What's next for Turkey in Syria

The fall of Bashar al-Assad’s government in Damascus in just a matter of days was not entirely a surprise for Ankara.

The Syrian military had been offering little resistance, and senior Turkish officials had long seen Assad’s downfall as inevitable. However, no one predicted that the collapse of the Syrian government would happen so rapidly.

Turkish officials last month had only permitted a limited operation by Syrian armed opposition groups aligned with Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) to exert pressure on Assad and his Iranian allies.

Yet, they did not anticipate the sudden capture of Aleppo. The primary reasoning behind this operation was the repeated attacks by Syrian government forces on residential areas in Idlib, which regularly drove civilians toward the Turkish border.

The timing was also ripe. Russia was preoccupied with the war in Ukraine, while Hezbollah and Iran were focused on Israel.

Additionally, the United States was in a transitional period, with President-elect Donald Trump set to take office within a month. Ankara was considering a limited operation to secure the small but strategically important area of Tal Rifaat while HTS launched its offensive.

However, what began as a limited operation quickly escalated into a significant campaign, resulting in the capture of entire cities in just 11 days. This development has positioned Ankara as the most dominant force in Syria.

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