Boots on the ground

Russian officials and Russian news outlets have started making a very serious claim that Turkey was preparing a land operation in Syria. Turkey immediately and flatly denied the claim, saying Russia was trying to cover up the crimes it has been committing in Syria with ludicrous charges. Further, Ankara claimed that the reflection on the ground of every American contact with the Russians was more aggression.

On the other hand, the Saudis publicly revealed that they were ready to contribute land troops to an international coalition that would fight the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Syria while Walid al-Muallem, the Syrian foreign minister, said any foreign military entering his country without the consent of his government would be considered an act of aggression and would be dealt with accordingly. He said such troops would "return home in wooden coffins."

Could Turkey be part of an invasion force? Could an operation inside Syria against any target without the consent of the Syrian government be considered a legitimate anti-terrorism push? If the Sunni coalition led by the Saudis with the supposed blessing of a lame-duck Obama administration enter Syria through Turkey - as has been speculated - would such an action be a demonstration of an anti-terrorism resolve or the trigger of a bigger proxy war if not a full-fledged regional war?

Washington has been clear all along that there will not be American boots on the ground in Syria. The same Washington, however, was the mentor of the Sunni alliance led by the Saudis to fight Muslim jihadist, Salafist extremism, as if Wahhabism in power in the holiest land in Islam is much different in essence than that the practiced by the former.

Could Syria be a second Yemen? Could...