Erdogan Rebukes Iraqi Prime Minister, Vows to Join Mosul Fight

(Bloomberg) -- Turkey’s top officials said their military will join a planned operation against Islamic State fighters in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan dismissed protests from Baghdad with a string of insults on national television.

“You are not my interlocutor, you are not at my level, you are not my equivalent, you are not of the same quality as me,” Erdogan said, referring to Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi. “It is not important at all that you are screaming in Iraq, we will do what we know. You should first know your boundaries.”

Erdogan’s vow to have his forces actively engage in the Mosul fight would be the second time in as many months that Turkey puts its NATO ally, the U.S., in an awkward position. Turkish forces flowed into Syria to retake the border town of Jarablus last month, with tanks and armored units advancing toward militant-held areas northwest of Aleppo. That prompted the U.S. to ask Kurdish militias allied with Washington to withdraw.

Erdogan’s comments prompted a quick retort from al-Abadi, who said on Twitter that “we are not your enemy and we will liberate our land through the determination of our men.”

Turkey deployed troops at the Bashiqa training base near Mosul at the end of 2014. The deployment was in response to invitations from the central Iraqi government, Erdogan said Tuesday. Iraq has since demanded their withdrawal.

"All of Iraq’s neighbors need to respect Iraqi sovereignty and territorial integrity,” U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby told reporters in Washington Tuesday when asked about Erdogan’s comments. “We want Iraq and Turkey to work this out together through dialogue.”

Staging Ground

Liberating Mosul is a key strategic and symbolic goal for Iraq and the U.S.-led coalition fighting Islamic State: It was the first major Iraqi city claimed by the group and it’s where its leader declared his so-called caliphate. A defeat of the terrorist forces there, along with continuing setbacks in neighboring Syria, would deprive Islamic State of a key staging ground and claim to legitimacy.

Turkey warned of the danger if Sunni-dominated Mosul is liberated by Shiite troops, which form the base of the Iraqi military. Premier Binali Yildirim said that attempts to change the “demographic structure of Mosul after Daesh is taken out would spark a big civilian and sectarian war.” Daesh is another acronym for Islamic State.

Similar fears floated before earlier battles against Islamic State forces in the Iraqi city of Fallujah -- traditionally a Sunni stronghold -- and elsewhere in the country largely haven’t been realized, though abuses were reported.

UN Role

Iraq on Tuesday said it will continue working with the United Nations Security Council to stop Turkey’s interference in its affairs, the Kurdish newspaper Rudaw reported, citing the office of Al-Abadi.

Complications will abound before and after the fall of Islamic State in the city, Robert Rabil, a professor of political science at Florida Atlantic University, said by e-mail last month. “The worst scenario is open warfare among all parties if no prior agreement is concluded.”

Iraq has long pushed back at the presence of Turkish troops in or near its territory.

The first leaders of the Turkish republic, founded in 1923, sought to include the Iraqi cities of Kirkuk and Mosul within its borders. Turkey abandoned its claim to the territory in 1926, but it has continued to seek influence there. The Turkish army has stationed a tank battalion near the Iraqi frontier town of Bamerni for almost two decades, and has frequently sent planes and troops across the border to target the separatist Kurdish PKK, which used the region as a springboard for attacks in Turkey’s southeast.

To contact the reporters on this story: Selcan Hacaoglu in Ankara at shacaoglu@bloomberg.net, Nick Wadhams in Washington at nwadhams@bloomberg.net. To contact the editors responsible for this story: Bill Faries at wfaries@bloomberg.net, Alaa Shahine at asalha@bloomberg.net, Mark Williams