralize terror threats against Turkey and lead to the establishment of a safe zone, facilitating the return of Syrian refugees to their homes,” <a href="https://twitter.com/rterdogan/status/1181922277488762880">Erdogan tweeted at the time.</a> </p>
<p id="42q8br">“We will preserve Syria’s territorial integrity and liberate local communities from terrorists,” he continued, referring to the Kurdish Worker’s Party, a Kurdish militant group in Turkey that the US considers a terrorist group, as well as Kurdish forces and administration in northeastern Syria. Now, Erdogan says he wants to go further. </p>
<p id="kPoLQY">US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was reportedly briefed on a possible invasion, according to <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/isis-stands-gain-potential-turkish-offensive-syria-pentagon-warns-rcna38353">NBC News’ Courtney Kube</a>; Austin then directed Pentagon staff to develop a response, according to defense officials Kube interviewed on background. When asked to confirm Kube’s reporting, the Department of Defense referred Vox back to Stroul’s comments on Wednesday. </p>
<p id="FuO4LC">Anya Briy, a researcher and member of the Emergency Committee for Rojava — the autonomous Kurdish region in northeastern Syria — presently in the city of Qamislo (which sits on the border between Rojava and Turkey) said that, “The [Rojava] administration is preparing for an invasion, they have declared a state of emergency, and military reinforcements have been sent to the areas that Turkey has singled out for attack,” specifying that the reinforcements in question are with the Syrian government, which has agreed to back the SDF in the event of an invasion. </p>
<p id="7bWXXe">Mazloum Abdi, the General Commander of the SDF, warned in a press conference on Friday that Turkey is preparing for another invasion. Abdi acknowledged talks with the US, but expressed doubt in the coalition’s ability to stop further incursions, <a href="https://twitter.com/RojavaIC/status/1548215882010087424">saying</a>, “The coalition made stances, but they cannot stop Turkey’s attacks against our areas.”</p>
<h3 id="kkl3p0">Turkey and its partner forces have been accused of numerous human rights abuses during the occupation</h3>
<p id="x4mImR">A large part of the US and Kurdish concern over the invasion is in its possible humanitarian impact.</p>
<p id="jIxy7y"><a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2021/country-chapters/syria#23335a">Human Rights Watch</a> and <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2020/09/syria-violations-and-abuses-rife-areas-under-turkish-affiliated-armed-groups">others have documented</a> abuse of civilians in a so called “safe-zone” since its creation in the 2019 invasion of Kurdish-controlled Syrian territory, which includes indiscriminate shelling of civilian areas, sexual violence, and restricting critical supplies like water to Kurdish-held areas. </p>
<p id="hEiP63">In 2021, Turkey’s partner force, the Syrian National Army (SNA) arbitrarily detained 162 people and recruited at least 20 children into its factions, <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2022/country-chapters/syria#9cedca">according to a Human Rights Watch</a> report. Any move by Turkey to increase its territory in Syria will in turn increase violence for civilians, and cause further instability in an already-unstable landscape.</p>
<p id="Qqqh3S">The <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Kurdistan-Workers-Party">PKK, or the Kurdistan Workers’ Party</a>, is a Kurdish nationalist militant group based in Turkey. It was responsible for terror attacks there in the 1970s, ‘80s, and ‘90s in its quest to first overthrow the Turkish government, and later demand rights and self-determination for Kurds in <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/research-and-innovation/en/projects/success-stories/all/echr-and-human-rights-violations-against-kurds-turkey#:~:text=In%20earlier%20times%2C%20the%20ECHR,and%20politicians%2C%20and%20arbitrary%20arrests.">a nation that had historically oppressed them </a>by outlawing their culture, <a href="https://pure.uva.nl/ws/files/867135/65687_13.pdf">massacring civilians</a>, and destroying Kurdish villages, among other abuses. </p>
<p id="wUKH6S">Furthermore, the <a href="https://rojavainformationcenter.com/storage/2022/07/Q4-Occupation-Report.pdf">Rojava Information Center’s</a> — a volunteer-run media organization in Rojava providing analysis, research, and reports on northeastern Syria— most recent state of the occupation report points to forced displacement of Kurds and construction of villages for Arab Syrians from other parts of the country. The report estimates that since 2018, nearly 300,000 Kurds have been displaced from the Afrin area in northern Syria, with nearly as many refugees settled there with the help of entities tied to the Turkish government and investment from Gulf countries. </p>
<p id="nYZZtv">Fighting — <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/10/world/europe/un-turkey-kurds-human-rights-abuses.html">and human rights abuses</a> — along Turkey’s Syrian and Iraqi borders has also ramped up since 2015, when a ceasefire between Turkey and the PKK broke down. According to analysis by the <a href="https://www.crisisgroup.org/content/turkeys-pkk-conflict-visual-explainer">International Crisis Group,</a> 600 civilians have been killed in terror attacks or fighting; 3,878 PKK fighters have been killed, and 1,360 members of Turkish state security forces have been killed in the conflict since 2015. During the invasion in 2019, the group found further evidence of abuses like <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/11/27/syria-civilians-abused-safe-zones">summary executions of civilians</a>, <a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/syrian-arab-republic/displacement-and-despair-turkish-invasion-northeast-syria">mass displacement</a>, and <a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/syrian-arab-republic/displacement-and-despair-turkish-invasion-northeast-syria">attacks on civilian targets</a> on the part of Turkish armed forces and the SNA were found by .</p>
<h3 id="1DHKO9">A resurgent ISIS would be bad for the world, and worst for Syrians and Iraqis</h3>
<p id="Z63iSu">As Stroul pointed out Wednesday, there are risks for the security of ISIS prisons and refugee camps that the SDF is guarding. According to her estimate, nearly 10,000 ISIS fighters are held in SDF-run prisons and approximately 60,000 refugees — some of whom are ISIS sympathizers and have high potential to be radicalized — live in Al-Hol and Azaq camps in “degrading, arbitrary, and often inhuman and life-threatening conditions,” according to a <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2022/country-chapters/syria#9d8b2c">2022 Human Rights Watch</a> report. </p>
<p id="VrFY2b">During the height of of its power, the primary victims of ISIS’s cruel ideology and methods were the people actually living under their rule. <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2015/12/08/daily-life-caliphate-0">Brutal violence</a>, including public executions or threats of serious physical harm for infractions like wearing Western clothes, were the daily norm. While attacks in the West and other regions successfully sowed terror, civilians in ISIS-controlled territory were forced to live in a perpetual state of fear.</p>
<p id="WhFsis">As Syrian journalist <a href="https://carnegieendowment.org/sada/86643">Taim Al-Hajj</a> wrote for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in March of this year, ISIS is still staging smaller-scale, regional attacks that aren’t dependent on territorial control. A <a href="https://media.defense.gov/2022/Feb/10/2002936936/-1/-1/1/LEAD%20INSPECTOR%20GENERAL%20FOR%20OPERATION%20INHERENT%20RESOLVE%20OCTOBER%201,%202021%20TO%20DECEMBER%2031,%202021%20V2.PDF">Pentagon report from December 2021</a> describes a diminished ISIS in both Iraq and Syria — but one that still has the capabilities to attack, sow fear, and “exploit and provoke sectarian, ethnic, and tribal divisions.” In Syria, ISIS primarily carries out smaller scale attacks and kidnappings in pursuit of a renewed territorial caliphate. </p>
<p id="Qr4JrD">On the US side, the concern is that in an already unstable situation SDF fighters-cum-prison guards will leave the prisons and camps to protect their communities in the event of a Turkish invasion. That’s likely a legitimate concern. </p>
<p id="CuZGAG">“There’s only so many SDF to go around, so they’re going to de-prioritize what we care about,” Stroul said. “What we care about is security of the detention facilities, and continued counter-terrorism partnered operations, so we can keep the pressure on ISIS.” </p>
