Just What Is Turkey Up To?

by Graham E. Fuller

Turkish policies towards the Middle East have been in wild oscillation over the past many weeks, even months. Ankara has now finally and begrudgingly initiated military action against ISIS in cooperation with the US. But it has also initiated air attacks against its former Kurdish negotiating partners. Just what is going on? There may not be any coherent strategy, but the following seem to me to represent the key issues driving policy.

  • At the top of the list is President Erdo?an and his quest for political survival. After the rebuff to the ruling AK Party in the June elections that caused it to lose its majority in parliament, Erdo?an is now desperately trying to recover, find a reliable partner for a coalition government and, in its absence, to force new elections next month in the hopes of recouping his majority. Given the growing impression of growing loss of coherency at the top levels of the Turkish government , it is something of a gamble that the AKP could achieve a better electoral outcome next month. Indeed the AKP may well emerge yet weaker.

That said, the AKP’s best chance for a coalition partner is the nationalist MHP which opposes negotiations with the PKK (the armed Kurdish nationalist movement) or any cooperation with the PKK’s ally in Syria, the YDP. A decade ago the AKP initiated encouraging and historic negotiations with the PKK; observers had every good reason to hope for a major breakthrough on this ethnic issue that has plagued Turkey almost since its birth. But domestic politics have intervened and Erdo?an has now irresponsibly turned his back on these negotiations, even beginning military operations against the PKK again, probably putting an end for some time to any hope of reconciliation. Such aggressive steps delight the nationalists in the MHP, now a key potential coalition partner. In sum, short-term and short-sighted AKP electoral politics are destroying aspirations for vital national reconciliation.

Erdo?an has another good reason as well to sabotage his own early pioneering efforts at Kurdish reconciliation: with the improving political environment of a few years ago, for the first time a Kurdish party, the Peoples’s Democratic Party, is now reaching for national status as a true liberal party beyond simple Kurdish nationalism. It was that party that took away crucial votes from the AKP in the last elections and Erdo?an has blood in his eye.

  • The second key factor is Ankara’s disastrous Syrian imbroglio. Erdo?an’s decision, indeed current obsession, with overthrowing the Asad regime in Syria starting in 2011—represented an abrupt reverse of a decade of warm and brotherly relations with Syria. No AKP foreign policy failure can equal the Syrian disaster: it has intensified the butchery in Syria’s savage internal conflict, damaged vital relations with Iraq and Iran, helped unleash a flood of millions of Syrian refugees into Turkey, created domestic unrest, damaged the economy, and pushed Erdo?an into a distasteful embrace with Riyadh against Asad.

In doing so, Erdo?an has been forced to turn an ever blinder eye to the extremism of Islamist forces operating against Asad in Syria, including ISIS itself. While having little real sympathy for ISIS, Erdo?an has nonetheless tolerated it. In the end he preferred strengthening ISIS against Damascus than deepening Turkish ties with the Kurds—Turkey’s natural regional partners for the future.

This Turkish policy has greatly embittered most Kurds against Turkey, especially in Syria. Erdogan’s Kurdish ties are now everywhere at risk: in Turkey, Iraq, and Syria. Only the event of a serious terrorist ISIS attack a few weeks ago on Turkish soil (targeting mostly Kurds), forced Erdo?an to reconsider this relationship. As a result Erdo?an has reluctantly bowed to US pressure to take a tougher position against ISIS. There is actually little love in Turkey at all for ISIS except among a very small minority of radical fundamentalists. Here too now, Erdo?an still seems to lack a conceptual compass on these strategic issues.

  • A third driver is the US nuclear deal with Iran. This momentous agreement will be changing the face of Middle Eastern geopolitics. It has raised the stakes for Ankara, making it clear that it can now ill afford to ignore Iran. Yet this should not be a serious problem for Turkey: the first decade of AKP rule saw good working relations with Tehran, and Turkey has basically avoided ideologically championing Middle Eastern Sunnis in any sectarian struggle. This is where Erdo?an’s unholy alliance with Riyadh against Syria had begun to push him in a dangerous sectarian direction that contradicts nearly all of Turkey’s national interests, including ties with Iran. Ankara’s recent air operations against ISIS shows some signs now of pulling back from this egregious strategic error, even as Riyadh itself has come to fear feeding ISIS any further.

In short, primarily for domestic political reasons, but also due to foreign pressures from the US, Iran and Iraq, Ankara is now wavering in its strategic directions. It would be wise if it joins Iran, Russia, China, Oman, and probably now the US, in seeking a political solution in Damascus that will lead to Asad’s eventual resignation but not a toppling of the present regime.

But the implications of Obama’s agreement with Ankara to establish a buffer zone in Syria along the Turkish border is disturbing; it now may drag the US deeper into local ground wars and coordination with bad Turkish policies. The fact is, an Asad regime for the moment is a far better option than continuing civil war and the continuing growth of extremist jihadi forces of ISIS and al-Qa’ida who are ideally positioned to eventually eliminate moderate Islamic opposition forces against Asad.

A potential Turkish coalition government that combines the AKP (with its plurality) and a left-of-center Republican Peoples Party and the new liberal Kurdish Party would seem to offer the healthiest mixture to oversee Turkish foreign policy in these exceptionally troubled and complex times. Erdo?an’s vaulting ambitions and increasing loss of judgment and statesmanship will best be neutralized in such a coalition. Despite the emotionalism around the Kurdish issue, a new generation of a Turkish electorate is unlikely to opt for a politician who seeks greater confrontation in the region, especially as a tool for his own ambitions.

Graham E. Fuller is a former senior CIA official, author of numerous books on the Muslim World; his latest book is “Breaking Faith: A novel of espionage and an American’s crisis of conscience in Pakistan.” (Amazon, Kindle) grahamefuller.com

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3 Comments

  1. Erdogan is liability for Turkey. His role is over, he should retired before been toppled by corruption scandals.

  2. They used to call Turkey the “sick man of Europe” about a century ago in the days leading up to WWI

  3. What Turkey is doing now is not new ; signs of todays policy were visible in Turkey’s foreign relations since 2007:
    1- Turkey cut off it’s relations with the West and turned its face to East.
    2- Turkey did not fullfill any obligation that would lead to unity with EU.
    3- Turkey searched and established alliances based on Sunni Muslim belief and supported such communities/organizations/political parties financially and/or politically in the World.
    4- Turkey played role in domestic affairs of other countries by openly supporting one side of the conflict (Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, jihadist rebels in Syria, Omar al-Hasi in Libya) and contradicted with the policies of international community.
    5- Turkey opened jihadist highway through its border with Syria for the flow of foreign fighters to ISIS forces, closed its eyes for flow of arms/ammunition.
    So as you see, nothing is new, the game is played openly by Turkish side; Turkey is playing to be the “big Ottoman brother” in the Middle East by provoking etchnical and religious/secterian conflicts. What is not easy to understand is why the West was reluctant to see it during the last 8 years.

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