Ankara and Washington: It’s a New Deal

As Ankara is pushing Washington to hand over Fethullah Gulen, the man accused of orchestrating a failed July 15 coup in Turkey, Radio Sputnik’s Loud & Clear host Brian Becker discusses with former CIA analyst Ray McGovern the new relations between the two long-term allies.
Turkey’s Justice Minister Bekir Bozda traveled to the United States on Tuesday, for talks with U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch, primarily seeking the extradition of cleric Gulen. In McGovern’s view, Ankara should not expect that Washington will forcibly extradite the former ally of Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan.
‘ wants to have a pretext to dissociate themselves with the United States, not going to be bowing before you on things like Iraq’s Mosul and Syria’s Aleppo, both of which Erdogan seems still to consider parts of his Grand Ottoman Empire he would like to reestablish,’ asserted the analyst on Loud & Clear program.
Larry Galearis, who provided this sputniknews.com story/audio interview, had this to say about it…”Finally someone is discussing what Turkey is doing in Syria. And I agree with Ray here that Turkey’s interests are not necessarily in line with Russia’s or Syria’s or Washington’s. On the topic of a Turkish declaration of NATO Article 5, if Russia shoots down a Turkish aircraft up to no good in Syria, Ray did not clarify whether a NATO invading another country would neuter Article 5 as it is an aggressor nation in Syria. But note that the Russians were very clear about what its response would be to even unknown aircraft (IFFs can be turned off); they would be shot down. Nobody was talking about this in the American press, but unofficially that is a “no fly zone”. And so far both Turkey and Washington is taking it seriously. But Ray’s last comment about how the “cowboy” elements in the DOD could try to test out the this red line. That nobody is talking about this (MSM) is actually a sign that Washington is taking this seriously.
But the way Carter ended the ceasefire and the Russian unofficial no-fly zone imposed has essentially very much limited Washington’s military responses in Syria and I still wonder why Carter is still head of the DOD…..Perhaps he needs to show he can be on Hillary’s team too and knows he is protected?

This post was published at Sputnik News