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On February 13, the Turkish Armed Forces (TAF) released a statement saying that 1,439 ‘terrorists’ had been neutralized since the start of Operation Olive Branch. The statement added that TAF airstrikes neuntralized 70 ‘terrorists’ in the overnight airstrikes on February 13.
The TAF is actively using its advantage in artillery, military equipment and aircraft to pound positions of the People’s Protection Units (YPG) in the Afrin area.
According to some sources, the TAF and the Free Syrian Army are not hurrying up to advance deeper into the YPG-held area and it uses the sitaution to destroy as much YPG fortifications, weapon depots and equipment as possible.
#YPG attack on #OperationOliveBranch forces from Jinderes district on #UAV camera.Aerial bombartment destroys the building which YPG vehicles are hiding.#Afrin pic.twitter.com/nD8ouYKiGU
— Cemal (@Acemal71) 13 February 2018
On February 13, reports also appeared that the TAF artillery had shelled the center of the city of Afrin. There is no info about the alleged casualties as a result of the shelling.
I think the Turkish government exaggerates a lot, maybe by a factor 10. When they say that they killed about 1439 terrorists, I believe that the real number may be rather in the order of 150 PKK (SDF-YPG) terrorists. When they say that 31 Turkish soldiers died, I believe that the real numbers may be rather in the order of 300 Turkish soliders killed.
Any proof? i dont think so. Even if they may exaggerate i think its not by 10 but more probably by 2 or 3, so in my opinion the real numbers should around 200-300.
I agree with Bru though. The Turks are advancing at a snail’s pace and are probably losing a lot more personnel then they are willing to admit. In order to justify this they are probably counting every dead civilian as YPG and every unsubstantiated claim of their pet Jihadis as true. So yeah, their kill numbers are probably insanely inflated. When you’re that incompetent in fighting your enemy, you’re probably even more incompetent in counting their dead.
Also, fixating on counting dead enemies is a piss poor way of working towards a victory goal. From the top of my mind the goal should be to either break the YPG as a military force, bring them to the negotiating table, or at the very least deny them the use of the Syrian/Turkish border region as an operating area by creating a proxy controlled buffer zone. Killing lots of them is only a means to those aim, but not the be all end all. The Germans tried that with the Red Army in WWII and to their horror discovered that no matter how many Red Army troops they killed or captured, more kept popping up. In essence the YPG is more of a guerilla force then a regular army, so you can’t defeat them with taking the odd village here and there and killing some of them. The Kurds are in it for the long haul and they’ll probably be willing to trade bodies if it means getting a lot of Turks killed as well. And I doubt that Erdogan can afford to get lots of Turks killed, otherwise he would not be clamping down as hard as he does on anyone who dares to express dissent.
You provided 0 argument as to how those numbers could be exaggrated.
Come on, kill numbers are ALWAYS exaggerated. Name one war where it wasn’t?
Again: – Shitty army that has been purged into incompetence – Shitty irregulars used as cannon fodder – Shitty new officers that want to please the Great Sultan from Ankara in order to avoid getting purged as well
That’s basically an ideal recipe for piss poor recordkeeping and cooking the books. Add to that that the Great Sultan from Ankara is apparently so insecure that he needs to throw people in jail who even dare to criticism the war I see nothing to suggest that anything the Turks say could be anything other then insanely inflated propaganda hogwash.
“Shitty” army. Who exactly was purged, do you know? And how exactly it affected the Turkish Armed Forces’ capabilities and operational effectiveness?
Come on, thousands of generals, colonels, majors and all sorts of officers get purged and it doesn’t have an effect on combat readiness and effectiveness? You only need to look at the Turkish army’s performance in Afrin and Euphrates Shield. Incredibly slow progress despite enjoying MASSIVE firepower advantage against light infantry. Turkish tanks that get shot to pieces because they are not properly supported by infantry. And the infantry they use is not even worth the name. Just FSA thugs. That is not a sign of a well performing army. That is a sign of an army that is clueless in how to wage war, because all the competent officers have been purged and replaced with green incompetent yes men. And that is giving the Turkish army the benefit of a pass because of Erdogan’s purges. Because the alternative is that they were always shite. In which case no wonder they could never really defeat the PKK.
I will start from your latest statement.
“In which case no wonder they could never really defeat the PKK.”
What do you mean by defeating PKK? Obiviously you lack information about PKK. First of all, let me tell you that the terrorist organisation’s name is KCK(Koma Civakên Kurdistan). PKK is KCK’s political party for Turkey. The guerillas Turkey is fighting are called HPG(Hêzên Parastina Gel) and HPJ(Hêzên Parastina Jinê). Obiviously HPG’s ranks are male while HPJ’s are female.