<p id="W4L3M4">If indeed Turkey attacks and SDF fighters push north, conditions would be right for ISIS to stage a jailbreak — a tactic they are accustomed to. In January, ISIS attempted a high-stakes operation at a prison in <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/03/syria-hasakah-isis-prison-attack/">Hasakah, Syria</a> in which more than 500 people were killed and an unknown number of prisoners escaped, the Washington Post’s <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/03/syria-hasakah-isis-prison-attack/">Louisa Loveluck and Sarah Cahlan reported in February</a>. SDF guards only regained control of the facility after 10 days of fighting with support from American and British forces. In the Post’s recounting of the battle, civilians were either displaced by the fighting, under lockdown, or left without access to critical supplies like medicine and fuel.</p>
<p id="XG8q32">However, the invasion isn’t fait accompli, no matter what Erdogan says. According to Briy, a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/russias-putin-meet-erdogan-raisi-next-tuesday-kremlin-2022-07-12/">meeting on Tuesday between Turkey, Iran, and Russia</a> could thwart Turkey’s efforts. Despite the preparations for attack, and the potential for serious fallout both for counter-terror operations and the humanitarian situation in Syria. “There is also a belief that Turkey will ultimately not get permission to attack from either Russia or Iran,” she said. </p>
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https://www.vox.com/2022/7/17/23259615/why-the-us-doesnt-want-turkey-to-invade-syriaEllen Ioanes2015-11-24T17:30:01-05:002015-11-24T17:30:01-05:00A Russia expert explains how Putin will likely respond to his downed plane
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<img alt="Vladimir Putin speaks to soldiers." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/V_Sd0HRUGWpP4yKnKChsLM5nX8o=/0x26:3500x2651/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/47735403/GettyImages-489129346.0.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Vladimir Putin speaks to soldiers. | (Sasha Mordovets/Getty Images)</figcaption>
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<p>On Tuesday, Turkey <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9790990/turkey-russia-plane-shootdown" target="_blank">shot down a Russian warplane</a> that it says had crossed into its airspace from Syria. Though Russia denies it had violated Turkish airspace, Turkey has been complaining of such Russian violations ever since Russia began its military intervention in Syria this September.</p>
<p>To understand why Russia might do this and how Moscow might respond to this incident, I called Mark Galeotti, a professor at NYU's <a href="http://web.scps.nyu.edu/global.affairs/msga/people/faculty/galeotti.html">Center for Global Affairs</a> who focuses on Russia. He suggested that Russia could have been poking at NATO, as it has in the past, but also discussed some much deeper, and more important, issues in the Russia-Turkey relationship and Russia's military adventure in Syria. What follows is a transcript of our conversation, edited for length and clarity.</p>
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<p><em class="name">Zack Beauchamp:</em> Why would Russia fly into Turkey's airspace in the first place?</p>
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<p><em class="name">Mark Galeotti:</em> There are a few possible reasons.</p>
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<p>First is pilot error. They were operating near the border and so strayed over by mistake. It's unlikely, given modern avionics, but nonetheless we can't completely exclude the possibility.</p>
<p>The second thing is that this could, since Turkey is a NATO state, have been Russia just trying to flex its political-diplomatic muscles. Wanting to make the point that they can do this with impunity — which, of course, they have done in NATO's northern reaches.</p>
<p>The third possibility is that this was just a brief foray into Turkish airspace, and the bomber pilot was just setting up an attack run. And given that the Turks are actively supporting some pretty toxic rebel groups, it could have been that the target was just inside Turkish borders. That's the problem when you have a target-rich environment on both sides of the borderline.</p>
<p>It's [also] worth noting that we heard that one of the two pilots was gunned down by rebels while parachuting down, which means that it's possible that it was in Syria. Nonetheless, the fact that the Russians are operating so close to the Turkish border in any case does say something about a certain arrogance and a certain brinksmanship.</p>
<div class="question">
<p><em class="name">Zack Beauchamp:</em> Speaking of brinksmanship: Immediately after the attack, Putin threatened "serious consequences" for the Turks after the plane went down. How seriously should we take his threat?</p>
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<p><em class="name">Mark Galeotti:</em> These days it's very hard to predict Putin. But I suspect Moscow is not keen to start yet another diplomatic war, let alone anything more than that. They're stuck in a quagmire in Ukraine. There's a very dangerous commitment to Syria. They have a whole series of international sanctions on them.</p>
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<p>What we're likely to see is some kind of symbolic act: maybe banning Turkish airliners from landing in Russian airports, some kind of economic sanctions, words with the Turkish ambassador, that kind of thing. [<i>Ed</i>.<em> note: after this conversation, the Russian Ministry of Defense suspended military-to-military communications with its Turkish counterparts.</em>]</p>
<p>At the same time, they'll hope for there being even the faintest signs of contrition from Ankara, which would allow Putin to tell the Russian people that "the Turks messed up, the Turks have acknowledged that, we move on."</p>
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<p><em class="name">Zack Beauchamp:</em> So what is the Russian public reaction to this going to be?</p>
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<p><em class="name">Mark Galeotti:</em> The first indications are that there's a definite surge of public anger. They only know what the Kremlin is going to tell them, which is that this was a Turkish attack on a Russian plane over Syria while it was trying to bomb terrorist targets. All Putin's rhetoric about being stabbed in the back will have resonance, particularly because Russians — even more so than many other people — are very conscious of their history.</p>
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<p>Russia has a long pre-Soviet history of rivalry with the Turkish Ottoman Empire, and a sense that the Turks are not to be trusted, rooted in crude cultural stereotypes. But one has to realize that it's not as though they're demanding war: They can, to a large extent, be modulated and if need be distracted through the state controlled media. I don't think this is, in any meaningful sense, a constraint on the Kremlin.</p>
<p><q class="center" aria-hidden="true">"Turkey has — at best — been a frenemy to Moscow"</q></p>
<p>In Russia, the whole Syrian adventure has been played as "strike the terrorists in Syria before we have to fight them in Russia." It's been sold as an operation that's tremendously successful. You could argue with how effective the airstrikes are — let's be honest, the best the Russian airstrikes can do is slightly slow the rate at which Assad is losing the war; they won't turn the tide. But that's not how it's being sold in Moscow. Finally, it's been sold as a safe operation: no large ground troop commitments, the Russians are doing everything at arm's length away from danger.</p>
<p>One plane being shot down — and by another country, not the rebels — is not going to change that last element. But it really does point to the fact that if the Russians do start taking losses, losses they can't paper over with their propaganda machine, then there are risks that this will quite quickly become less popular.</p>
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<p><em class="name">Zack Beauchamp:</em> That point you made about historical animosity between Russia and Turkey is interesting, and brings up a bigger issue: how do you see the Russian-Turkish relationship today more generally? Will this incident change anything?</p>
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<p><em class="name">Mark Galeotti:</em> We saw, at one point, something of a connection forming between Turkey's [President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan and Russia's Putin. Both of them were leaders in the strongman roles.</p>
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<p>But to be perfectly honest, Turkey has — at best — been a frenemy to Moscow. Under Erdogan, Turkey has embarked on a campaign to assert itself as a regional power. To essentially acquire a sphere of influence, and in the process it is inevitably challenging and competing with Moscow.</p>
<p><q class="center" aria-hidden="true">"Putin is much more concerned with that political dimension than the military one"</q></p>
