WHO LOST TURKEY? AN ALLY GOES ROGUE.
The Weekly Standard
Vol. 20 No. 5
October 13, 2014 Monday
by Daniel Pipes, The Weekly Standard
Only 12 years ago, the Republic of Turkey was correctly seen as the
model of a pro-Western Muslim state, and a bridge between Europe and
the Middle East. A strong military bond with the Pentagon undergirded
broader economic and cultural ties with Americans. And then, starting
with the 2002 elections that brought the Justice and Development party
(AKP) and Recep Tayyip Erdogan, first as prime minister and now as
president, to power, Turkey dramatically changed course. Slowly at
first and then with increasing velocity since mid-2011, Erdogan’s
government began breaking laws, turned autocratic, and allied with
the enemies of the United States.
Even those most reluctant to recognize this shift have been forced to
do so. If Barack Obama listed Erdogan as one of his five best foreign
friends in 2012, he showed a quite different attitude by having a mere
charge d’affaires represent him at Erdogan’s presidential inauguration
a few weeks ago a public slap in the face.
What caused this shift? To understand today’s unexpected circumstances
requires a glance back to the Ottoman Empire. Founded in 1299, its
control over substantial parts of the European continent (mainly
the Balkan area, named after the Turkish word for mountain) made it
the only Muslim polity to engage intensely with Europe as Western
Christians rose to become the wealthiest and most powerful people on
the planet. As the Ottoman Empire weakened relative to other European
powers over the centuries, how to dispose of it became a major concern
of European diplomacy (the Eastern question ) and the empire came to
be seen as potential prey (the sick man of Europe ).
Turkey’s defeat in World War I occurred against this backdrop,
prompting the army’s outstanding general, Mustafa Kemal, to seize
power and close down the empire in favor of the Republic of Turkey,
far smaller and limited mainly to Turkish-language-speakers. For the
new country’s first 15 years, 1923-38, Kemal (who renamed himself
Ataturk) dominated the country. A strong-willed Westernizer, he
imposed a sequence of radical changes that characterize the country
to this day, and make it conspicuously different from the rest of the
Middle East, including laicism (secularism on steroids) and codes of
law based on European prototypes.
Starting almost immediately after Ataturk’s death in 1938, a reversal
of his secularism began. But the Turkish military, in its dual role
as the country’s ultimate political power and the self-conscious heir
of Ataturk’s legacy, placed limits on these changes. The military,
however, is a force for neither creativity nor intellectual growth,
so the adages of Ataturk, unceasingly repeated over the decades,
became stale and restricting. As dissent increased, the parties
holding to his 1920s vision stagnated, degenerating into corrupt,
power-seeking organizations. By the 1990s, their revolving-door
governments had alienated a sizable portion of the electorate.
In 2001, Erdogan and another Islamist politician, Abdullah Gul,
founded the AKP. Promising good government and economic growth based
on conservative values, it performed impressively in its inaugural
election of November 2002, winning just over one-third of the vote.
Erdogan focused at first on the economy and racked up Chinese-like
rates of economic growth. In foreign policy, he emerged as a
power-broker in the Middle East (for example, offering to mediate
peace talks between Israel and Syria) and became the West’s favorite
Islamist. In the process, he seemed to solve a centuries-old conundrum
of relations between Islam and the West, finding a successful blend
of the two.
In reality, it seems that Erdogan sought to reverse the Ataturk
revolution and return Turkey to an Ottoman-like domestic order and
international standing. With that in mind, he weakened the military
by contriving preposterous conspiracy theories its top brass had
ostensibly engineered. For reasons still unclear, the leadership of
the armed forces barely pushed back, even as its top officers were
arrested and the general staff eventually fired.
As the military surrendered, Erdogan took aim at his domestic rivals,
especially his longtime ally, Fethullah Gulen, an Islamist and leader
of a massive national movement with networks placed in key government
institutions. As Erdogan demonized his critics, he delighted his
base Turks who felt oppressed by Ataturkism. With each election,
he accrued more personal power, as did Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.
