The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) was a Kurdish-led coalition of left-wing ethnic militias and rebel groups, which served as the official military wing of the Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (DAANES; also unofficially known as Rojava) from 2015 to 2026. Founded on 10 October 2015, the stated mission of the SDF was to create a secular, democratic, and federalized Syria. The SDF was opposed by Turkey, who viewed the group as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which is internationally designated a terrorist group.
Formed as a rebel alliance in the Syrian civil war with American support, the SDF was composed primarily of Kurdish, Arab, and Assyrian/Syriac, as well as some smaller Armenian, Turkmen, and Chechen forces. It is militarily led by the People's Protection Units (YPG), a Kurdish militia which is designated as a terrorist group by both Turkey and Qatar. The SDF also includes several ethnic militias and various factions of the Syrian opposition's Free Syrian Army.
Opponents of the SDF included various Islamist, Syrian nationalist, and pro-Turkish forces involved in the civil war. Major enemies included al-Qaeda affiliates, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), the Syrian National Army (TFSA), the Turkish Armed Forces, and their allies. Up to 2019, the SDF focused primarily on ISIL, successfully driving them from important strategic areas such as Al-Hawl, Shaddadi, Tishrin Dam, Manbij, Tabqa, Euphrates Dam, Mansoura Dam, and ISIL's former capital of Raqqa. In March 2019, the SDF announced the total territorial defeat of ISIL in Syria, with the SDF taking control of the last stronghold in Baghuz. After that, the SDF was increasingly involved in combatting the TFSA and Turkish presence in northern Syria. In January 2026, the Syrian transitional government launched an offensive against the SDF in northeastern Syria, leading to the capture of Raqqa and Deir ez-Zor, ending in a 14-point ceasefire agreement negotiated through the US as a basis for integration.
On 10 March 2025, the SDF agreed to integrate into Syrian state institutions under the Syrian caretaker government. In January 2026, the Syrian transitional government launched an offensive against the SDF in northeastern Syria. On 18 January, a 14-point ceasefire agreement with the SDF, negotiated through the US envoy Tom Barrack, was announced, under which the SDF started integrating into the Syrian government, and the governorates of Raqqa and Deir ez-Zor immediately handed over to the government, together with the administration of prisoner-of-war camps for Islamic State members, all border crossings and oil fields. On 25 August 2026, SDF commander-in-chief Mazloum Abdi declared the SDF's dissolution, and its complete integration into the Syrian Army.
History
Establishment
Foundation The establishment of the SDF was announced on 11 October 2015 during a press conference in al-Hasakah. The alliance built on longstanding previous cooperation between the founding partners. While the People's Protection Units (Yekîneyên Parastina Gel, YPG) and the Women's Protection Units (Yekîneyên Parastina Jin, YPJ) had been operating throughout the regions of the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, the other founding partners were more geographically focused.
Geographically focused on the Euphrates Region were the YPG's partners in the Euphrates Volcano joint operations room, several mainstream Syrian rebel factions of the Free Syrian Army, who had helped defend the Kurdish town of Kobanî during the Siege of Kobanî. Liwa Thuwwar al-Raqqa had been expelled by the al-Nusra Front and ISIL from the city of Raqqa for its alliance with the YPG. The group participated in the capture of Tell Abyad from the Islamic State.
Geographically focused on the Jazira Region in northeast Syria were the Assyrian Syriac Military Council (Mawtbo Fulhoyo Suryoyo, MFS) and the al-Sanadid Forces of the Arab Shammar tribe, both of whom had cooperated with the YPG in fighting ISIL since 2013. The MFS is further politically aligned with the YPG via their shared secular ideology of democratic confederalism, which in the Assyrian community is known as the Dawronoye movement.
Geographically focused on the Manbij Region was the Army of Revolutionaries (Jaysh al-Thuwar, JAT), originally an alliance within the FSA of several groups of diverse ethnic and political backgrounds, who had in common that they had been rejected by the mainstream Syrian opposition for their secular, anti-Islamist views and affiliations.
In 2017, then-Commander of U.S. Special Operations Command Raymond Thomas stated that they were aware of Turkey's concerns about the YPG's ties to the PKK since 2015. For this reason, it was necessary for YPG to change their name and incorporate the word "democratic". Thomas explained that this is how the name Syrian Democratic Forces came to be.
Signatory groups The following groups signed the founding document:
People's Protection Units (Yekîneyên Parastina Gel, YPG) Women's Protection Units (Yekîneyên Parastina Jin, YPJ) Al-Sanadid Forces Syriac Military Council (Mawtbo Fulhoyo Suryoyo, MFS) Liwa Thuwar al-Raqqa Euphrates Volcano Army of Revolutionaries (Jaysh al-Thuwar, JAT) 99th Infantry Brigade Brigade Groups of al-Jazira
Political representation On 10 December 2015, after a two-day conference, the Syrian Democratic Council was established. Human rights activist Haytham Manna and Ilham Ehmed were elected co-chairman/woman at its founding. The Assembly establishing the Syrian Democratic Council was made up of 13 members of different ethnic, economic and political backgrounds.
Ethnic makeup Initially, the mostly Kurdish YPG/YPJ comprised the majority of SDF and dominated it organizationally. However, it has had smaller minorities of other communities involved in it from the beginning, including Christians, Yezidis, Turkmen and Arabs.
