Though Erdogan has never made a secret of his desire to redraw Syria's map of Kurds and Arabs via his Turkish military incursion in northern Syria, and in the months prior to his ordering the operation even made statements tantamount to an open policy of ethnic cleansing, it was surprising how easily the White House gave the green light a month ago despite Ankara's stated aims. 

But now a leaked internal US government memo published by The New York Times spells it out clearly, and underscores the fact that everyone in Washington knows NATO's second largest military is now engaged in ongoing ethnic cleansing. The internal State Department memo states bluntly the Turks are conducting "an intentioned-laced effort at ethnic cleansing".

It was authored by William Roebuck, Americas top diplomat in northern Syria, who for years previously served as the Deputy Chief of Mission in Syria. He was also recently the US Ambassador to Bahrain.

The most shocking line among its 3200 total words are as follows: 

"Turkey's military operation in northern Syria, spearheaded by armed Islamist groups on its payroll, represents an intentioned-laced effort at ethnic cleansing."