Turkey has summoned retired military officers to duty and assigned them to border provinces with Syria, a Turkish newspaper reported adding that NATO forces might intervene in Syria.

Turkey has summoned retired military officers to duty and assigned them to border provinces with Syria, a Turkish newspaper reported adding that NATO forces might intervene in Syria.

“The General Staff sent duty summons to every officer retired from the military in the past five years. More personnel have been deployed in bases and strategically important outposts”, Today’s Zaman said on Thursday.

The daily also said that the majority of the officers summoned were positioned in stations near the border, adding that the security measures at the İskenderun Naval Base were doubled.
Turkish Officials on Thursday announced that the number of Syrians taking refuge in Turkey had reached 7,239.

The newspaper further said that Turkey was concerned about a possible NATO intervention in Syria.
“The government believes that such an intervention would hurt Turkey the most and hopes that the situation is resolved without the need for an international intervention. Turkey also fears that a NATO intervention might spark a backlash in the Muslim world.”

It quoted an associate professor from the Bolu Abant İzzet Baysal University, Veysel Ayhan, as saying that a NATO intervention in Syria would turn the region into absolute hell. 

“Turkey is back to its position in the 1990s. It is pursuing a proactive foreign policy. We can confidently say that a wave of refugees much bigger than the one during the Gulf War is in store, as it is unlikely that the situation in Syria will be resolved in the near future. NATO handled the situation in Afghanistan and Libya badly. Western countries can't make any contributions to NATO in similar operations. If this can be solved, it can only be solved through Turkey's efforts. If, in the long run, NATO intervenes, we could be faced with a direr picture,” Ayhan said.