The operation, conceived to teach Russia not to interfere with the Third Syrian War – designed to create a colonial state in Northern Syria to which the Turkish Kurds would be transferred – had the opposite effect. Moscow has reinforced its anti-aircraft capacities in Syria, and has isolated Turkey. Ankara has now lost the benefit of the secret oral agreement it had concluded with Hafez el-Assad. And London, Paris and Tel-Aviv no longer know how to implement their plan.

Athe end of the Turkish civil war, Turkey threatened to invade Syria with the help of NATO if it continued to offer asylum to the leader of the PKK, Abdullah Öcallan. President Hafez el-Assad thus asked Öcallan to find another refuge, and was obliged to conclude an oral agreement with Turkey. It was agreed that the Turkish army would be allowed to penetrate Syrian territory, within a limit of 8 kilometres, in order to ensure that the PKK could not fire mortars from Syria.