Who struck the Turkish Armed Forces?

Investigations by the Turkish Armed Forces and intelligence units continue into the air strike on a Special Forces team positioned to the north of Al-Bab within the Euphrates Shield operation. Investigations are focussing on whether or not the coordinates of the team’s position were leaked. Military sources point out that it would have been impossible for Syria to have struck the Turkish special forces team in a night raid without this critical information having been passed on. Immediately after the strike, Air-Force Radar Command supplied top-level state administrators with on-site findings and the radar trace of the plane that conducted the raid. This includes radar records that show in detail the path taken by the plane that bombed the Al-Bab region.

‘Is there a leak?’

According to information obtained from military sources, the identity of the plane remains an enigma. This accounts for the comment, “A plane belonging to Syria is considered to have conducted the strike” that was made with reference to the bombing. The sources, indicating that such wording is reserved for situations that evade clarification, pointed out that a small number of planes remained at the Assad regime’s disposal and the number of planes capable of staging night operations was even smaller. The sources, stating that there was no way that the special forces’ position could have been detected by the Assad regime, pointed out that this raises the prospect of a potential leak or assistance by other actors who would have been capable of making such detection. The sources had the following to say about the lack of clarity: “The Assad regime all but lacks the systems needed to detect and pinpoint the target. Sophisticated equipment was needed to enable the position of the special team and the artillery elements close by to be detected. The planes at the regime’s disposal are most certainly not capable of providing close air support. This was a strike that could only have been staged if precise coordinates had been given or if the target had been pinpointed. This is not a strike that the regime could have staged without obtaining support.”