Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu summarized Turkey’s fight against the PKK in 2018 in an assessment delivered to parliament in November: “We conducted 87,838 operations against the PKK and [killed] 1,289 terrorists. Our field operations over the past two years have gone up three times compared with earlier periods. With our field pressure, the PKK’s armed attacks — which reached 965 in 2017 — declined to 677 in 2018, while their [land]mine and improvised explosive device attacks were reduced to 148 from 250.”

Soylu further stated, “The decline in armed clashes is especially significant as it shows their loss of attack capability. Also, the number of terrorists in Turkey, which had been around 2,500, decreased by 69%, to around 750-880. The organization's recruitment is now at its lowest in 30 years. In 2015, 3,881 people joined the organization; the number last year was a meager 95.”

Soylu credited the decrease in the number of Kurdish fighters to a significant increase in the operational mobility of Turkish security forces and the resulting increased pressure on the PKK. The declining ranks of the PKK also suggest reduced interest in joining the organization. Soylu claimed that the PKK has almost reached the end of the line in Turkey.

Defense Minister Hulusi Akar told the state-owned Anadolu Agency October that the PKK had some 17,000 fighters in Turkey (750, or 4%), northern Iraq (3,000, or 18%) and northern Syria (13,000, or 78%). Akar perked up ears when he said the struggle with the PKK would not end until the PKK presence is eradicated in northern Syria. Obviously, Ankara is watching the group’s transfer of its military strength, logistics and training operations in bulk to northern Syria.

After a nearly two-and-a-half-year cease-fire during the Kurdish-Turkish peace process, intense fighting had resumed in July 2015. Toward the end of 2015, clashes in southeastern Turkey had basically devolved into trench-barrier warfare, while western metropolitan centers, including Ankara and Istanbul, became primary targets of both the PKK and the affiliated Kurdistan Freedom Hawks.

In 2017, after trench-barrier warfare ceased, clashes shifted back to rural areas. The following year, 2018, turned out to be much calmer than the two preceding years. Was the calm and the decline in PKK activities because the organization has lost its punch in Turkey or because the group strategically opted not to launch attacks?

Both reasons are likely at play. In other words, the PKK's relative inactivity in 2018, as noted by Turkey's interior and defense ministers, is due to the pressure of incessant security operations as well as a conscious decision to forego attacking major cities.

Turkish security forces did not cutback their efforts against the PKK despite their substantial duties abroad and ongoing domestic efforts against the Gulenist network, which is accused of plotting the botched coup in 2016 and is considered a terrorist organization by Turkey. Turkish security forces are continuing fast-paced pre-emptive efforts in Turkey and northern Iraq, not merely reacting to “non-stop operations.”

In the meantime, precision air strikes by Turkish F-16s are seriously limiting the ability of PKK fighters to enter and leave Turkey. Of course, an ever-increasing number of drones contributes significantly to reconnaissance, surveillance and precision targeting. Soylu said the police and gendarmerie have 37 in operation, and in the next two years, 70 more will be added to the inventory.

According to a defense expert who spoke to Al-Monitor on the condition of anonymity, the number of flight hours in 2018 for unmanned aerial vehicles was seven times more than during the previous year. Turkey also sharply increased its attacks against PKK leaders that year. According to the Ministry of Interior, some 1,700 PKK militants were taken off the battlefield. This figure encompasses those killed or captured and those who surrendered. About 110 (7%) of those were from the list of top leaders, a much higher number than ever before.

That same year, 141 Turkish soldiers, gendarmerie and paramilitary village guards were killed and wounded in operations against the PKK in Turkey. Despite increased operations in 2018, Turkish casualties that year were lower than in 2017, with 270 casualties, because of the increased use of drones and developments in human intelligence and signal intelligence.

I have never before heard of the number of PKK fighters in Turkey dropping below 2,000. Given that the official estimate for 2018 is around 700 to 800, why hasn't the PKK sent in 1,200-1,300 more forces to preserve its area of domination? Why didn't the PKK reinforce its mountain presence in 2018 to sustain its initiative inside Turkey? According to Turkish officials, the PKK has sufficient military strength in northern Iraq and Syria for such a reinforcement. In addition, despite the blows the PKK received in urban areas, it has been able to preserve its strength in that sector. It could have transferred forces to rural terrain, so why didn’t it?

It appears to have been a strategic choice by the PKK's command in the Qandil Mountains, in northern Iraq. The command currently views Turkey as a secondary front, giving priority instead to northeastern Syria. Although PKK clashes with the Islamic State (IS) have basically ended, it's significant that the PKK has not shifted its forces from northeastern Syria to northern Iraq and Turkey.

It is not unreasonable to assume that this strategic choice reflects the PKK’s promises to the United States that the PKK-affiliated Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units not use US-supplied weaponry and equipment inside Turkey. Moreover, the PKK doesn’t want to resort to violence in western Turkey because it might endanger the growing prestige and positive image it has created abroad in its struggle against IS.

The reality is that according to Ankara’s official figures, 13,000 of the PKK’s total 17,000 combatants are in northern Syria. What Ankara wonders now is whether those 13,000 will be demobilized and disarmed after the clashes with the conclusion of fighting against IS at Baghouz or whether they will remain active in northern Syria. The answer is likely to be determined by bargaining among the United States, Turkey and PKK headquarters in the Qandil Mountains.

Al-Monitor

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