The People's Defense Forces (HPG) announced on Friday that US-made CH-47 Chinook helicopters are also being used in the Turkish army's invasion of the Medya Defense Zones in southern Kurdistan (northern Iraq), which has been carried out with the support of the KDP since April 17.

Within the framework of its extermination concept against the Kurdish people, the Turkish state has resorted to many different methods to occupy the guerrilla areas in Kurdistan in recent years. It has not been successful in doing so. The fact that the Turkish army is using Chinook helicopters, which can transport heavy loads and troops, in its latest invasion of the Zap region is attracting attention.

Chinook helicopters are generally preferred in comprehensive war zones and frequently used in NATO missions. Turkey owns eleven helicopters of this model. The AKP/MHP government acquired them from the manufacturer Boeing through negotiations between Ankara and Washington for a unit price of about $90 million.

The twin-engine helicopter with a tandem rotor arrangement can carry about sixty armed soldiers and ten tons of load. The Turkish state signed the agreement to purchase eleven models in 2011. However, due to the high financial volume, the purchase was postponed several times. In the course of the new war concept against the Kurdish liberation movement, the agreement was renewed in 2015. Six helicopters were delivered in 2016. Turkey received the remaining aircraft in July 2019 after dirty negotiations with the then Trump administration. Previously, following the agreement between the Erdogan regime and Russia on the purchase of the S-400 missile defense system and the arrest of U.S. pastor Andrew Brunson in Turkey in 2018, certain arms agreements had been halted by order of U.S. President Donald Trump, including the F-35 fighter jet. To compensate for the imposed sanctions, the first Chinook was delivered in 2018, followed by four more in 2019.

That the first deployment of Chinook helicopters is now in southern Kurdistan indicates the scale of the military operation. The U.S. has used this model in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. Turkey first used the helicopter on the third day of the operation in the Zap region. This raises the question of whether the helicopters transported dead and wounded. The model can carry 24 stretchers and be used as a mobile hospital.