<p>This predates Syria. I remember when I was in Azerbaijan, there were a whole variety of actors competing there, very clearly including Turkey. Turkey was making quite a push [to the chagrin of] the Russians. There's actually a long history of rivalry in the modern era; the Russians have clearly infringed on Turkish sovereignty, including the assassination of Chechen rebel fundraisers on Turkish soil by what were almost certainly Russian intelligence officers.</p>
<p>Relations are unlikely to change, then, because they've always been quite tense and antagonistic.</p>
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<p><em class="name">Zack Beauchamp:</em> Another thing you said I'd like to pick up on: The more Russia takes casualties, the more of a burden the Syria war will become for Putin. If that's the case, then is this incident going to make Putin less assertive in using military force in Syria?</p>
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<p><em class="name">Mark Galeotti:</em> It depends very much on the scale. If we're talking about a slow-drip feed — a soldier killed by a sniper here, a plane shot down there — it's a lot more manageable. On the other hand, I'm thinking back to when Ronald Reagan was forced to call back the US Marines from Lebanon after the major truck bombing in the barracks [in 1982]. A single, cataclysmic loss of life made this much more of a story.</p>
<p>But let's be honest. Moscow is not looking for an open-ended, much less an expanded, military effort in Syria. The purpose of the air attacks is, more than anything else, to place Moscow within the decision-making cycle about what happens in Syria. What the Russians are actually looking for is to be some part of a political settlement.</p>
<p>Now, a political settlement would actually see Assad go — the Russians are probably the only people who can get Assad out of Damascus peaceably and offer him sanctuary in Russia. It would also include the creation of some kind of political settlement, including the rebels and the Alawite elite. That's the only way you're going to get enough combatants on the ground in Syria to actually take on the Islamic State.</p>
<p>Putin is much more concerned with that political dimension than the military one — he wants to be moving on that political dimension as soon as possible. And thanks to the Paris attacks, it looked like the momentum was actually going his way. This shoot-down could stymie efforts at reaching a West-Russia deal, or it could make it more urgent. We really don't know at this stage.</p>
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<h3>VIDEO: Syria's war, explained</h3>
<div class="volume-video" id="volume-placement-6360" data-volume-placement="article" data-analytics-placement="article:middle" data-volume-id="4601" data-volume-uuid="e0613e8c4" data-analytics-label="Syria's war: A 5-minute history | 4601" data-analytics-action="volume:view:article:middle" data-analytics-viewport="video"></div>
https://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9794816/turkey-russia-plane-galeottiZack Beauchamp2015-11-24T14:50:01-05:002015-11-24T14:50:01-05:00The little-known group at the center of the Turkey-Russia crisis
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<img alt="Commander Omer Abdullah of the Sultan Abdulhamid Han Brigade speaks about their campaign against Assad and Russian airstrikes in the Bayirbucak region in northern Latakia province of Syria on October 27, 2015. " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/hix4oxW0QQtN1FkwznGmVG42Rng=/0x46:4699x3570/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/47733531/GettyImages-494460938.0.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Commander Omer Abdullah of the Sultan Abdulhamid Han Brigade speaks about their campaign against Assad and Russian airstrikes in the Bayirbucak region in northern Latakia province of Syria on October 27, 2015. | Photo by Fatih Aktas/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>The Turkish-backed ethnic Turkmen minority are probably the least well-known of all the groups fighting against the Assad regime in Syria. Reports that Turkmen may have killed the pilots who ejected from the <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9790990/turkey-russia-plane-shootdown" target="_blank">Russian warplane</a> Turkey shot down on Tuesday has put the spotlight on them, their relationship with Turkey, and their role in the Syrian civil war. To help better understand all of this, I called up Henri Barkey, the director of the Middle East program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and an expert on Turkey. He explained how the Turks use the Turkmen as a political tool and offered his predictions about the likely reaction from the Russians.</p>
<p>What follows is a transcript of our discussion, lightly edited for clarity.</p>
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<div class="question">
<p><em class="name">Jennifer R. Williams:</em> What is the role of the Turkmen in the Syrian conflict?</p>
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<div class="answer">
<p><em class="name">Henri Barkey:</em> Information about the Turkmen minority in Syria is very murky, and nobody really knows what their numbers are. The Turks have been using them as another boot fighting Assad. In the context of today's incident, the problem is that it's dicey for Turkey if the Turkmen killed the Russian pilots, as media reports are suggesting, because according to international law you're not supposed to fire at parachuters. I think the Russians will be much angrier at the killing of the pilots than the downing of plane. It will be a very emotional issue. It will be interesting to see how the Russians deal with it, whether Putin makes a big deal over the funerals, whether he'll play it up domestically. He may decide not to make a big fuss.</p>
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<div class="question">
<p><em class="name">Jennifer R. Williams:</em> What has been the relationship between Turkey and the Turkmen minority in the past?</p>
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<div class="answer">
<p><em class="name">Henri Barkey:</em> The Turks have always used the Turkmen not just in Syria but also in Iraq. After the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, the Turks played the Turkmen card and used them as leverage against the Kurds in Iraq. It backfired on them in two ways: 1) They discovered that the Turkmen were not really loyal to Turkey and were more loyal to their Shia identity; in the first elections after the 2003 invasion, the Turkmen party received an embarrassingly low number of votes. And 2) Turkmen militias were involved in plot to kill the governor of Kirkuk [in Iraq]. So it has always backfired for them.</p>
<p>If the Turks play this card again now, it will be slightly different because the Turkmen in Syria are Sunni, not Shia, so it's a somewhat different situation. But the point is that when you have groups like that, they don't necessarily obey your rules, and they create problems for you down the road.</p>
<p>The Turks have always used the Turkmen, especially against the Kurds. They talk about Turkmen rights as a way of denigrating Kurdish rights, even though the Kurds are more numerous. In fact, yesterday I believe the Turks filed a complaint with the UN Security Council saying that the Russians were committing atrocities and genocide against the Turkmen in these exact areas. So there was already tension between Turkey and Russia even before this.</p>
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<div class="question">
<p><em class="name">Jennifer R. Williams:</em> How do you think this incident will affect Turkish-Russian relations?</p>
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<div class="answer">
<p><em class="name">Henri Barkey:</em> Until recently, the Turks and the Russians had succeeded in compartmentalizing their differences over Syria. Because they're on opposite sides: Since the beginning of the Syrian civil war, the Turks have tried to do everything they could to overthrow Assad, and Russia has done everything they could to keep Assad in power. But it didn't affect the relationship between [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan and Putin until recently, with the major Russia intervention in Syria. Now we're seeing increasing escalations. We're seeing now a major change in Turkish-Russian relations.</p>
<p>This also undermines the efforts of [French President François] Hollande, who is coming to talk to Obama about creating a grand coalition to counter ISIS that would include Russia. Hollande was supposed to go to Moscow after. This undermines that. And of course, there's also the issue that a NATO member country shot down a Russian warplane, and all the potential ramifications that could have. We'll have to see.</p>
</div>
<h3>VIDEO: The war in Syria, explained</h3>
