The other day the bodyguards of the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan scuffled with the UN security men. Under normal circumstances, this would be an ordinary incident. Someone failed to recognize someone else, the prime minister was late and decided to take a short cut, which is against the rules, and so on, and so forth. Just another unfortunate misunderstanding, nothing more, one could think. But under the present circumstances, it acquired a special significance, somewhat symbolic – the more so that it was not the first time that something of this kind had happened. In September 2009, Erdogan’s bodyguards challenged President Obama’s securities. The incident was then hushed, but it turned out to indicate a rule rather than be a mere chance. Something of this sort happened during the Turkish prime minister’s visit to the friendly Egypt.
Turkey is demonstrating an ever growing bellicosity. Its relations with Israel could be described in terms of cold war. It drops unambiguous threats against Cyprus because of the deep-water drilling launched by the American company Noble Energy in search of gas fields in the economic zone of the Greek part of the island. Ankara flatly opposes Cyprus’s presidency in the EU, otherwise it threatened to freeze its relations with this leading European organization. Europe has stopped being top priority for Turkey’s leadership. Thus we can observe a U-turn in politics, with absolutely different goals and methods for their achievement.
The Islamic world is pregnant with two opposing blocs, the Sunni and the Shiah. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and (to some extent) other Gulf emirates are extremely concerned about Iran’s aggressive expansionism. They are trying to oppose it by the mobilizing of other Sunni nations under their colors, first of all those that have actual economic and military power. In this respect, Turkey suits them perfectly well. Pakistan is another important element of the incipient union. Despite its inner instability and the complicated relations with India, the regime in Islamabad has nuclear weapons at its disposal, which a priori guarantees the bloc’s considerable advantage at the moment.
On the other side are Iran and Syria, which still remains the former’s satellite. The theocrats in Teheran have no other allies, save for Hezbollah in Lebanon. But it is exactly Syria that is the prize in the tough struggle today, which results in numerous casualties and bombardment and shelling of the country’s rebellious towns.
Turkey seeks to play the first chair in the incipient Sunni bloc. The ruling triumvirate – Prime Minister Recep Erdogan, President Abdullah Gul, and Minister of Foreign Affairs Ahmet Davutoglu – see their main goal in the restoration of the Ottoman Porte (of course, not in the sense of occupation of the others’ territories and subjugation of nations from Maghreb to the Euphrates). It means the obtaining of leadership in the Islamic world. The triumvirate believe that Turkey’s stand in the dialog with Europe will be quite different then. Davutoglu acts as the ideologist of this policy, while Erdogan is the main executor, or rather implementer.
In this triangle Erdogan and Davutoglu play a tougher role, while Gul’s is in a certain sense milder. Speaking during his visit to Germany, the president urged the Turks living there to learn German and send their children to German kindergartens and schools. Before him, Erdogan had stated (also in Germany) that they must not give up their mother tongue, and they shouldn’t teach their children German since it was an effective betrayal of their identity. But one should not think that the triumvirate is split by essential grave contradictions. Each player has a specific role assigned to him.
One has to hand it down to Erdogan, who was able to brilliantly play the artificial conflict around the so-called Freedom Fleet. Erdogan absolutely does not need the alliance with Israel, created by his political opponents; moreover, this alliance is cumbersome and dangerous from both foreign and domestic standpoints. The Turkish Army leadership, who defended the mundane policies as ordered by the founder of the Turkish Republic Kemal Ataturk, saw tight connections with Israel as a kind of guarantee of this path of the country’s development. Let alone the purely material possibilities of getting access to up-to-date weapons, given that it was only from Israel that Turkey could get them, with the suspicious attitude of the US.
However, there was political competition between the Army command and Erdogan. It is no mere incident that the worsening of relations between Turkey and Israel coincided with persecutions of Army generals, who were arrested and imprisoned by the hundred. Erdogan keeps repeating that there have been military plots in the country – and he might have every reason to say so. One can hardly expect Turkish top officers to obediently agree to a political and physical exile.
Turkey’s leadership might have foreseen the “Arab spring.” In any case, it jumped at the opportunity given by the void in the Arab world after Egypt had lost its leadership. Erdogan’s visits to Islamic countries turned into his political triumph – notwithstanding the fact that ever since the time of the Ottoman Empire the Turks and the Arabs have had very tense relations. These contradictions are present even now. But, with all their prejudice against Ankara, Arab capitals give open preference to Turkey. Many ruling elites in Arab countries find the Turkish model of development and state-building so attractive that they take it as an example.
