Turkey is not making a distinction between the PYD/YPG and PKK. Prof Henri Barkey pointed out that Turkish govt press & papers that back Erdogan routinely say that PKK, PYD & YPG are all the same and that they are a bigger threat than IS. The only time the Turks try to make this distinction is when they talk to the U.S. and you can guess why.
There are words, and there are actions.
Surely, for public consumption at home, Erdogan (don't worry: I'm not trying to defend him) is making no difference between the PKK and the PYD (YPG is the armed wing of the latter).
And he's got not only 'a few good reasons' to do so: the PYD/YPG-conglomerate is de-facto led by the PKK-cadre that used to cooperate with Assadists before the PKK was 'disbanded', three years ago, after which they all fled to Syria. Through the last three years they have assasinated, executed, liquidated or forced into exile any concurent Kurdish leader in Syria in order to establish 'their' PYD/YPG as a 'representative for all the Kurds in Syria'.
They are actually still collaborating with the Assad regime, and not the least interested in supporting other insurgent factions in Syria (though it finds it fine when these are supporting it).
So, considering history of their leaders, and what are they doing... why should it be surprising the PYD/YPG ended on at least the Turkish list of terrorist organizations?
But, this does not mean that Turkey is now going to start bombing US- (and FSyA-) supported YPG units fighting the Daesh around Hassaka. Even less so it's going to drive its Army into northern Syria in order to conquer the area presently controlled (primarily) by the PYD/YPG.
New Chatham House paper on Turkey's entry into IS war. Concludes Ankara wants to establish hegemony over Syrian Kurds rather than fight IS and any safe zone created in northern Syria would probably be used by anti-western jihad groups who want to fight Assad rather than IS.
http://www.chathamhouse.org/expert/c...N25HY,CSLXQ,1#
'Anti-Western Jihad groups who want to fight Assad'...?
Yeah, everybody in the West and his/her next kin, 'knows' that not only Syria, but all the countries in the Middle East are predominantly populated by exactly such elements: crazy hordes of extremist Islamists that want nothing else but to be anti-West and to go fighting Assad...
...like JAN, which pledged allegiance to al-Qaida, but can't stop declaring no intention to go fighting Jihad in the West, and is fighting Assad at every opportunity...
...or like the IF, which has nothing to do with al-Qaida, and fights Assad above everything else...
...or all the different moderate groups, which are still there and still more numerous despite everybody's - really everybody's: Assad's, Daesh's, JAN's, and even Western - sternous efforts to exterminate them...?
...and let me guess what comes as next: 'logical next step' would be to sell - or better: donate - B-52s to Israel, so it can better 'defend' itself... because it is ah-so-well-known that Israel is the only US 'friend' in the Middle East and all the time doing precisely what the USA says and what is in US interest... just like it's clear that continous blanc support for corrupt theological dictatorships like that in Saudi Arabia is certainly going to result in them help establishing democracies in such countries like Syria or Yemen...
Bottom line: throw the facts and logic out of the window. Who cares? It's since long that common sense is anything but common.
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