Where does exactly KCK is stationed as of now? It’s stationed in Qandil Mountains. Which are a set of colossal mountains deep in Iraq. Half of those mountains are in Iran. KCK’s PKK, recruits, trains and equipts its fighters in the villages and caves of this mountain system.
Those trained ones launch their attack on Turkey from there. So, ending PKK would mean an at least 300.000 thousand men marching deep into Iraq and part of Iran and completely removing everything there. Which is impossible without Iraq and Iran’s approval.
So you saying PKK is still not defeated not only portrays your lack of knowledge on this terrorist organisation’s structure but your lack of understanding of political and military stuation in the middle-east between Turkey, Iran, Iraq and KCK.
You can search the news; in the last 4 months; PKK(HPG/HPJ to be more prcecise) were able to launch only 4 attacks on Turkey. Because after Fethullah Gulen’s CIA slaves were kicked out of the country; an all out and comprehensive series of operations were launched against them. Now, once again( i say once again because what i will mention next happened a series of times), HPG/HPJ forces are beaten back to Iraq’s mountains.
Sadly most people does not understand anything about the failed coup attempt in Turkey. There are two types of generals/officers in any arm of the world. First type is the ACTUAL ones that gain their ranks with ACTUAL combat experience. The second type is the ones that gain their ranks by sitting at a table. The most ACTUAL officers/generals of TAF are belons to the 3rd army which is not a part of NATO and to the special forces units and constantly fights agains PKK=YPS=SDG for almost 40 years. But most so called “purged” ones are belongs to 1st and 2nd army and air forces which are NATO armies. Is this a coincidence? No this is exactly the reason for Turkish people believe the coup attempt was backed or known and disguised (does not matter) by US (But this is another story). And immediately after the coup attempt many of the ACTUAL generals and officers (which most of them are seculars) that are being held in prison due to false accusions and made up evidences by FETÖ public prosecutors and judges are released. Interestingly (not actually) the casualities against PKK=PYD=YPG=SGD are lowered drastically after the failed coup attempt. And many evidences of espionage for terrorists to weaken the goverment to help the coup was found. Therefore it seems the actual effectiveness of TAF was not lowered but increased significantly. And do you know who is the general of Operation Olive Branch? One of the released generals. The only doubt of weakining was air forces and thats why Olive Branch started wiht a massive (biggest in TAF history) air strike (72 fighters) in such a small are as Afrin. That was a message but it seem some people did not get it. Doesn’t matter the ones who matters understand this. Therefore Skagos donn’t try to explain any more. Tlthough they understand they will not accept the facts. Because this simply does not suit their interests.
Oh come on, Erdo-Führer-Fanboy, I told you bevor: 22 920 military personal had been sacked 6511 officers 16 409 cadets If this is not purging, what would you call purging? Seems like a big big spring clean – even if it was in summer ;-)
– In military strategy, it is admitted that the attacking side toll is generally abt 4 times higher than the defending side. Specially during the initial phase of the attack. – We are talking about Turkey here, a country where propaganda is the daily bread. – Except those figures, Turkish army provided no proof of the alleged Kurdish casualties. On 1500, they should be at least able to prove a few hundreds. So far, just the same pictures circulating again and again.
Again, you provided 0 meaningful arguments.
“In military strategy, it is admitted that the attacking side toll is generally abt 4 times higher than the defending side. Specially during the initial phase of the attack”
You are living in WWI. Unless its a war between 2 countries; no army will suffer such high casulties. What, do you think SAA suffered more casulties than FSA and ISIS during their 6 year long offensive against them? Absoulutely not. Because SAA had modern weapons, officers that knows how to use them and a somewhat capable air force.
“We are talking about Turkey here, a country where propaganda is the daily bread”.
Ok.
” Except those figures, Turkish army provided no proof of the alleged Kurdish casualties. On 1500, they should be at least able to prove a few hundreds. So far, just the same pictures circulating again and again”
TAF Command Center uses 0 viuals during their informative announcements. Are you hallucinating or something while reading TAF’s announcements?
Plain and simple : I have no proof neither that TAF figures are true, and you were unable to provide such. Im sure TAF would be gladly providing pictures of dead Kurds to support their statements but they dont have any.
How? One just counts any shot near a fighter as a kill shot, any bomb dropped as having x casualties and having enthusiastic untrained militia spouting wild claims and adding them all up.
I was thinking that too. With an obviously overwhelming firepower and taking there time Turks should have killed between 200-300 just as you said.