<div data-volume-uuid="e0613e8c4" data-volume-id="4601" data-analytics-placement="article:middle" data-volume-placement="article" id="volume-placement-4384" class="volume-video" data-analytics-label="Syria's war: A 5-minute history | 4601" data-analytics-action="volume:view:article:middle" data-analytics-viewport="video"></div>
https://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9792986/turkey-russia-turkmenJennifer Williams2015-11-24T14:10:02-05:002015-11-24T14:10:02-05:00Why Turkey shot down a Russian warplane in Syria, according to an expert
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<img alt="A Russian warplane goes down in Syria's northwestern Turkmen town of Bayirbucak near Turkey's border on November 24, 2015. " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/s1kuzpPZ1RriAj8OKyEHPSbqXSA=/0x115:3311x2598/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/47733323/Russia_warplane_crash.0.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>A Russian warplane goes down in Syria's northwestern Turkmen town of Bayirbucak near Turkey's border on November 24, 2015. | Photo by Fatih Akta/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9790990/turkey-russia-plane-shootdown">downing of a Russian military plane by Turkish forces</a> has introduced another layer of complication to the Syrian crisis and raised fears over possible escalation and the potential for a direct conflict between the US and Russia.<strong> </strong></p>
<p>To get the Turkish perspective on this incident, I spoke with Steven A. Cook, the Eni Enrico Mattei senior fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, about why the Turkish military would take such dramatic action and what this could mean for the future of Turkish-Russian relations and Turkey's policy toward Syria. What follows is a transcript of my conversation with Cook, lightly edited for length and clarity.</p>
<hr>
<div class="question">
<p><em class="name">Jennifer R. Williams:</em> Why would the Turkish military shoot down a Russian warplane?</p>
</div>
<div class="answer">
<p><em class="name">Steven A. Cook:</em> The Russians have been taunting the Turks. They have violated Turkish airspace on at least two previous occasions. It was humiliating and had the potential to become a political problem for the Turkish leadership. Obviously they felt that they had to protect their sovereignty and believed they had NATO's backing to do so.</p>
</div>
<div class="question">
<p><em class="name">Jennifer R. Williams:</em> How could this affect Turkish policy toward Syria?</p>
</div>
<div class="answer">
<p><em class="name">Steven A. Cook:</em> I don't think it will alter Turkey's approach dramatically. They will continue to support Turkmen, coordinate with select extremist groups, and try to prevent the emergence of "Western Kurdistan." I imagine that the Russians will try to make the Turks pay in some way, but Moscow is already targeting people on Turkey's side of the fight there.</p>
</div>
<div class="question">
<p><em class="name">Jennifer R. Williams:</em> What does it mean for Turkish-Russian relations?</p>
</div>
<div class="answer">
<p><em class="name">Steven A. Cook:</em> Well, it adds a new dimension to relations, which up until now the leaders of both countries have been able to compartmentalize. The fact that Russia supports Assad and Turkey is a leading advocate of regime change in Syria did not disrupt commercial ties, for example. There will be a lot of hot rhetoric from Moscow, especially, and there is a risk of escalation, but cooler heads are likely to prevail.</p>
</div>
<div class="question">
<p><em class="name">Jennifer R. Williams:</em> What role do the ethnic Turkmen play in all this in terms of their importance to Turkey and Erdogan's willingness to protect them?</p>
</div>
<div class="answer">
<p><em class="name">Steven A. Cook:</em> The Turkmen are the card that Turkey plays when it wants to get involved in something or [convince] its allies to do something. Turkey's position on Kirkuk and other Iraq issues were often tied to the Turkmen, though they were just convenient for Ankara.</p>
</div>
<h3>VIDEO: The war in Syria, explained</h3>
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https://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9792810/russian-plane-turkey-shot-whyJennifer Williams2015-11-24T14:00:03-05:002015-11-24T14:00:03-05:00Syria’s Turkmen: who they are, and what they have to do with Russia’s downed plane
<figure>
<img alt="A Syrian Turkmen leader." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/m-gNchTs54Hn0m4Ll_vG7eedl6I=/0x0:4000x3000/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/47733311/GettyImages-160413299.0.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>A Syrian Turkmen leader. | (JM Lopez/AFP/Getty Images)</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>After Turkish forces shot down a Russian Su-24 warplane on the Turkey-Syria border on Tuesday morning, disturbing reports emerged that members of a Syrian rebel group claimed to have killed the Russian pilots as they descended with parachutes after ejecting from their destroyed plane.</p>
<p>"Both of the pilots were retrieved dead. Our comrades opened fire into the air and they died in the air," <a href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/2015/11/24/uk-mideast-crisis-syria-turkey-shooting-idUKKBN0TD1TM20151124">Alpaslan Celik</a>, a rebel commander, told Reuters.</p>
<p>To understand why Celik's rebels would even claim to do this, you need to know a little bit about who they are. These rebels aren't part of Syria's Arab majority: They're Turkmen, an ethnically Turkish minority in Syria that plays a unique role in the Syrian conflict — one that may have had something to do with the downing of Russia's aircraft in the first place.</p>
<h3>Who are the Turkmen?</h3>
<p> <figure class="e-image">
<img alt="Turkmen children" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/HrZCylziDdNkKWW0fFXX1KPkI5A=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/4296479/GettyImages-167256872.0.jpg">
<cite>Miguel Medina/AFP/Getty Images</cite>
</figure>
</p>
<p class="caption">Turkmen children at a displaced children's camp. (Miguel Medina/AFP/Getty Images)</p>
<p>Turkmen (not to be confused with <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=uGKmBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA62&dq=turkmen+middle+east&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjNsdaHwanJAhXFdR4KHXYmAPQQ6AEIQDAF#v=onepage&q=turkmen%20middle%20east&f=false">people from Turkmenistan</a>) are spread across several Middle Eastern countries but are mostly concentrated in Syria and Iraq. Their total population is thought to range <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34910389">from 1.5 to 3.5 million</a>, though reliable estimates are hard to come by. Of those, somewhere in the range of <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2015/11/24/world/middleeast/ap-ml-syrian-turkmens-glance.html?_r=0">100,000</a> to <a href="http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/12/syria-al-qaeda-targets-turkmen-minority-isis-jihadist-kurds.html#">200,000</a> likely live in Syria, mostly in the country's north near the Turkish border.</p>
<p>The Turkmen arrived in what's now Syria <a href="http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=40961&tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=7&cHash=7913ab2f01cb16ba44052b4e30054793#.VlSW92SrSL0">centuries ago</a>, as various different Turkic empires — first the Seljuks, then the Ottomans — encouraged Turkish migration into the territory to counterbalance the local Arab majority. Under Bashar al-Assad's rule, the mostly Sunni Muslim Turkmen in Syria were an oppressed minority, denied even the right to teach their own children in their own language (a Turkish dialect).</p>
<p>However, the Turkmen <a href="http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/12/syria-al-qaeda-targets-turkmen-minority-isis-jihadist-kurds.html#">didn't immediately</a> join the anti-Assad uprising in 2011. Instead, they were goaded into it by both sides. Assad persecuted them, treating them as a potential conduit for Turkish involvement in the Syrian civil war. Turkey, a longtime enemy of Assad, encouraged the Turkmen to oppose him with force. Pushed in the same direction by two major powers, the Turkmen officially joined the armed opposition in 2012.</p>
<p>Since then, they've gotten deeply involved in the civil war, receiving significant amounts of military aid from Ankara. Their location has brought them into conflict with the Assad regime, ISIS, and even the Western-backed Kurdish rebels (whom Turkey sees as a threat given its longstanding struggle with its own Kurdish population). Today, <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34910389">the Syrian Turkmen Brigades</a> — the dominant Turkmen military faction — boast as many as 10,000 fighters, per the BBC, though the real number could be much lower.</p>
<h3>Russia and the Turkmen</h3>
<p> <figure class="e-image">
