Evidence Shows Kurds Have Received MANPADS and TOWs
by Adel Karim
According to Al-Masdar, as part of a bargain struck on 15 January 2018, Kurdish YPG have received a shipment of MANPADS and TOWs from the United States to counter Turkish aircraft and armored vehicles to use if the situation deteriorates.
Obtaining intelligence data on the forthcoming Turkish offensive, the U.S. Special Operation Forces (USSOF) delivered these weapons well in advance in Afrin and handed them over to the Syrian Kurds.
This has been reported by Turkish president Erdogan. While addressing the audience in Elâzığ Province, he stressed that the Pentagon had sent weapons, including MANPADS, for further use against the Turkish AF and military hardware.
A number of independent Twitter activists have already confirmed the information. İbrahim Haskoloğlu has published information on weapons captured from Kurds in the cantonment of Afrin.
Another Kurdish Internet activist and witness, Ahmad Masih, twitted that Kurds are already equipped with about 100 MANPADS and TOWs and are ready to use them against Turkish armed forces at any moment.
Besides, a geopolitical and security analyst on MENA, Michael A. Horowitz, has published footage of YPG’s attack showing perfect use of a guided missile to target a Turkish tank. As a result, the vehicle was destroyed.
The news about Kurds supplied with MANPADS and TOWs regularly appeared before. For instance, some field units closely linked with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK, so hated by Erdogan) published video footage in May 2016 showing a downed Turkish helicopter.
Massive use of MANPADS and TOWs by Kurds hasn’t been recorded to date. Possibly it is because USSOF hasn’t trained enough Kurdish specialists yet. Instead, initiating the Operation Olive Branch and invading Syrian Kurdish-controlled territory, Ankara just pre-empted the US.
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Perhaps turkey should call on its NATO allies the next time it’s forces are attacked?!
Concerning Afrin: everyone knows that NATO has a “collective defense” Article 5 …how is that impacted when the two proxy warring parties are both NATO allies ? Turkey pits the FSA (al Nusra) against the US-backed SDF (PKK): Trump warns Erdogan to “exercise caution” so that he can get on and train his 30,000 terrorist border guard …and the whole potentially escalating shooting match is ironically named “Olive Branch.” It gets to a point in the psychoses of foreign policy when there is no longer a need to comment?
Article 5 is out the window in MENA today and concerning the Turkish military which is anything BUT a typical Ruritanian miniature NATO-EU army.
Reports on the ground say that Turks are flying Afrin-bound planes out of Incerlik, and US forces are flying supplies for Afrin (and points east & southeast) out of Incerlik.
So the US continues to stoke conflicts in the world while preaching peace to others.
Clearly this indicates NATO is a joke and far from offering security to Europe serves as patsy for US geopolitical interests. POTUS twitter has turned out to be another marionette for the murderous military industrial complex of America.
As Pinter commented “Brutal, scornful and indifferent”.
Surely it is time to stop this endless march to Armageddon.