It is not only a matter of Turkey being a guiding light and a reliable support for the Arab street in its opposition to Israel, and governments have to take the street’s opinion into consideration, especially after the well-known events. Many see the Turkish model as a means of preserving their power and of opposition to radical Islamism (although the border between radical and the so-called moderate Islamism is getting thinner and thinner).
With all the acuteness of the Turkey-Israel relations, they will hardly ensue in direct military confrontation, although certain separate episodes cannot be ruled out. First, Israel is not an easy opponent and can rebuff aggression and cause considerable damage. Besides, the two countries are geographically separated, which considerably limits the bellicosity of the Turkish leadership. On the other hand, Israel is being incredibly restrained, which also prevents a possible resort to force by Turkey. Ankara does not want to look aggressive.
Second, Turkey’s NATO membership is an essential restrictive factor. There will hardly be a member of the Alliance to support Turkey in this kind of opposition, starting with Greece that is anxious to replace Ankara in its cooperation with Israel and use the situation to maximum advantage. Besides, Europe will never encourage Turkey’s aggressiveness towards Cyprus, so there is no one to listen to its demands that Nicosia should not preside over the EU.
Third, with all the scope of the media attention to Turkey-Israel opposition, it is not Tel-Aviv but Teheran that is Turkey’s main goal. It is against this Shiah neighbor that Ankara’s main effort is directed, and this is the foundation on which the Sunni bloc is being built. One can find proof to this in the reports of the prepared military alliance between Turkey and Egypt. Erdogan’s scheduled visit to Gaza is more of the anti-Iran than anti-Israel nature. The Turkish prime minister is to define possibilities for pulling Hamas away from Iran and its re-orientation at other patrons. Naturally, it will be Turkey, with financial support from Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
Syria became the battlefield in the confrontation between Turkey and Iran. Turkey’s chief goal at present is to wrench this ally and junior partner from Teheran. If accomplished, it will send Iran in tight international isolation, essentially devaluating its claims to leadership in the Islamic world. And this is the case when words and deeds are never at variance. According to Erdogan, in the framework of the embargo for weapons supplies to Syria Turkish authorities have detained a freight ship under the Syrian flag. “If weapons are transported by air or by land, we will detain and confiscate them just as we always have,” said the prime minister of Turkey.
Earlier this year Turkish customs officers have several times stopped the shipments of arms to Syria from Iran. Thus, in March Turks found and confiscated a batch of submachine guns, portable missile launch pads, and mortars. Another shipment of Iranian arms to the Syrian military was intercepted in August. The concentration of Turkish troops on the Syrian border is supposed to exercise pressure not only on Damascus, but on Teheran as well. Iran responded with a threat to shell NATO bases in Turkey.
Although Iran, too, has some trump cards up its sleeve – in particular, a possibility to upset the situation in Lebanon and thus break up its opponents’ front line – its chances to oppose the Sunni bloc do not look particularly advantageous. With the possible formation of Ankara – Riyadh – Islamabad political axis the diplomatic and military defeat of Teheran (in case of the conflict getting into a hot phase) is merely a matter of time.
Thus we can observe every sign of the rise of a new center of power in the Middle East. And this is not an incidental opportunistic factor resulting from a collision of short-term interests. In the Islamic world, which is now going through the ferment phase, new leaders and personalities are taking shape. This is a process which will take a couple of generations, and the world has to take it into consideration. This is especially true of Ukraine, since these events are happening right outside our borders. And we have to come up with our long-term policy in this troubled world now, so as to not be taken aback by the next “Arab spring.”
COMMENTARY
The Day asked Ihor SEMYVOLOS, executive director for the Association of Middle East Studies, to comment on the possible threats Turkish neo-Osmanism may harbor for Ukraine.
“There is no threat for Ukraine there. If this is just a term coined by journalists, it is okay to use it, since ‘neo-Osmanism’ carries an imminent threat in any case because it means the revival of an empire, and it also means some terrorist or radical policies. It isn’t a question of the return of the empire. If, for instance, Russian imperialism aims at the revival of the empire, even in purely territorial terms, Turkey virtually has not a single group that would aspire to this. The most we can see (but I’m not sure if they exist at present) are the champions of the closer cooperation in the Turkic world.
“I can guarantee that Turkey has no intentions to revive the Osman Empire. A detailed project has already been developed, envisaging Turkey as a key factor in security and stability in the Middle East. Thus, in order to ensure a safe position in the negotiations with the European Union, Turkey must be something more than just a home to a 70-million population and a country with economic progress and democratic transformations.”
