VEKİLLİKTEN ÇATIŞMAYA, ÇATIŞMADAN ORTAKLIĞA: PKK-SURİYE İLİŞKİLERİNİN DEĞİŞEN KARAKTERİSTİĞİ
Sarı, Buğra
PKK-Suriye ilişkileri 1980 yılında terör örgütü mensuplarının Suriye’de ağırlanmasıyla başlamıştır. 1980’den Ekim 1998’e kadar PKK-Suriye ilişkileri Suriye rejiminin izni ve denetimde sürmüştür. Bu dönemde terör örgütü rejimin Türkiye’ye karşı yürüttüğü vekâlet savaşı dâhilinde faaliyet göstermiştir. Bu doğrultuda Suriye sahası daha kuruluş yıllarından itibaren PKK’nın örgütsel yapılanma, eleman, lojistik ve finans temini ve operasyonel kabiliyeti açısından kilit bir role sahip olmuştur. Ekim 1998’de Türkiye’nin askerî müdahale tehdidinin ardından Suriye rejimi ülkesinde PKK’nın faaliyetlerini yasaklamış ve terör örgütüne karşı harekete geçmiştir. Takiben Suriye rejimi, ülkesinde PYD yapılanması adı altında faaliyetlerine devam eden PKK mensuplarına karşı tutuklamalar gerçekleştirmiştir. B...
The Struggle for Syria: Strategic Rivalry and the Risks of Escalation
Sarı, Buğra | Kırışık, Avnihan
This article investigates the rivalry between Turkey and Israel over Syria, which has intensified since the ouster of Bashar al-Assad in December 2024. The two states have pursued conflicting security objectives, becoming principal actors in Syria's shifting political landscape. Ankara seeks to combat groups affiliated with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, build up a friendly regime in Damascus, and establish a lasting military presence. By contrast, Israel aims to secure its northern border by creating a buffer zone against the new Islamist government and targeting Iran-linked infrastructure. These conflicting strategies have raised the risk of proxy violence or even direct confrontation, especially in key areas like Quneitra, near the Golan Heights, and Druze-inhabited areas i...
Not only Relational but also Structural: Revisiting the Resolution of the 1998 October Crisis through Elements of Structural Power
Sarı, Buğra
The 1998 October Crisis between Turkey and Syria has long been studied in various aspects. However, these studies are limited to an understanding that depicts the crisis as a relational power relationship in which Turkey forced Syria to cease its support for the PKK, which Syria would not have done otherwise. While not rejecting the relational explanation, this paper attempts to complement it with a structural approach, drawing on the post-positivist structural power conceptualization, by investigating how Syria’s structurally shaped subjective interests in the post-Cold War international structure and norms regarding international terrorism disempowered it resisting Turkey’s demands.
The Struggle for Syria: Strategic Rivalry and the Risks of Escalation
Sarı, Buğra | Kırışık, Avnihan
This article investigates the rivalry between Turkey and Israel over Syria, which has intensified since the ouster of Bashar al-Assad in December 2024. The two states have pursued conflicting security objectives, becoming principal actors in Syria's shifting political landscape. Ankara seeks to combat groups affiliated with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, build up a friendly regime in Damascus, and establish a lasting military presence. By contrast, Israel aims to secure its northern border by creating a buffer zone against the new Islamist government and targeting Iran-linked infrastructure. These conflicting strategies have raised the risk of proxy violence or even direct confrontation, especially in key areas like Quneitra, near the Golan Heights, and Druze-inhabited areas i...
The Roots of the Soviet-Syrian Alliance: A Neo-Gramscian Perspective
Akgüden, Muhterem & Atmaca, Ayşe Ömür
The Soviet and Baath regimes enjoyed a consensual relationship between the 1940s and the 1980s. The nature of this relationship was shaped both by the need for an alliance in a period of Cold War bipolarity and by shared common ideological worldviews such as anti-imperialism and socialism. These relations were not free from pragmatism to a certain extent, as the degree of commitment to socialism and Pan-Arabism within the Baath Party sometimes fluctuated. Nevertheless, the generally close relationship between Syria and the USSR cannot be seen as a purely pragmatic strategy; rather, this relationship's ideational, institutional, and material dimensions must be considered as a whole. In this context, this article examines Soviet-Syrian relations from the perspective of neo-Gramscian heg...