US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces announce campaign to liberate Raqqa from Islamic State

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) declared on Sunday the beginning of the Ghadab al-Firat, (Euphrate’s Anger) campaign.  The offensive will see nearly 30,000 soldiers, men and women, Kurds and Arabs, who will advance towards the Syrian city of Raqqa, the capital of Islamic State in Syria.

The SDF is a diversified army, but the Syrian Kurds YPG, the people’s protection units, are believed to be its backbone. The US declared that they have taken the decision to support the SDF, guaranteeing air support, as they did in 2015 during the battle for the liberation of Kobane.

The operation starts in the middle of the Mosul offensive, a major ongoing military operation which aims to reconquer the Iraqi capital of the Islamic State. The coordinated attack is undoubtedly a major blow for the Islamic State which is likely to lose its two major towns.

If they suffer defeat, it will be hard to for the terrorists organisation to continue to claim that they are a State and the even affect the moral of the remaining fighters. The US decision to support the Kurds might lead to strained relations with Turkey, a NATO member and the strategical starting point for many US-led military operations in Western Asia. Ankara have repeatedly stated that it won’t accept any major role for Kurds in the offensive against Raqqa.

Less than a month ago Turkey President Erdogan had signed a gas pipeline deal with his Russian counterpart, an event which indirectly meant a possible new closeness between the two countries. 

Turkish declarations are based on the fear that an eventual success will give the Kurds the international legitimacy to request an autonomous region located in the vast north Syrian region called Rojava which they control for the last two years after reconquering the region from the Islamic state. In case Syrian Kurds get the chance to present their request in Geneva and receive a positive answer, they will form a united region running all along the Turkish border.

The US support comes in a moment where Turkey is conducting a campaign of total aggression against many Kurdish citizens and organisations active on its soil, a move that has attracted fierce criticism from the international community.

Turkish authorities blocked internet services in the southern part of the country, where they have been carrying on bombings for months.  The co-leaders of the left-wing pro-Kurds People’s Democratic Party (HDP), Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag, have been arrested along with several other members of the party.

The announcement of an alliance between the US and the SDF for Euphrate’s Anger campaign leaves Turkey isolated in the fight against the Islamic State for the second time after the ban that the Iraqi Prime Minister posed on their participation to the Mosul offensive.

Just a few days before their elections, the US government chose the perfect timing to announce the attack,  managing to present themselves as the most active actor in the fight against the Islamic State.