The Syrian civil war, where two of the world’s largest military powers — Russia and the United States — are supporting opposite sides of the conflict, is now being seen, at least by Turkey, as the inevitable theater of the beginning of World War 3. That is, if the two nations cannot somehow come to terms and resolve the situation that has now been raging in Syria for five years.
The Daily Mail reported last week that, at least according to Turkey’s deputy prime minister, Numan Kurtulmus, there is little doubt that World War 3 will erupt between Russia and the United States over the Syrian war if that conflict cannot somehow be resolved. Kurtulmus made the foreboding comments soon after the U.S. pulled out of the ceasefire talks regarding the Syrian civil war.
To make matters worse, the U.S. also accused the Russians of the massive computer hack that has disrupted the Democratic Party during the 2016 presidential campaign. That was quickly followed by accusations that Syrians and Russians had committed war crimes in the fighting against Syrian rebels, the contingent supported by Turkey and the U.S.
Kurtulmus wasted no words equivocating.
“If this proxy war continues, after this, let me be clear, America and Russia will come to a point of war.”
And he did not stop there. He observed that the Syrian civil war had placed the world “on the brink of the beginning of a large regional or global war.”
His words echo those of diplomatic and military experts around the world. In fact, as the Inquisitr previously reported, the entire planet has been on edge since Russia entered the conflict in September 2015 to back the flailing Bashar al-Assad regime and presented the added danger of confrontations or accidents when its aircraft also took the skies, along with various Middle Eastern and coalition warplanes flying missions against ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria).
Although tensions have been high for some time, they’ve recently spiked around the attacks against Aleppo, which Syria — and, by extension, Russia — sees as a haven and launching area for Syrian rebels. The U.S. and its allies claim that Syria and Russia are needlessly attacking civilian targets, including refugees that have fled the war in other parts of Syria. Back in September, the Russians were accused of bombing a humanitarian convoy, which Russia immediately charged was a cover for hostile elements.
Syria and Russia maintain that all their targets are hostile, claiming that rebels or terrorists (the terms have become interchangeable from the Syrian government’s standpoint, as all anti-Assad factions are considered “terrorists,” although there has been some effort on Russia’s part to strike against ISIS targets) are legitimate targets and that the civilian casualties incurred have been an unfortunate byproduct of the missions.
The U.S. has also been caught up in these so-called unfortunate mistakes. Prior to the Russian bombing of the convoy, a U.S. raid hit a Syrian military installation, killing 62 Syrian Army personnel, according to Fox News . The U.S. quickly acknowledged its mistake, having aborted the mission as soon as it became known that the target hit was not supposed to be a target at all.
Accusations have been flying that the attacks — from both sides — have all been purposeful and statements made afterwards have been outright subterfuge and/or misdirection, the actions of the attackers falling under the category of plausible deniability.
Then there are the misunderstandings. Take, for instance, the diplomatic uproar created by a media report that the British Foreign Office would later say was “inaccurate.” The Inquisitr reported last week that the Russians demanded to see the British military attache for an official explanation after it was widely reported that British Tornado jets flying out of Iraq had been given the green light to shoot down any Russian aircraft acting in a hostile manner.
Initially, there had been hopes that the U.S. and Russia could somehow navigate the Syrian civil war situation with care and combine to help eliminate the ISIS caliphate that had claimed territory in both Syria and Iraq. And although ISIS has experienced a continuing series of defeats and is on the brink of being driven out of Iraq altogether, many of the attacks on the terrorist state have been the focus of accusations that the actual targets by Russian/Syrian-initiated attacks were Syrian rebels, and attacks carried out by the coalition were geared toward the Syrian government.
It is within this tangled web of distrust and deceit, accusation, and denial that the Turkish deputy prime minister’s words fall. And with all the saber-rattling going on with NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) and Russia in eastern Europe; Russian military threat on the Ukraine border; the economic sanctions connected to that and Russia’s globally-frowned-upon annexation of Crimea in 2014; Russian inroads in its relations with China, India, and Pakistan; and, as was reported by the Inquisitr , the increased militarization of Russia within the past decade, is there any doubt why the deputy prime minister feels that World War 3 between the U.S. and Russia is inevitable?
[Featured Image by William Potter/Shutterstock]