In the past year Turkey has occupied north-eastern Syria, punched deep into Iraq and intervened in Libya’s civil war
has close ties with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party , a separatist Kurdish group in Turkey. So when America pulled out in October, Turkish troops moved in, backed by local Arab rebels. Together they pushed the Kurds out of much of their statelet. Turkey now occupies a 30km-deep strip in Syria extending for 145km along their border.in the Kurds’ autonomous region in northern Iraq. Turkey says it has “neutralised” over 1,400 Kurdish fighters in Iraq and Syria this year.
Turkey is now a force to be reckoned with along a 600-km stretch of the Mediterranean. It controls an airbase in al-Watiya, close to Libya’s border with Tunisia. Its frigates protect Libya’s coast in the west. Some say Mr Erdogan is trying to turn the eastern Mediterranean into a Turkish sea. Does Turkey have staying power? Its armed forces may already be stretched thin, having lost thousands of officers to show trials and purges in the past decade. And its adventurism isn’t cheap. Its operations in Syria alone cost up to $3bn a year, says Nihat Ali Ozcan of, a think-tank. But Mr Erdogan focuses on the benefits. Qatar, for example, has gone on an investment spree in Turkey.
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