<img alt="Turkmen rebel syria" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/wMQTeQTkgJm39r5ZwedFE8B5a_A=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/4296483/GettyImages-160413278.0.jpg">
<cite>(JM Lopez/AFP/Getty Images)</cite>
</figure>
</p>
<p class="caption">Turkmen rebel fighter in Syria. (JM Lopez/AFP/Getty Images)</p>
<p>The Turkmen role in the conflict has put them directly in Russia's crosshairs. The Russians, contrary to their stated goal of fighting ISIS, have directed most of their military efforts to helping Assad's forces fight rebels. The Turkmen have clashed repeatedly with Assad and his allies in the north — which led to Russian planes targeting Turkmen militants last week.</p>
<p>Turkey was not happy, and called in the Russian ambassador to register its disapproval. "It was stressed that the Russian side's actions were not a fight against terror, but they bombed civilian Turkmen villages and this could lead to serious consequences," the Turkish foreign ministry said in a description of the meeting provided to <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/11/20/us-mideast-crisis-syria-turkey-russia-idUSKCN0T91MO20151120#IPcA7xeAWLVF7Bd5.99">Reuters</a>.</p>
<p>And indeed, something "serious" happened Tuesday morning, when Turkish fighter planes shot down the Russian warplane. Turkey claimed the attack happened because the Russian plane violated its airspace, a claim that seems quite plausible. That might well be all that's going on here.</p>
<p>But it's also possible that the Turkish actions were influenced by Russia's attack on the Turkmen. The Russian plane appeared to have been flying over Syrian Turkmen territory at one point. It's possible that the Turks were, at least in part, attempting to send a message about Russian aggression in Turkmen territory.</p>
<p>"In recent days, thousands of civilians have fled over the border, saying they feared Russian bombing raids in support of regime forces in [a Turkmen-populated] area ... the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/turkey/12013517/Dont-panic-Turkey-shooting-down-a-Russian-warplane-wont-start-World-War-3.html">clash that led to the downing of the Russian jet today</a> may be connected to that fighting," <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/turkey/12013935/Who-are-the-Turkmen.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter">Telegraph</a> Middle East correspondents Louisa Loveluck and Richard Spencer write.</p>
<p>This would be consistent with what we've been hearing from Turkish officials recently. "Turkish media and officials have for weeks highlighted the plight of Syria’s small ethnic Turkmen population," <a href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/borzoudaragahi/turkey-had-warned-russia-that-it-would-defend-its-border-and#.xvePp6WNjX">BuzzFeed</a>'s Borzou Daragahi writes. One Turkish official, according to a report in Turkey's Hurriyet newspaper, told Russian officials that "Turkey won’t be indifferent to attacks targeting the life security of Turkmen."</p>
<p>Regardless of whether that was a motivating factor behind Turkey's actions on Tuesday, one thing is for sure: The Turkmen are clearly a growing source of tension between Russia and Syria, making them yet another complication in Syria's already-complicated civil war.</p>
<h3>Watch: Syria's war — a 5-minute history</h3>
<p></p>
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https://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9792830/russia-plane-turkmenZack Beauchamp2015-11-24T11:40:01-05:002015-11-24T11:40:01-05:00No, Turkey shooting down a Russian warplane will not spark World War III
<figure>
<img alt="Obama and Putin lock eyes at an international summit in Mexico." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/QeuK1f2l6netH1IMpUfCSlJlTVE=/86x0:1937x1388/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/47732435/146539328.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Obama and Putin lock eyes at an international summit in Mexico. | ALEXEI NIKOLSKY/AFP/Getty</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Only three short hours of Turkey announcing it had <a target="_blank" href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9790990/turkey-russia-plane-shootdown">shot down a Russian warplane</a> for violating its airspace, an unusual phrase appeared as a new trending topic on Twitter: "World War 3." The conversation is both joking and not joking.</p>
<p>You can see why people might worry. Turkey is a NATO ally, meaning that at least in theory the other members of NATO — the United States and most of Europe — can be obliged to come to its defense against an external attack. A theoretical slide into conflict between Turkey and Russia could thus also become a conflict between Russia and NATO, dragging the world's top four nuclear powers into war. Tensions between NATO and Russia have been rising for two years, and now both are bombing on opposite sides in Syria. With fears of some unintended escalation in Ukraine or now Syria sparking a larger conflagration, it sounded scarily possible.</p>
<p>But I am here to reassure you: <strong>This is not the start of World War III</strong>. And I say that as someone who has <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/6/29/8845913/russia-war">voiced real concern</a> about other ways in which Russia and the US could be dragged into an unintended escalation to war. But those conditions are not present here.</p>
<h3>Why neither Russia nor NATO will risk major war over this</h3>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt="The Russian Tu-95 long-range bomber, one of the aircraft types that has flow in or near NATO airspace in recent months, viewed by Western governments as a dangerous provocation (Wojtek Laski/Getty)" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/DyKoT2xQMGFVp2mUCieH6Hj8J4s=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/3665386/82827038.0.jpg">
<figcaption>The Russian Tu-95 long-range bomber, one of the aircraft types that has flow in or near NATO airspace in recent months, viewed by Western governments as a dangerous provocation. (Wojtek Laski/Getty)</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The answer is pretty simple: The stakes are just too low. The things at issue here are Russia's bombing of anti-Assad rebels in Syria, the sanctity of Turkish airspace, and the life of one (or possibly two) Russian pilot.</p>
<p>Those things matter, and Turkey cares an awful lot about its airspace and about what happens in Syria. But Russia doesn't care enough about those things to risk a major war. And neither do the leading members of NATO (the US, UK, France, etc.), which will largely decide how NATO responds.</p>
<p>There is thus every reason to believe that both Russia and NATO will seek to deescalate. Neither cares enough about enforcing Syria-Turkey border zone air rights to escalate much over this.</p>
<p>Russia expert Mark Galeotti, who teaches at NYU, <a href="https://inmoscowsshadows.wordpress.com/2015/11/24/turkey-shoots-down-a-russian-jet-and-we-return-to-the-19th-century/">summed this up well</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I suspect neither Moscow nor, at the very least, the other European NATO powers will want to let this go too far. Russia cannot fight hot diplomatic wars on too many fronts, and Europe clearly wants Moscow to be part of the solution in Syria and maybe Ukraine, too. And, frankly, there is in many capitals concern about Turkey, its agenda and its role in the region. Much will depend on where Washington falls, of course, but if Moscow can get even a crumb of contrition from Ankara or sympathy from Europe, then we can expect this to be splashed on Russian TV and allow the Kremlin to let this slide a little.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>There's another very important factor here. Because the Syria-Turkish border is so far from Russia or from central Europe, there is just zero risk that either side could misperceive this as the start of something bigger.</p>
<h3>The Turkey-Syria border is just not a place where Russia-NATO war could break out</h3>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt="syrian rebel aleppo" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/_tM4jaSvwmZk4oru3HxGzZX9bJk=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/3947180/GettyImages-487064561.0.jpg">
<cite>(Baraa al-Halabi/AFP/Getty Images)</cite>
<figcaption>A Syrian rebel fighter in Aleppo. (Baraa al-Halabi/AFP/Getty Images)</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The thing that has made Russia-NATO escalation in Eastern Europe so dangerous is that that is exactly where, were Russia and NATO to fight a war, it would happen. So any misstep or overreaction risked being misperceived as the start of something larger.</p>