The participation of thousands of Arab troops fighting under the SDF, in its military councils as well as various militias and rebel groups, during the battle for Raqqa in 2015 initially made local Arab groups see that Arabs and the SDF could work together. This encouraged increased Arab membership at the time. By 2017, the SDF was reported by the United States Department of Defense to have an Arab majority. A 2019 Wilson Center study also suggested that a majority of the Syrian Democratic Forces' personnel are Arabs. The study was based on a representative survey with 391 SDF fighters; of the total respondents, 68.7% were Arabs, 17.2% Kurds, 12.5% Christians, 0.9% Yezidis, and 0.6% Turkmens. By comparison, the SDF itself estimated at the time that 50–70% of its troops were Arabs, 30–50% Kurds, 5% Christians, 2% Yezidis, and 2% Turkmens. Arabs comprised more than half of the SDF by 2019, and possibly earlier.Statelet of Survivors: The Making of a Semi-autonomous Region in Northeast Syria, Amy Austin Holmes, 2024, pp. 50, .
Unofficial figures, quoted in Al Majalla in 2021, similarly indicated a sizeable Arab majority, 65,000 out of 100,000 total. The Arab membership of the SDF may relate to the pay levels and conscription going on within the Arab majority Northeast Syria region, as the SDF has a mandatory 1 year of service for all men living in its area of control.
Size, growth and composition
In 2018, following a Turkish invasion into north west Syria, the SDF was forced from Afrin. In October 2019, the SDF had to retreat from Tell Abyad and Ras al-Ayn after a renewed Turkish invasion of Syrian territory. , the SDF controlled about 25% of the territory of Syria.
2015 At the time of its founding in late 2015, The Economist described the SDF as "essentially a subsidiary of the Kurdish YPG". At the end of October, the al-Shaitat tribal militia, the Desert Hawks Brigade, joined the SDF to fight ISIL in the southern countryside of Hasakah Governorate. In November, the FSA group Euphrates Jarabulus Battalions announced its accession to the SDF. In December, members of the Deir ez-Zor Governorate-based Arab tribe al-Shaitat joined the SDF, sending fighters to al-Shaddadah.
2016
With continuous growth in particular due to Arab groups and volunteers joining, in March 2016 only an estimated 60% of the men and women in the SDF fighting force were ethnic Kurds. Growth in particular of Arab, Turkmen and Assyrian participation in the SDF has since continued. In an interview on the first anniversary of the SDF's founding, spokesman Talal Silo, an ethnic Turkmen and former commander of the Seljuq Brigade, stated that "we started with 13 factions and now there are 32 factions", and that "90 percent" of the SDF growth since it began its operations were ethnic Arabs. In the context of the November 2016 Northern Raqqa offensive, The Economist said the SDF fighting force to be composed of "about 20,000 YPG fighters and about 10,000 Arabs". The next month in December 2016, Colonel John Dorrian, the Operation Inherent Resolve spokesman, stated that the SDF contained around 45,000 fighters, of which more than 13,000 were Arabs. On 6 January 2016 an additional 400 members of the Arab Deir ez-Zor Governorate-based tribe al-Shaitat joined the SDF, sending fighters to Al-Shaddadah. On 5 February 2016, a group called Martyrs of Dam Brigade from an Arab village called al-Makhmar (liberated by the Syrian Democratic Forces in the Tishrin Dam offensive) joined the Northern Sun Battalion and the SDF. On 28 February 2016, a group called Martyr Qasim Areef Battalion from Sarrin was formed and joined the Army of Revolutionaries and the SDF. On 10 March 2016, a group called the Soldiers of the Two Holy Mosques Brigade joined the Syrian Democratic Forces as part of the Northern Sun Battalion. It was formerly part of the Army of Mujahideen's 19th Division. The group operated in the northern Aleppo Governorate countryside, and also have a presence in Aleppo city and Kobani. On 12 March 2016, it was reported that more than 200 locals from the earlier liberated areas around the town of Shaddadi joined the SDF, most of them Arabs. On 19 March 2016, it was reported that a group under the name of Liwa Ahrar al-Raqqa ("Free Raqqa Brigade") joined the SDF. The group had earlier been known under the name of Liwa al-Jihad fi Sabeel Allah ("Jihad in the Path of God Brigade") and had in September 2014 been part of the Euphrates Volcano operations room. On 2 April 2016 the SDF established the Manbij Military Council with the goal of securing the city of Manbij and its surrounding countryside (Manbij offensive (2016)). The council also included previously unknown groups such as the Manbij Revolutionaries Battalion, or the Manbij Turkmen Brigade which joined the Northern Sun Battalion of the Army of Revolutionaries. On 20 June 2016, a group called the Tel Rifaat Revolutionaries Battalion, with 250 members, joined the Kurdish Front of the Army of Revolutionaries. On 23 June 2016 in the al-Shaddadah area, 158 al-Shaitat tribesmen from the FSA group Elite Forces, which was not yet an SDF component group at the time, defected to join the SDF component group, the Desert Hawks Brigade, consisting of members of that tribe. On 14 August 2016, after securing Manbij, the SDF established the al-Bab Military Council with the goal of securing the city of al-Bab and its surrounding countryside. On 21 August, in a similar fashion to the establishment of the Manbij and al-Bab Military Councils, the SDF established the Jarablus Military Council with the goal of securing the city of Jarablus and its surrounding countryside. The council also includes the newly established group, the Manbij Revolutionary Brigades. The commander of the council, General Sattar Jader from Jarabulus Hawks Brigades, was assassinated the next day, a suspect was later arrested.