Last similar example I have in mind is the 4 days war between Armenians and Azeri Turks in Karabakh in April 2016. Azeris have announced officially 31 dead on their side, while most conservative figures from US State dpt and Russian sources put the figure 10 times higher at least.
Probably LIES. Let’s see the bodies like Syrian and Russians always show??? More like murdered civilians.
Its hard to figure out Erdogan,but just like the Russians,its better to fight and kill the terrorists that are supported by jewSA,inSYRIA,than have them come to your own Land later.
Logic would be enough proof that Turkey is lying. Usually there are several times more wounded than killed in a war. So some 1.500 killed would mean some 4 to 5 k wounded. Put together, some 5 to 6k out of action, which would mean some 60% of SDF numbers (as estimated by turks) out of action. No army can function anymore when 60% is out of action.
More like 143 if they mean killed
Kurd’s are the worlds most famous suicide bombers attacking civilians. They also blew up a suicide bomb at a football stadium filled with fans just a few short years ago.
The asault in Beşiktaş smells hell a lot like Bologna…
Real anti facist action, change your name to racist turk instead
In the 18th and 19th Century “The Turk” was a code phrase for inhuman monsters – based on the atrocities the Turkish Empire had inflicted on its ‘slave’ vassals- and its universal use of rape slaves. The Turkish Empire literally revolved around the normalisation of rape.
HOWEVER major Turks became modernisers during the 19th century, and wanted Turkey to join Modern West Europe and the USA. To put behind it medieval islamic practises. Eventual the crypto-jewish movement, The Young Turks, would oversee the final dismantling of the empire and the formation of modern Turkey- the same Turkey so desperate to become a member of the EU today.
But what did the cyrpto-jews known as the Young Turks do as their first act of true power? The Armenian Genocide, when the judaic team worked to exterminate a problematic CHRISTIAN sect that failed to properly bend the knee to judaism. Since that day, Israel and Turkey have been one. For sure sometimes Turkish leaders PRETEND animosity with Israel for appearance and politicing, but its just for show.
The kurds aren’t christians, of course, they are muslims who live and dress like modern christians. And this makes them a real problem to other, more fundamental, islamic sects. And the kurds have chunks of various regional nations, none of which want them to have a nation of their own.
The turks still desire to use 18th and 19th century methods to keep the kurds in their place. And Empire Powers act as fair-weather friends of the kurds when it suits them, not caring what happens to those kurds later down the line.
Turkey wants the Syrian government to gain full control over kurdish regions and prevent local regional para-military possibilities. But Turkey was previously the other major conduit of ISIS terror into Syria on behalf of the Deep State. Sadly you can trust Turkey as far as you can throw it.
Worse, just like Israel and the USA, Turkey shows depraved bloodlust in their military PR press releases where they gloat in the mass murder of forces that have done them near zero harm (if any), and imply the victims are ‘sub-Human’ scum. The official words of the Turkish, Israeli and American governments prove them to be demonic butchers.
More like 143 HAHAHA.
Some people can not phantom the facts even when the evidence is intruduced. In the first video (above), you can easily see your “lovely civillians” in jeans and sweaters while they are using their weapons (is that artillery?) on a vehicle. The armed drone does not attack immediately. Does not attack even when the other vehicle (the anti-air one) stops. Just follows the so called “civillians” to their burrow (pun intended) and ONLY THEN attacks. TAF reports as “3 targets neutralized” although there may be other “armed civillians” in the building. PKK=SDF=YPG announces as 10 “civillians” killed. The thing is; unlike some armchair generals suggested this is not a “convential” war. This is not a “trench” war. This is not even war. The organisation in Afrin is terrorists + some forcefully or emotionally(=$) armed civillians. And this organisation stopped wearing uniforms in the socond week of the operation. They are using tunnels, mines, booby traps and suicide bombers. And they are using these with rocks, toys and even deceased bodies of their comrades. Of course there are real civillians (and too many of them) in Afrin which are being used as human shields especially when they dont want to fight agains TAF. By the way, what does international laws say about “armed civillians without uniform and a responsible leader” and “suicide bombing” ? The thing is they do not protect anything incliding their own lifes. They fight because they believe they can gain international support by this “civillian murders” propaganda. But yes sadly civillians are dying everywhere in Syria. Still this is exactly what war is. Those who thinks game is real war also thinks that war is a game.
I’ll give this one to the Turks. For the first time they did something right and are taking their time on the Afrin operation in order to minimize casualties as their ground forces are crap. Though, the kurds have received many reinforcements… This battle is going to take a very long time, whoever finishes up their manpower and equipment first will lose.