<p>Had today's shoot-down happened in, say, Estonia, then there would be a risk that NATO could misperceive it as Russia attempting to do in Estonia (a NATO ally) what it had done in Ukraine. Russia might have misperceived the shoot-down as the start of a NATO war against Russia — something that sounds silly in Washington but <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/5/6/8540063/russia-europe-war">is taken seriously in Moscow</a>. (And is a fear you hear earnestly expressed from some in NATO.) Thus each side might respond to such an incident by escalating a little to defend against the other side. Then each side could misread the other's escalation as an act of aggression. That's how, in an unlikely but scarily plausible worst-case scenario, you could get a major war that neither side wanted.</p>
<p>There is no such danger on the Turkish-Syria border. Russia has zero reason to believe that Turkey is about to invade it (and, if it did, it sure wouldn't do it by marching south into Syria). And NATO has no reason to believe that Russia is considering an invasion, or a Ukraine-style "hybrid war," in Turkey. So neither side has any real reason to see this as anything but an isolated incident.</p>
<p>And even if Moscow or Washington did want to escalate here — which they don't — neither has that capability. The number of Russian forces located in or near Syria is quite small — way too small to provoke, intentionally or unintentionally, any kind of major conflict. The US forces in the region are also relatively modest. The point is that neither Russia nor NATO could possibly believe that the other side is about to launch an invasion.</p>
<p>So, to review: Neither Russia nor NATO has enough at stake to escalate to anything near the point of war. Neither has the physical military capability to do so in this region. And because the Syria-Turkey border is so far removed from either Russia or Europe, there is very little risk of unintended escalation.</p>
<h3>But the world should take this as a warning: What if this had happened in Eastern Europe?</h3>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt="Russian President Vladimir Putin and Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu visit military exercises in Kirillovsky (MIKHAIL KLIMENTYEV/AFP/Getty)" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/Rgjw8ipGVIcC_lZ145MlRS1Yrqc=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/3665350/476506935.0.jpg">
<figcaption>Russian President Vladimir Putin and Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu visit military exercises in Kirillovsky. (MIKHAIL KLIMENTYEV/AFP/Getty)</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As I argued in a <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/6/29/8845913/russia-war">lengthy piece this summer</a>, even though neither Russia nor NATO has any desire whatsoever to fight a direct war, there is a real fear on both sides that it could happen anyway. The reasons for this are complex and laid out in the piece. But many of the risk factors are very specific to Eastern Europe, and especially the Baltic states (which are NATO allies on Russia's border), and do not apply in Turkey and Syria.</p>
<p>That said, this incident today should make us worry all the same. If it had happened in, say, Estonia or Latvia, the risks of a major US-Russia war would still be remote. But they would be awfully <em>less</em> remote. If you're curious about that risk, what it looks like, and why many take it seriously, I would urge you to <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/6/29/8845913/russia-war">read my piece from this summer</a>, but here is a super-condensed version:</p>
<p>The US has a number of military forces on perpetual "temporary" deployment to the Baltics, where they sometimes parade within a couple hundred yards of the Russian border. The US and NATO see this as defensive, meant to deter Russia from any Ukraine-style actions in the Baltics. That's not a hysterical fear — Russian security forces stormed across Estonia's border and kidnapped an Estonian agent shortly after Obama gave a speech there promising to defend the country.</p>
<p>But many in Russia see it as offensive; the Kremlin earnestly believes that the US fomented violent regime change with Ukraine's 2014 uprising and that it seeks the same in Moscow. Moscow worries about Kaliningrad: a small region of Russia that is physically separated from the rest of the country and located on the far side of the Baltic states. Russia has long feared that the West secretly desires to "retake" Kaliningrad (it was formerly part of Germany).</p>
<p>The point is not that Russia thinks NATO is poised to invade tomorrow, or that NATO believes Russia is prepping a massive invasion of the Baltics. Rather, the point is that NATO sees the Baltics as very insecure and very at risk from Russia <em>should</em> conflict break out. Russia sees Kaliningrad as very insecure and very at risk from NATO <em>should</em> conflict break out. Insecurity breeds escalation, and escalation can be misread as offensive.</p>
<p>Thus the risk is that <em>if something happened</em> that both sides could misread as the beginning of a possible attack, then both sides would likely respond with "just in case" escalations to prep their defenses, which the other side would misread as confirming their worst fears of a coming attack, and so on.</p>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt="President Obama speaks to US and Estonian soldiers in the Estonian capital of Tallinn, where he pledged the US would come to Estonia's defense in the case of aggression by its neighbor, Russia (SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty)" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/c38QGVRnA14fNzbW0BT3O7Upk68=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/3665396/454551254.0.jpg">
<figcaption>President Obama speaks to US and Estonian soldiers in the Estonian capital of Tallinn, where he pledged the US would come to Estonia's defense in the case of aggression by its neighbor, Russia. (SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty)</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>If this sounds outlandish, it's important to note that there are a number of other factors that increase the risk of such a misunderstanding: For example, Russian state media spent much of the spring hammering away at the idea that ethnic Russian minorities in the Baltics are at imminent risk — an echo of what Russian state media said about Russian-speaking Ukrainians shortly before Russia invaded Ukraine.</p>
<p>And then there are the Russian flights. Before Russian planes were buzzing Turkish airspace, they were buzzing — and at times violating — NATO airspace in the Baltics. Russian subs were showing up at communications cables or going missing off the Swedish coast. Aging Russian bombers were rumbling around even British airspace.</p>
<p>In other words, what allegedly happened in Turkey that began today's incident — a Russian jet crossing into NATO airspace and ignoring calls to turn back — has in fact happened in the Baltic states of Eastern Europe, exactly the place where such an incident would be so much more dangerous. NATO forces in the Baltics have not fired on Russian warplanes in response, and they're smart enough not to shoot at Russian forces along the Russian border. In other words, the odds of a shoot-down are much lower in the Baltics than they are in Turkey. But the stakes are potentially much higher.</p>
<p>Hopefully a lesson that Russia and NATO will take from today's incident is that they should find a way to better manage tensions and prevent possible escalations in Eastern Europe, where the danger of a major conflict is still quite low — but not nearly as low as it is along the Turkey-Syrian border.</p>
<h3>VIDEO: The war in Syria, explained</h3>
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https://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9791612/russia-turkey-nato-world-war-3Max Fisher2015-11-24T10:34:15-05:002015-11-24T10:34:15-05:00Watch Putin's angry response to Turkey shooting down a Russian plane
<figure>
<img alt="" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/-0KpkwKdo-qofVTZJ9jr09ZFU2U=/0x0:820x615/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/47731791/Screen_Shot_2015-11-24_at_10.32.02_AM.0.0.png" />
<figcaption>(Russia Today)</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Early on Tuesday morning, Turkey shot down a Russian military plane near the Turkey-Syria border. Afterward, Russian President Vladimir Putin addressed the downing of his aircraft during a public appearance with Jordan's King Abdullah in Sochi. Here are the comments, translated by Russia's English-language propaganda outlet Russia Today (starts at 5:40):</p>
<p><iframe width="1280" height="720" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/9fw8GT0ow_Y" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Putin, clearly, is quite angry. He calls Turkey's actions a "stab in [Russia's] back," and blames the country for enabling ISIS's "barbarous, heinous ways" by allowing it to sell oil in Turkish territory. Most ominously, he threatens "serious consequences" for relations between Russia and Turkey, a NATO ally:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We have long identified that there are a lot of oil and petro products coming to Turkey from [ISIS] territory. And some of these military groups get their financing from there. And now they stab us in the back; they hit our planes that are fighting terrorism. Together with the US partners, we signed an agreement to prevent incidents in the air.</p>
