Operation Euphrates Shield
Turkish cross-border military operation / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Operation Euphrates Shield (Turkish: Fırat Kalkanı Harekâtı) was a cross-border military operation conducted by the Turkish Armed Forces in the Syrian Civil War which led to the Turkish occupation of northern Syria. Operations were carried out in the region between the Euphrates river to the east and the rebel-held area around Azaz to the west. The Turkish military and Turkey-aligned Syrian rebel groups, some of which used the Free Syrian Army label, fought against the forces of the Islamic State (IS) as well as against the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) from 24 August 2016. On 29 March 2017, the Turkish military officially announced that Operation Euphrates Shield was "successfully completed".[1]
Operation Euphrates Shield | ||||||||||||
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Part of the Turkey–IS conflict, the Rojava conflict, the military intervention against IS, and Turkish involvement in the Syrian civil war | ||||||||||||
Turkish-backed opposition control SDF control Syrian Army control Islamic State control For a more detailed, up-to-date, interactive map, see here. | ||||||||||||
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Belligerents | ||||||||||||
Turkey Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army[15] Support: United States[a][16][17][18] Russia[a][19][20][21][22] United Kingdom[a][23] | Islamic State |
Syrian Democratic Forces[24] Syria (minor clashes) Support: Russia | ||||||||||
Commanders and leaders | ||||||||||||
Lt. Gen. Zekai Aksakallı[27] (Operations chief commander) Lt. Gen. İsmail Metin Temel[28][29] (Second Army commander) Col. Ahmed Othman[30] (Sultan Murad Division commander) Fehim İsa[31] (Sultan Murad Division commander) Others
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Muhammad Ahmed[45] (Manbij Military Council commander) | |||||||||||
Units involved | ||||||||||||
Orders of battle | ||||||||||||
Strength | ||||||||||||
4,000–8,000 troops[47][48][49] Unit Strengths
| 5,000–7,000+ militants[49][55][56][57] | Unknown | ||||||||||
Casualties and losses | ||||||||||||
71 killed[58] 614 killed[59][60] | 2,647 killed, 417 captured (per Turkey)[61] |
131+ killed (per SOHR and SDF)[62] 30+ killed, 22 captured[63][64][65] | ||||||||||
540+ civilians killed (per SOHR)[66][67] |
The Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on the first day of the operation that it was aimed against both the IS and Syrian Kurdish "terror groups that threaten our country in northern Syria".[68] The objective to capture Manbij, under the de facto control of the AANES administration, that had been promulgated by the Turkish president at the end of February 2017[69] remained unfulfilled.