International relations followed a similar pattern, with an initial
set of modest foreign goals becoming, over time, ever grander and more
dangerous. A zero problems with neighbors policy enunciated by foreign
minister Ahmet Davutoglu began successfully as Ankara managed warm
relations with Syria and Iran, and mutually beneficial, albeit tepid,
relations with Israel. Even longtime foes such as Greece and Armenia
gained from Erdogan’s charm offensive. The great powers sought good
relations. The AKP’s neo-Ottoman dream of acquiring primacy among
its former colonials seemed attainable.
But then Erdogan displayed the same arrogance abroad that he had
unleashed at home, and to much worse reviews. If a majority of the
Turkish electorate applauded his tongue-lashings, few foreigners did.
As the Arab upheavals changed the Middle East beginning in 2011,
Erdogan and Davutoglu found their accomplishments slipping away, to
the point that Ankara now has poor to venomous relations with many
of its neighbors.
The break with Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, perhaps the most
dramatic of Erdogan’s losses, has had many negative consequences. It
saddled Turkey with millions of unwelcome Arabic-speaking refugees,
led to a proxy war with Iran, obstructed Turkish trade routes through
much of the Middle East, and gave rise to jihadist forces. Hostility
to Israel ended Ankara’s strongest regional bond. Erdogan’s support
for the short-lived Muslim Brotherhood rule in Egypt turned into open
enmity toward the next government in Cairo. Threats against Cyprus
in the aftermath of its discovery of gas further soured an already
adversarial relationship. Turkish contractors lost more than $19
billion in Libya’s anarchy.
Internationally, a feint in the direction of buying a Chinese missile
system brought security relations with Washington to a new low.
Erdogan’s urging the millions of Turks living in Germany to resist
assimilation caused tensions with Berlin, as did Ankara’s possible
role in the murder of three Kurds in Paris. These outrages have
left Ankara nearly friendless. It enjoys warm relations with Qatar,
the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq, and the Muslim
Brotherhood, including its Palestinian offshoot, Hamas.
Erdogan will face three challenges over the next year: electoral,
psychological, and economic. Having ascended to the presidency on
August 28 requires constitutional changes allowing him to become the
strong executive president he aspires to be. In turn, those changes
require the AKP to do well in the June 2015 national elections; or,
alternatively, to make substantial concessions to Turkish Kurds to win
their support for his ambitions. Now that the party finds itself in the
untested hands of Davutoglu, recently promoted from foreign minister
to prime minister, its ability to win the necessary seats is in doubt.
Second, Erdogan’s fate depends on Davutoglu remaining his faithful
consigliere. Should Davutoglu develop independent ambitions, Erdogan
will find himself limited to a mostly ceremonial post.
Last, the shaky Turkish economy depends on foreign money seeking higher
rates of return and a host of infrastructure projects to continue
growing. Here, Erdogan’s highly erratic behavior (ranting against
what he calls the interest lobby, rating agencies such as Moody’s,
and even the New York Times) discourages further investment, while
huge debt threatens to leave the country bankrupt.
With its youthful population of 75 million, a central location,
control of a key waterway, and eight mostly problematic neighbors,
Turkey is a highly desirable ally. In addition, it enjoys a position
of prominence in the Middle East, among Turkic-speakers from Bosnia to
Xinjiang, and among Muslims worldwide. The U.S.-Turkish alliance that
began with the Korean War has been highly advantageous to Washington,
which is understandably loath to lose it.
That said, one side alone cannot sustain an alliance. Ankara’s record
of friendly relations with Tehran, support for Hamas and the Islamic
State, undermining the authority of Baghdad, virulence toward Israel,
and threats against Cyprus make it a questionable, if not entirely
duplicitous, NATO partner. The Obama administration can signal that the
bullying tactics that have won Erdogan votes at home have won him only
animosity in the rest of the world. The White House can make clear
that unless major changes occur quickly, it will push for Turkey’s
suspension and eventual expulsion from NATO. If Erdogan insists on
acting the rogue, then that’s how its former ally should treat him.
Daniel Pipes is president of the Middle East Forum.