Biden has treacherously shown what his real legacy is: bringing back perpetual wars, creating chaos through bribery and corruption, financing coups, unfreezing dormant conflicts and playing one against the other.

Within two weeks of the election of Donald Trump, outgoing US President Joe Biden took an extremely disruptive step in international relations, pushing the conflict in Ukraine to a much more dangerous level by authorising Kiev to use American long-range missiles against Russian territory, a rogue move certainly intended to hinder the détente his successor had announced.

As if that weren’t enough, a week later, Turkey (the largest NATO army in Europe) launched an offensive in neighbouring Syria through intermediaries led by HTS*, the former Al-Nusra Front*, effectively tearing up the Astana agreements with Moscow and Tehran on its role in Syria. Towards the end of the Biden administration, two major escalations took place in the two largest military conflicts taking place today, in Ukraine and the Middle East, both geographically separated by Turkey, which has now entered the scene.

At whose behest?

It would be naive to think that Erdogan took the initiative to stage the invasion of Syria without the support, or at least the acquiescence, of the Americans, the British, the Israelis and the Europeans. Organising, training and arming tens of thousands of men on Syrian territory under his authority or in Turkey itself is an operation that requires logistical and intelligence coordination between various state and non-state entities.

Anatolia is the Eurasian axis par excellence, where three tectonic plates meet (the Eurasian, the African and the Arabian). Geographically, Turkey has always been an asset to NATO, particularly in the Caucasus and Central Asia. This is where the natural spaces of Turkish projection and influence collide with those of Russia. For decades, NATO has tolerated Turkey’s neo-imperial ambitions, especially during the Erdogan era, even if they have historically been anti-Western. This is a strategic asset that the Atlanticists are saving for the right moment.

In reality, Turkish nationalism has been expressed in these regions since the early 1980s, and in the 1990s, with the vacuum left by the post-Soviet chaos, its influence spread and the Turan project was revived, which is now very visible in the form of the Organisation of Turkic States. But Turanism isn’t Ankara’s only asset. On the one hand, the Turkish diaspora in Europe, on the other hand the Islamic charity and educational network that Turkey manoeuvres in Africa, and on the other hand the military expansion with several bases in a good dozen countries in Europe, Africa, the Caucasus and the Middle East, shape Turkey’s aspirations to project power in the world.

The crossroads of the Levant

The reactivation of the Syrian civil war, or even the dismemberment of the country, is full of contradictions, unlikely alliances and unclear objectives, but also the hidden but known interests of a number of external actors who have been trying to take over the country since 2011.

It serves Israel well, after more than 40 years of occupation of the Golan Heights, which are legally Syrian. Tel Aviv could extend its dominance in the area in the face of a Syria that is likely to be dysfunctional and without an army. Netanyahu’s regional escalation is also his way out of the mess he got himself into over a year ago in Gaza and Lebanon, while he waits for the new US administration, full of Zionists in foreign policy positions.

Coincidentally or not, the hordes of jihadists took over Syria the day after the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah was announced. It should come as no surprise that behind this episode lies a tacit pact between Ankara and Tel Aviv to eliminate Iranian influence from the region.

The US role is more nebulous. Officially, it didn’t make a statement until the final fall of Assad. But it’s also a role that doesn’t need clarity because it’s the only power that has allowed itself to occupy Syria since 2014, especially with clandestine military bases in the centre-south and east of the country, justifying this blatant international illegality with the flimsy excuse of being able to “fight ISIS*”.

In reality, the US is ensuring a strategic military presence with an eye on Iran and Russia, which will certainly be formalised with the next phase in Syria. In addition, Washington has several major players on the ground, such as the Kurds of the SDF, who control the north, and the Free Syrian Army, which confronts them.

On the other hand, the leader of the HTS, Abu Muhammad al-Julani, who now controls most of the territory, spent five years in US prisons in Iraq (including the notorious Abu Ghraib). Al-Julani will surely be the most important and valuable asset for American interests in this proxy war.

But what have the Western powers given Erdogan to make him take the initiative to conquer Syria? What is the bargaining chip? Is the new Syrian government willing to give up the Russian base in Tartus, or is its removal one of NATO’s conditions for Erdogan? What about Palestine and the genocide in Gaza? Will Lebanon follow the possible fragmentation of Syria?

Who will form the new government, and what will be its vision for the future? Will there be an energy agreement between Ankara, Baku and Brussels? What will happen to trade, energy and infrastructure relations between Turkey and Russia? Will Turkey still be a candidate for the BRICS? Many big questions have been asked.

Syria and Ukraine, the same conflict

The most worrying aspect of the current scenario is that the two ongoing conflicts, surrounded by volatile regions, are moving closer together. The HTS, brought to Syria by Ankara, has been in Ukraine learning new combat tactics and night attacks from Kiev troops using advanced drones supplied by Qatar.

Unlike the Emirates and Saudi Arabia, Qatar has never sympathised with the Assad government after it took over Aleppo. Among the members of the Arab League, Qatar, an ally of Turkey (which has a naval base in Doha), is the only Arab country that has consistently sided with the Syrian Salafist opposition since 2011.

After Erdogan’s move, Russia will not be able to accept a freeze in military activity on its borders, lest it see the enemy rearm. It is therefore impossible to expect a ‘Minsk 3’ for the Trump era. In any case, an understanding between Russia and the US is necessary. After such a dark four years of the Biden administration, which brought war again to Europe and the Middle East, there is certainly hope for better relations between the world’s two largest military powers. An escalation of the conflict in Ukraine is unthinkable.

More immigration for a Europe in recession

For Europe, the current situation in Syria is terrible because it opens up new prospects for hundreds of thousands more refugees, depending on how the situation in Syria develops. Assad’s Syria was a dictatorship, just like Gaddafi’s Libya, but it provided a stability that is no longer guaranteed.

The ‘melting pot’ that Europe’s major cities have become after 20 years of perpetual US wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria also has the potential to bring the inter-community and inter-ethnic problems of the Middle East onto European soil at a time of recession, as is the case in Germany.

With this move, Turkey has opened the game and shown that it wants to compete with Russia for its sphere of influence. Erdogan has taken on the destabilising role his external superiors have assigned him. Erdogan’s alignment with Western designs in Syria opens a rift in relations with Moscow and should be seen as a declaration of intention.

War on multipolarism

The Syrian war, which has all the makings of a protracted affair, is also a far-reaching move against the BRICS, since Turkey was one of the main candidates for membership of the organisation. The control of this strategic region, which is increasingly in the domain of the Silk Roads and the BRICS, is now entering a period of predictable instability. Indeed, the very strange Hamas attack in October 2023 took place in the middle of the new members of the group (Egypt, Ethiopia, the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Iran), and launched a war on the region along the lines of the ‘creative destruction’ advocated by the neoconservative think tanks.

Just when everything was getting ready for a new US administration that seemed at least minimally pragmatic and willing to engage in dialogue and put an end to the Ukrainian conflict, and to the joy that for the first time in three years a Western statesman was uttering the word ‘peace’, Biden has treacherously shown what his real legacy is: bringing back the eternal wars, creating chaos through bribery and corruption, financing coups d’état, unfreezing dormant conflicts and playing one against the other. An old practice of those who can’t compete with economics, trade and diplomacy and think they can with wars.

*- banned in the Russian Federation

Ricardo Nuno Costa ? geopolitical expert, writer, columnist, and editor-in-chief of geopol.pt. Courtesy

https://journal-neo.su/2024/12/09/ukraine-turkey-syria-and-bidens-greatest-legacy-war/