<p>And they announce that they are fighting terrorism as part of the US-led coalition. If ISIS has these amounts of money — and could it be even billions of dollars — due to the sales of oil and plus they have protection of the armed forces of the big state, then now it's clear why they're so blatant, why they kill people in the most barbarous, heinous ways. Why they conduct terrorist attacks in many places, including in the heart of Europe.</p>
<p>Certainly, we will analyze what's happening very seriously, and today's tragic event will have serious consequences for Russian-Turkish relations. We have always treated Turkey as not just a close neighbor, but as a friendly state. I don't know in whose interests today's incident is, but it's not in our interest. And instead of immediately establishing the necessary contacting us, the Turkish authorities immediately their NATO partners, as if we downed a Turkish jet.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Putin has something of a point. For a long time, even <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/27/middleeast/turkey-isis-q--a/">Western analysts</a> agreed that Turkey did very little to shut down ISIS supply lines that ran across its border into Syria, seemingly because it and ISIS had shared enemies (Bashar al-Assad and the Kurdish fighters in northern Syria). But that hardly amounts to active support for ISIS, let alone the kind of active support that would cause Turkey to shoot down a Russian plane.</p>
<p>As for Putin's bellicose rhetoric, it's worth taking it with a grain of salt: Some of it is for domestic consumption, to make Russia look strong in the face of the death of at least one of its own.</p>
<p>"Putin's primary goal re downed fighter is to save face at home," <a href="https://twitter.com/samagreene/status/669138230860767232">Sam Greene</a>, director of the King's Russia Institute at King's College London, tweeted. "Expect the rhetorical bark to be much worse than the policy bite."</p>
<h3>VIDEO: The war is Syria, explained</h3>
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https://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9791158/putin-plane-russiaZack Beauchamp2015-11-24T10:00:02-05:002015-11-24T10:00:02-05:00Turkey shot down a Russian warplane. Why it would happen and why it matters, explained.
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<img alt="Russian President Vladimir Putin." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/L_3zfOP5BYLupNg9T_hXH6mYnOM=/2x0:797x596/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/47731599/129030698.0.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Russian President Vladimir Putin. | Jason Lee — Pool/Getty</figcaption>
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<ul>
<li>Turkey says it has shot down a Russian warplane that violated its airspace. Russian jets, in the area to bomb neighboring Syria, have violated Turkish airspace <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/6/9464847/russia-turkey-jets">previously</a>. Tensions between Russia and Turkey have been rising in recent weeks.</li>
<li>Russian President Vladimir Putin <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/323240-russia-turkey-warplane-downed/">acknowledged</a> the shoot-down but says the plane was in Syria, 4 kilometers from Turkey's border. He described Turkey as "backstabbing" Russia and accused it of financing ISIS.</li>
<li>Several videos have emerged that <a href="https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2015/11/24/verifying-video-of-a-dead-russian-pilot-in-syria/">appear to show</a> the body of the Russian pilot recovered from the plane.</li>
<li>Turkey is a member of NATO, making it a military ally of the US and most of Europe. NATO has called an emergency meeting over the incident. The risk of a major escalation between Russia and NATO is very low, but this may nonetheless have serious repercussions.</li>
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<h3>Why Russia might send a warplane into Turkey's airspace</h3>
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<p class="caption">A Russian Su-24 jet — the type of plane reportedly shot down over the Syria-Turkey border — on exercises in China. (Zhang Lei/ChinaFotoPress/Getty Images)</p>
<p><span>It is certainly possible that if this Russian plane did cross into Turkish airspace, it was an accident; Russia has been bombing some targets along the Syria-Turkey border, after all. But Russian jets have committed enough such violations that it's also very possible this was deliberate.</span></p>
<p>Russian jets first crossed into Turkey's airspace in early October, just a few days after Russia began bombing targets in Syria. Both the US and NATO <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/6/9464847/russia-turkey-jets">publicly warned</a> Russia that this was extremely dangerous: Turkey is a member of NATO, meaning that the US and European powers are at least theoretically obligated to defend it from attack.</p>
<aside><q>Russia and Turkey are on opposite sides of Syria's increasingly heated proxy war. Something like this may have been inevitable.</q></aside>
<p>But there was every reason to expect that Russia's airspace violations would continue, in part because Russia had been doing the same for months against another set of NATO allies: the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in northeastern Europe. Those Russian flights began shortly after Russia covertly invaded eastern Ukraine, which prompted Western sanctions against Russia.</p>
<p>When you ask Russia experts why Moscow would send its warplanes buzzing NATO airspace in Europe, they'll often point out that Russia's military is much weaker than America's and NATO's — and Moscow knows it. And indeed this military imbalance is something you hear Russian defense officials bring up <em>constantly</em>; this fact of their relative weakness is world-shaping for them.</p>
<p>So one way Russia has dealt with its relative weakness is by being more provocative, by demonstrating its willingness to raise the stakes and toe ever closer up to the line of outright conflict. The intended message of such flights isn't that Russia will deliberately start a war with the West — it won't — but rather that it is more willing to take on risk, so if the West doesn't want the headache it should just back down.</p>
<aside><q>Russia's Syria intervention was already unpopular at home. It could become more so now.</q></aside>
<p>In terms of Syria, then, those flights may be about Russia finding a way to assert its military presence, and preempt any Western effort to chase it off, by taking pushy and provocative steps like buzzing Turkish airspace.</p>
<p>That this was risky and dangerous may have been precisely the point: With its flights across NATO airspace in the Baltics, Russia was likely seeking to raise the stakes and hope that Western countries, wanting to avoid an incident like today's shoot-down, would take on the burden of deescalating. But that is not how things worked out with Turkey.</p>
<h3>Why Turkey would shoot down the plane — and why this might surprise Russia</h3>
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<img alt="turkish president recep tayyip erdogan" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/acMKDhiyX1OsoXvFsxRWjSZM7Lo=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/3774824/GettyImages-473145446.0.jpg">
<cite><p>(Dilek Mermer/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)</p></cite>
<figcaption>Turkish President Erdogan.</figcaption>
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<p>When Russian planes crossed into NATO airspace in the Baltics, as they did in several incidents last year and this year, NATO jets responded by scrambling to intercept the flights — and in one incident even came <a href="http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2015/may/14/russia-nato-twenty-feet-from-war/">within mere yards</a> of a collision — but never fired on them.</p>
<p>Russian officials can tend to see all of NATO as a unified block, and they may have concluded from these Baltic flights that Turkey wouldn't fire on them, either.</p>
<aside><q>That Russia's flights are provocative and dangerous may be precisely the point</q></aside>
<p>Turkey is different. Its foreign policy is, depending on your perspective, either unusually assertive or unusually reckless (or both). This is especially true in Syria, where it has long been involved in aiding the flow of rebels who are fighting Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.</p>
