US to withdraw Patriot missile system from Turkey

The United States, Germany and the Netherlands all deployed Patriots in early 2013, after Turkey asked North Atlantic Treaty Organisation for help protecting its territory as civil war in Syria intensified.

“The threat in this war-torn region has shifted in focus”, von der Leyen said in a statement on the defense ministry’s website. The group doesn’t possess missiles. “Not only by training and supporting the Kurdish and Iraqi security forces in Erbil but also with our naval force… in the eastern Mediterranean”. “Low ballistic missile threat” as well as the “high costs of the mission” are given as reasons for that decision.

The U.S. has decided to withdraw its border protection mission in Turkey which was deployed against possible threats from Syria, a joint statement by Washington and Ankara said on Sunday. Germany provides two of the five North Atlantic Treaty Organisation batteries and around 250 personnel to the mission, which is mandated to the end of January.

Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen announced at the weekend that Berlin would let its three-year Patriot mission lapse in January instead of seeking parliamentary approval to extend it.

Germany’s Patriot missile system is based in the Turkish town of Kahramanmaras, some 100km from the Syrian border.

The deployment was made at Turkey’s request following the shooting down of a Turkish jet by Syrian forces in June 2012 and the killing of Turkish civilians by Syrian shellfire four months later.

Certain press circles have speculated that the move may have be related to Turkey’s prioritizing of its conflict against the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and the west demanding a more direct involvement against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).