Erdogan

The ongoing Turkish offensive in Syria, aimed at eradicating US ally Kurdish forces, has significantly strained the relationship between Washington and Ankara.
Turkey’s Afrin campaign follows Erdogan’s promise to “strangle” the US-backed Border Security Force (BSF) in Syria, risking a direct conflict with US troops operating on the ground with Kurds in Syria.
To make matters more complicated, Russian planes have been spotted overhead as the Turkish convoy drives through Idlib province.

(ANTIWAR.COM) — Turkey announced Monday that they are continuing to intensify their invasion of the Afrin District in northern Syria, a district held by the Kurdish YPG. Turkey began shelling the area on Friday, and invaded over the weekend.

Today, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has rebuffed US calls to cutain Turkey’s military offense in Afrin, Syria, citing Washington’s 17 year-long military occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq.

(GPA) — After over a week of cross-border shelling by Turkish artillery and then a flurry of airstrikes that allegedly took out 153 Kurdish targets, Turkey has finally begun sending ground troops across the Syrian border into Afrin. Afrin is currently under the control of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a group primarily led by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG).

This was predictable. The Duran has been stating now for over a year that Turkey’s Erdogan would never allow the Kurds to set up any sort of state, quasi-state, or (as Rex Tillerson outlined last week) a “Border Security Force” made up of Kurdish fighters.
The a Kurdish presence south of Turkey is a threat to Turkey’s very existence as a nation state. Erdogan will have no choice but to crush America’s BSF forces.
The question on Pat Buchanan’s mind is what will the US reaction be?

Once again, Turkey’s leader has thrown a spanner into the Astana peace process, as he dog whistles to the Muslim Brotherhood support base.
This week, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan performed yet another u-turn by declaring that Syrian President Bashar Assad is “a terrorist” during a news conference in Tunis.

Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan faces off against UAE minster Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahayan in latest Twitter war.
This latest diplomatic spat between newly formed Turkey-Qatar-Iran alliance and the US-backed Saudi-UAE-Israel (tentatively with Egypt on board) axis power bloc – is indicative of where some of the regional fault lines are at present.
You can be sure that the US, Israel and Britain will work to exploit these differences in order to gain whatever economic and geopolitical advantage they can from the discord.

Guilty pleas, watch the throne and penis-free politicians + this day in history w/Poppy Bush invades Somalia and our song of the day by Ron Gallo on your Morning Monarchy for December 4, 2017.

Turkish gold trader Reza Zarrab, who is also involved in Special Counsel Mueller's investigation, has been released from federal prison and given immunity, and will be the star witness at a trial over a scheme to evade U.S. sanctions against Iran. Federal prosecutors in New York will have Zarrab on the stand on Wednesday to testify against his former co-defendant, Turkish bank executive Mehmet Atilla.

Rouhani, Putin and Erdogan say the end of the war in Syria is at hand [PPIO]
The Presidents of Iran, Russia and Turkey have concluded a tripartite summit on Syria in Sochi and say there is a real chance for peace now that the Islamic State has been largely defeated.
With IS forces routed in Syria (and Iraq), a cessation of hostilities in full effect, and hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees returning home, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that there is a real chance a political settlement will end the seven-year civil war.