<p>Turkey is also at war with Kurdish groups at home, and has <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-concerns-grow-over-turkish-bombardment-of-kurdish-separatists-1439422676">bombed</a> Kurdish rebels in Iraq. It has bombed ISIS some, but only sparingly; while it does not support the group, it is not particularly focused on fighting it.</p>
<p>All of this is to say that while Moscow may believe NATO controls Turkish military actions, in fact there has been significant disagreement between Turkey and its NATO allies over Middle Eastern military action, and Turkey has been more aggressive than its allies would like.</p>
<h3>Russia has been bombing ethnic Turkmen in Syria, enraging Turkey</h3>
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<cite>Stringer/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images</cite>
<figcaption>Ethnic Turkmen rebels in Syria.</figcaption>
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<p>There's also another factor here. Russia has, in just the past week, been bombing Syrian rebels who are part of the Turkmen ethnic group. This enraged Turkey, which <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/turkey-protests-russia-over-attacks-on-syrian-turkmen-areas/2015/11/20/7c9ec8ae-8f8d-11e5-934c-a369c80822c2_story.html">summoned the Russian ambassador</a> to demand Russia stop its bombing. Turkey considers <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/turkey/12013935/Who-are-the-Turkmen.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter">ethnic Turkmen</a> to be something like unofficial Turkish citizens.</p>
<p>Turkish Prime Minister <a href="http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/turkey-protests-intense-russian-bombing-turkmen-villages-1603191925">Ahmet Davutoglu</a> called the Russian-bombed Syrians "our Turkmen siblings" and said "we are condemning this barbarian attack in the strongest way." A statement by Turkey's foreign ministry warned the bombing "may lead to serious consequences."</p>
<p>That is not to say that Turkey necessarily shot down the Russian plane in cold-blooded vengeance for Russia bombing ethnic Turkmens. But the bombings may have contributed to already-rising tensions between Turkey and Russia over Syria. And it's not just the flights: Russia intervened in Syria to support Bashar al-Assad, but Turkey has been involved in Syria for a few years seeking to topple Assad. They're on opposite sides of a deadly serious proxy war. Escalation was not out of the question.</p>
<h3>What happens now? Not war, but this could still be significant.</h3>
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<cite>PHILIPPE DESMAZES/AFP/Getty</cite>
<figcaption>Secretary of State John Kerry with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in September.</figcaption>
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<p>If you're worried about this spiraling into World War III, take a breath: There is every reason to believe that both Russia and NATO will seek to deescalate. Neither cares enough about enforcing Syria-Turkey border zone air rights to escalate much over this.</p>
<p>Still, Russia and NATO are both taking this very seriously. Putin has already issued a public statement accusing Turkey of "backstabbing" Russia — and also saying publicly that Turkey finances and supports ISIS (this is not, as best we know, true). NATO is planning on holding an <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34907983">"extraordinary"</a> meeting to discuss the incident at 4 pm GMT (11 am EST) on Tuesday.</p>
<p>Relations between Turkey and Russia have previously been quite good, though they've been souring since Russia got involved in Syria. They may deteriorate further now. That's significant for both countries, especially economically. Turkey imports most of its energy from Russia — <a href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/2015/10/08/uk-mideast-crisis-turkey-russia-idUKKCN0S20JA20151008">60 percent of its natural gas imports</a> are Russian — and Turkey had a $20 billion deal with a Russian state-owned firm to build a nuclear power plant.</p>
<p>This doesn't mean that Russia is going to turn off the tap or that Turkey is going to cancel all its natural gas imports, but if there's going to be retaliatory escalation between them, it may well be in this economic sphere.</p>
<p><span>The similarities between Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan may be among the most important factors here. Both are nationalists who rely on military power and who are seeking to cast ever-more-assertive involvement abroad — having two such escalation-prone leaders going head to head is dangerous.</span></p>
<p>Both leaders are also deeply concerned with looking good at home, which means that neither wants to look like he's backing down. At the same time, both are canny and pragmatic. They'll both want to look tough here — and that makes them both more likely to escalate — but neither is crazy enough to let this spiral out of control.</p>
<p>Mark Galeotti, a Russia expert who teaches at NYU, explained well why everyone involved is probably going to <a href="https://inmoscowsshadows.wordpress.com/2015/11/24/turkey-shoots-down-a-russian-jet-and-we-return-to-the-19th-century/">try to deescalate here</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I suspect neither Moscow nor, at the very least, the other European NATO powers will want to let this go too far. Russia cannot fight hot diplomatic wars on too many fronts, and Europe clearly wants Moscow to be part of the solution in Syria and maybe Ukraine, too. And, frankly, there is in many capitals concern about Turkey, its agenda and its role in the region.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Still, "I don’t imagine that will be the end to it," Galeotti says. "I would expect some uptick in ‘mischief’ – perhaps some support for the Kurds or other violent extreme movements, for example – as well as a more assiduous campaign to push back and stymie Turkish regional ambitions."</p>
<h3>Russia was already showing hints that it considered its Syria intervention a mistake</h3>
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<cite>Salih Mahmud Leyla/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images</cite>
<figcaption>Syrian rebels.</figcaption>
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<p>One important question is whether this will have any ramifications for the international peace talks to end Syria's war. Russia has been making ever-so-tentative signals that it might be willing to make some real concessions to end the war, maybe even help to nudge out Assad.</p>
<p>This incident, then, could lead Russia to conclude that its Syria involvement is getting too costly.</p>
<p>While Russian leaders don't really, as a rule, admit mistakes — that's not how they teach it in the Moscow school of diplomacy, as I heard one senior US official put it — there are indications that it was beginning to see its Syria intervention as a mistake.</p>
<p>A number of Russians have reportedly died in the fighting, and they don't have much to show for it. In October, Russian and Iranian forces helped Assad's army launch a big military campaign to retake territory from the rebels — and it largely failed.</p>
<p>Russia's Syria intervention is <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/9/30/9426333/putin-syria-russia-problem">unpopular at home</a>, and Putin is extremely sensitive to public opinion. A <a href="http://www.levada.ru/28-09-2015/voina-v-sirii-vnimanie-otsenki-igil">September poll</a> by Moscow's Levada Center found that only 39 percent of respondents said they supported Russia's policy toward the Assad regime. When asked what Russia should do for Assad, 69 percent opposed direct military intervention. A tiny 14 percent of respondents said that Russia should send troops or other direct military support to Syria.</p>
<p>That's a pretty sharp contrast to Russia's policy toward Ukraine, which has been enormously popular with Russians. Putin's first, second, and third concerns have always been to maintain his own rule at home. With the economy in shambles, public opinion is crucial for that. Now that footage is emerging of a dead Russian pilot, Russian public opinion could become even more skeptical of the Syria intervention. And Putin will likely respond to that.</p>
<p>At the same time, this could lead Putin to harden his position on Syria — to seek to raise the stakes and make this about avenging Russian honor as a means to shore up public support for the war. That's probably not the most likely outcome, but it is a possibility.</p>
<h3>VIDEO: The war in Syria, explained</h3>
<div class="volume-video" id="volume-placement-3761" data-volume-placement="article" data-analytics-placement="article:middle" data-volume-id="4601" data-volume-uuid="e0613e8c4" data-analytics-label="Syria's war: A 5-minute history | 4601" data-analytics-action="volume:view:article:middle" data-analytics-viewport="video"></div>
https://www.vox.com/2015/11/24/9790990/turkey-russia-plane-shootdownMax Fisher