A momentous shift in the war against ISIS happened, when the Turkish air force started bombing Islamic State positions in Syria. In a cruel twist of irony, the former Ottoman caliphate finally went to war to the current declared caliphate.

Turkey's hand was apparently forced after a suicide bombing in Suruc, which killed around 30 people, mainly secular Kurdish students gathering to organize aid for their brethren, in the newly-liberated city of Kobane, where vicious street fighting saw ISIS forces beaten back by the Kurdish Peshmerga backed by the American air campaign.

Opposition press went ballistic, accusing Turkish Islamist President Erdogan of complicity in the rise and spread of ISIS, and Kurds rioted in every major cities, protesting against alleged government impotence. Tension was heightened when a Turkish soldier was killed in a cross-border firefight with the Islamic State.

At the time of writing, Turkey has already conducted three waves of bombing targeting IS militants in Syria and Kurdish forces in Iraq.

This situation is symbolic for several reasons. First of all, it implies a failed aspiration on Turkey's part. When Erdogan first won election, his Islamist AKP party vowed to follow a good neighborly policy with neighboring states, regardless of the political, social and historical baggage Turkey might share with them. Turkey was also aspiring to join the European Union at that time.

However, in reality the exact opposite happened. Turkey began moving towards creeping Islamism, regular arrests of Kurdish and other opposition, and a complete dismantling of the secular republic founded by Kemal Ata Turk. With the start of the Arab Spring, the Turkish government also found itself in a confused diplomatic conundrum, with conflicting pulls between traditional NATO allies, realist allies such as the secular Assad (Syria) and Mubarak (Egypt), and ideological brethren of moderate influence, including the Muslim Brotherhood and Free Syrian Army.

Turkey, as an erstwhile colonial power in the region, was uniquely poised as a Muslim power, to take a leading role in shaping the post Arab Spring Middle East. However, Turkey, to the surprise of many, chose to sit out the fight when it started.

This new problem for Turkey is completely self-created. Turkey decided that it could play PKK and other secular Kurdish militias against the ISIS, and stay out of the fight. The diplomatic gamble backfired. Turkey's reluctance in joining the American-led coalition against ISIS seemed to infer support for the Caliphate, and her reliability to the NATO alliance was called into question.

Not a single shot was fired from the Turkish side, when Kobane was surrounded by Islamic State and the threat of massacre loomed, despite repeated calls from the U.S. and other countries. Ultimately, it took the Kurdish peshmerga from Iraq to cross over and defeat the Islamic State and secure Kobane, with heavy American bombing. The joint operation bolstered American respect for the Kurds as the one true local force capable of confronting the Islamic State. With discussions in American media about arming the Kurds, Turkey had only itself to blame.

Turkey has been forced to acknowledge that putting one's head in the sand, hoping everything will be alright in the end, can never replace solid strategy. Another significant development is Turkey allowing United States to use its airbases just 60 km north of Syrian border.

After months of tense negotiations, reluctant Turkish leaders agreed to the American request, a development termed as "game changing" by American defense officials. This deal, which was sealed hours before Turkey started pounding ISIS positions, will enable American fighters and drones to strike moving ISIS targets within minutes of being called into action.

However, skepticism remains. First of all, just because the Americans now have access to air bases minutes away from Syria, doesn't mean, that the war against ISIS will intensify. The Obama administration seems reluctant and has delegated the main fighting to Iranian backed Shiite militias and the Kurds, relegating the air strikes to a more supporting role, and that strategy is not going to change radically in the last days of this administration. Also, if Turkey takes this opportunity to crack down on the Kurdish domestic arch nemesis and other left secular opposition, as suggested by bombing PKK positions in Iraq, along with attacking ISIS, it risks getting involved in a two front war it will find hard to win. Eventually, it will need to choose which is the greater evil of the two.

The writer is a columnist with China.org.cn. For more information please visit:

http://china.org.cn/opinion/SumantraMaitra.htm

Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.

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