Article Five
Claire Berlinski, Ed. ·
April 9, 2012 at 1:52pm
Syrian forces seem to have fired across the border at Turkey today. The reports are still confused, but Turkish state television is reporting that two Syrian refugees were killed and eighteen people injured.
We're in different territory now--at least from the perspective of international treaty obligations.
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May '10
Re: Article Five
A far-off incident in (almost) the Balkans. What's to worry?
Mar '11
Re: Article Five
I'm no authority, but I think these grounds might be a bit flimsy to justify the claim that Turkey itself is under armed attack in a way that NATO would actually invoke Article 5 collective self-defense provisions.
Even if this incident were found to be sufficient to invoke Article 5, that in itself might not trigger a full scale intervention or armed effort to affect regime change in Syria, but could be found sufficient for a more limited (or even clandestine) armed response under the "such action as deemed necessary" clause.
Re: Article Five
Whether Turkey could--or would want--to invoke Article 5 here will be a matter of strategic calculation. But until now, the debate has been about whether a massive refugee crisis would rise to the level of an Article V situation (with the conventional wisdom being that it would not). Shooting across a border is obviously something else.
Apr '11
Re: Article Five
The situation seems to be getting more desperate. Do you know if Syrian rebels are organizing forces and people in refugee camps to send back into Syria? To me that would seem a logical thing to do, from a strategic point of view.
Mar '11
Re: Article Five
Yes, agreed.
As you've alluded to, Turkey has various incentives to think through under the present situation. A hardly comprehensive but useful list (feel free, all, to add to it): it best for a brand new NATO member to try to invoke Article 5 as a result of an incident of this magnitude? Will that be seen as a overreaction by other NATO nations? Will a large enough contingent of other NATO members agree and respond? What is the desired nature/scale of the response? Can the incident be handled at a lower or more appropriate level? What will the Syrian regime say for itself (will they spin this as some "rogue commander"? will they accept responsibility?) and how does that impact the calculus of how to respond?
Re: Article Five
There was a shooting on the Lebanese border today, too; a Lebanese journalist was killed.
Valiuth, I'm sure they are.
I'm not sure anything I can say would convey quite how desperate the situation is. The videos that are allegedly from this scene might.
Re: Article Five
Brand new? 1952? West Germany didn't join until 1955!
Mar '11
Re: Article Five
Statement retracted.
Mar '11
Re: Article Five
Most sincere apologies to our Turkish friends (and longtime allies :) )--confused date of full membership with launch date of the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative in a moment of haste.
Jun '10
Re: Article Five
Could this be used as the justification needed for direct NATO action against Syria? I believe some have been looking for an excuse.
Nov '11
Re: Article Five
Things would have to get a lot worse all around before NATO would intervene. The paper requirements of Article 5 are largely irrelevant, strike that, totally irrelevant, in light of Russian and Iranian machinations. If Article 5 ever is cited as a basis for NATO intervention, it will be as pretext, rather than as the actual reason.
The sad truth is, other than searching frantically for someone especially nasty to appease (e.g., Moo Slim Bros, Inc., and that ain't no fat free yogurt creamery) the current US administration doesn't have any idea, much less an actual plan, about how to deal with Syria . . . or Iran . . . or any place else. (How very nicely are things working out in Egypt and Lybia!?!?)
With the utility of fluffy rhetoric exhausted, the only reliable constant in US foreign policy for the last three years has been knee-jerk antagonism toward Israel. As for the rest of the world, Obama wishes it would quit bothering him so he could comfortably re-assume his fakey-modest, looking-down-the-nose-above-it-all posture of supreme-citizen-of-the-world Nobel-Peace-Prize-winning coolness.
Only God can save us now.
Oct '11
Re: Article Five
Keep us informed, and well said ASTONISHING..