Turkish Military Poses Deadly Threat to 100,000 Christians in Syria; Seek U.S. Protection
“The main purpose for establishing NATO was to counter the threat of USSR / Communist expansion after World War II,” said Dr. Dilshod Achilov of the Department of Political Science, International Affairs And Public Administration East Tennessee State University. “The roots of accepting non-North Atlantic nations into NATO, mainly Greece and Turkey to begin with, lies at the heart of the Truman Doctrine — extending military and economic aid to states vulnerable to Soviet threat / expansion.”
At least 100,000 Christians in northeastern Syria are facing a Turkish attack that would end with genocide. The situation has prompted a Christian self-defense force to beg the American army for protection, according to a think-tank’s report..
A supporter of the Christian force, known as the Syriac Military Council (SMC), sent a message to Clarion Project asking for help. The SMC’s public statement says: “We urge the Christians in the U.S. to ask that the U.S. Army that is present in North-East Syria will not allow the Turkish army and jihadists to invade North-East Syria. Will the U.S. Army stand by idly while we are killed?”
Commander Aram Hanna, head of the Syriac Military Council, told the Clarion Project in a communique that the SMC has 3,000 members including a law enforcement branch called the Sutoro. SMC also includes a Christian female unit as well as Christians identifying as Syriacs, Assyrians, Chaldeans and Aremenians.
The Christians fought in the military campaign against the terrorist group the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), including the Battle of Raqqa.
The force expects to be targeted for destruction by the Turkish military and its jihadist proxies, putting the entire Christian population in the area “under direct threat” of genocide.
The Turkish Armed Forces (TAF; Turkish: Türk Silahlı Kuvvetleri, TSK) are the military forces of the Republic of Turkey. They consist of the Army , the Navy and the Air Force . The Gendarmerie and the Coast Guard , both of which have law enforcement and military functions, operate as components of the internal security forces in peacetime, and are subordinate to the Ministry of Interior .
“The current 100,000 Syriac/Assyrian Christians are the last few that are left [in the northeast]. They refused to leave their ancestral homeland. The ongoing genocidal mentality of Muslim radicals over the past 100 years has reduced us down to this small number,” SMC Commander Hanna said. An example of Turkey’s knack for genocidal operations was the destruction of Armenia when the Turkish government sided with Germany during World War 1 and was known as the Ottoman Empire.
Turkey considers the Syrian Democratic Forces—which includes the Syriac Military Council—to be an extension of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), an organization designated as a terrorist group by the U.S at the behest of Turkey.
The Islamist regime in Turkey openly aspires to destroy the Syrian Democratic Forces, a U.S.-backed coalition of Kurds, Christians, Arabs and others who control about one-third of Syria.
Johannes de Jong — the director of a European political organization connected to the European Christian Political Movement — writes that Christianity is spreading in the area run by the Syrian Democratic Forces. For example, a church in Kobane reopened after ISIS was defeated in the area and the majority of congregants are said to be converts.
“From my own observation and experience with this region since 2014, I know that the Syriac/Assyrian Christians as well as the Armenians are fully part of the government, military (SDF) and civil life … Even Aramaic has been restored for the first time since two millennia as an official language, as it is one of the four official languages,” de Jong told Clarion Project.
The area targeted for conquest by Turkey includes the population centers of the Christians and Kurds, as well as oil fields that the autonomous government relies upon for survival.
The planned Turkish offensive also endangers U.S. troops in the area who are working with the Syrian Democratic Forces to defeat ISIS and other terrorist groups.
In addition to the threat to U.S. troops, our allies and persecuted Christians, there are major national security consequences if Turkey is not stopped, according to officials at the Clarion Project:
2. Turkey will eliminate the U.S.’only ally in Syria.
As we have seen, air power alone cannot defeat or contain ISIS. Right now, there are four options vying for power in Syria (that is, if the U.S. doesn’t want to get involved in a long-term campaign including nation-building):
- The U.S.-allied Syrian Democratic Forces
- Al-Qaeda and like-minded terrorist groups
- Iranian puppets, including ISIS
- Islamist “rebels” like the Muslim Brotherhood and Wahhabists
3. Turkey will be strengthened as will Erdogan’s neo-Ottoman aspirations of creating a Turkish caliphate with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.
4. Iran will be strengthened. The Iranian-backed forces will conquer most of eastern Syria and its oil fields. The Syriac Military Council is opposed to the Assad regime, viewing that the Iranian-Assad regime and ISIS as two sides of the same coin.
5. A Turkish victory will be a major ideological defeat for the West.
The ideological war with Islamism cannot be won solely by defeating Islamist terrorists. It requires the success of ideologies that are not at war with the West and against Islamism. The autonomous Kurdish areas of Syria and Iraq have the potential to put Islamism on life support.
“What they [the Kurds] are doing in NE Syria is not just defeating ISIS. By implementing freedom and equality of women, freedom of religion and multi-ethnic governance, they are destroying the very fundamentals of jihadism. They are destroying the very culture of oppression which jihadism rests upon,” de Jong said.
