This time around the "empire" is not the US, pace Comrades Hugo and Fidel. The empire in question does not yet exist in its desired, reincarnated form. But, given the ambitions of Turkish prime minister Erdogan and the almost done deal between his country and the mullahs next door in Iran, it is not unfair.
The jefe grande of the Ottoman Empire 2.0 is, like his predecessors, terribly upset by the Kurds. Again in imitation of his non-Islamist forebearers, Erdogan is dreadfully keen on wiping the several groups fighting for Kurdish independence out of existence for once and all. The Supreme Guardian of the Revolution, just like the Shah during the days of the ancien regime, shares the sentiment heart and soul.
The US as well as the (presumably) US backed regime in Iraq are caught somewhere in the middle. Baghdad has a much larger dog in the fight to be sure. Iraqi Kurdistan, which is legally semi-autonomous, is the most stable and prosperous place in the partially rebuilt country. It is not simply Kurdistan's wealth and security that has raised hackles not only in Baghdad but through much of Iraq. No. Rather the deep distaste for Kurds and their region is about the only thing upon which the minority Sunnis and majority Shia can and do agree.
Way back in the mists of history (that is before World War I resulted in a massive exercise in creative cartography), Kurdistan was a territorial whole. It had so existed for a mort of centuries both before and after the Ottoman Turks came to supremacy in Stamboli (or Istanbul, if that is your preference.) The carving up of the old Empire was accomplished courtesy of the machinations of mid-level bureaucrats serving their masters in France and Great Britain. In what was one of the greatest sins committed against the self-determination of nations principle dear to the heart of Woodrow Wilson, the Kurds found their tight little nascent state divided between French run Syria and English operated Iraq with small amounts allocated to the Turkey of Ataturk and the Shah of Persia.
Had this violation of American policy not been allowed to take place, Kurdistan would have long ago been recognized as the independent sovereign state its people wanted (and want) it to be. But, as was so often the case, Wilson believed that the League of Nations (his centerpiece ideologically) would solve the injustice--an injustice he himself acknowledged.
For many decades, the issue rested silently in the mountains which constitute most of "Kurdistan." But that came to an end when the respective "occupying" governments came to realize what resources resided in them thar hills. Oil and hydroelectric resources to be precise. Iraq battened fat off the oil while Turkey saw the rivers as the source of both agricultural and industrial riches. The Iranians and Syrians saw potential in the fast running waters if not the oil and vowed to get their share.
With every passing year, the resources of "Kurdistan" have become more and more critical to Turkey and Iraq. While the other two states have not profited so much, both Tehran and Damascus see the danger resident in a successful separatist movement. The Syrian government both before and after the Baathist came to power sought to suppress the language, culture, and political identity of the Kurdish population. The same has been the case in Iran under both secularist shah and Islamist grand ayatollahs.
Right down to the present day, the central government of Iraq has used all methods fair and foul alike to limit the autonomy of Iraqi Kurdistan. The only thing keeping Baghdad from emulating the muscular methods of Saddam Hussein in the region has been the military capacity of the Kurdish peshmerga, which could fight the national army to a bloody standstill.
Over the past quarter century, the Kurds have been waging a low level defensive insurgency against both Iran and Turkey. The PKK (shooting Turks) and PJAK (doing the same with Iranians down range) have been a thorn in the side of their target states. Because Turkey is a NATO "partner," the US determined that the PKK is a terrorist organization. Since Iran is a hostile state, the US has not yet made the same determination regarding the other group, the PJAK (aka "good terrorists.)
Comes now Recip Erdogan to announce an impending agreement with Iran to mount a joint effort presumably involving ground as well as air forces against those pesky Kurds and the heavily fortified base camps high in the mountains. The reason to presume a ground effort is the abject failure of air assaults conducted by the Turkish air force to do more than move a few rocks around as well as kill a small number of civilians who did not find shelter in time but who in their deaths provided excellent propaganda material for the Kurds.
So far there has been no reported word from the Iraqi government regarding this proposed violation of sovereignty. Perhaps the Iraqis are more easy going about such matters then are, say, the Pakistanis. Or, the central government might be hoping for a good excuse to move large forces into Iraqi Kurdistan, forces which once there will not be quick to leave.
Nor has the Obama administration made comment on the proposed joint action--except implicitly. For some while the US has been providing intelligence information to Ankara concerning the PKK. This shared catch includes imagery and ELINT obtained by Predators. Now, the word has leaked out that the Obama crew is contemplating basing Predators in Turkey.
Not one to be asleep at the switch, Erdogan has responded by offering to purchase or lease a few Predators so as to cut out the middleman. Considering that the Paks have wanted to do this for a long while now, it would be quite a diplomatic and political coup for Erdogan to achieve the goal.
Not to put too fine a point on the Kurdish Question, there is ample evidence to the effect that the Kurds and their proposed state meet the tests provided in the UN Charter as well as subsidiary conventions. With Iraqi Kurdistan as the linchpin, there is no doubt but the hypothetical Kurdistan would meet the requirements of the Montevideo Convention. Considering this inconvenient context, US policy regarding the Kurds is flatly wrong.
The finding that PKK is a terrorist entity was based simply on the role Turkey theoretically plays in NATO while the similar act by the European Union dates back to the days when Turkey was knocking on the EU door. In short, these actions had little if anything to do with "terrorism" per se and much to do with extraneous political considerations.
Silence in the Oval regarding the odd couple military plans must fall in the same category. Arguably, the decision to share catch with Ankara and the basing of Predators in Turkey constitute another bribe to Erdogan for allowing the installation of the US X-band radar. The decision to allow this anti-Iran move has resulted in severe blowback from Tehran, so the Turkish prime minister probably wants additional compensation.
There is only one open question. No, that question is not will the US switch its policy regarding the Kurds and their right to and desire for a state of their own. Nor does this question involve the notion of granting the government of Iraqi Kurdistan its request of redeploying US forces within its borders. The present administration lacks both the depth of regional understanding and the political will to do either--even if each would be in American national interest.
The only remaining question is whether or not Obama and his "team" will cave and sell-lease a few spare Predators to Erdogan, and through him, the Iranians.
Wanna make a bet?
Showing posts with label Recip Erdogan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Recip Erdogan. Show all posts
Monday, September 26, 2011
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Ethno-Religious Democracy And The Next Mideast War
Turkey has declared rhetorical war on Israel. To err on the side of accuracy, the Islamist leaning government in Ankara has been escalating words to almost the this-means-war level over the past few days. Behind this development resides not only an ambition of regional power status but the explosive growth of a new Turkish nationalism based on the merging of ethnic and religious identities, which has substantially replaced the strongly secularist predicated sense of national self inaugurated by Kemal Attaturk.
The target of Turkey's ever more intemperate attacks has likewise reinvented its sense of national identity on the merging of religion and nationalism. When founded, Israel was both a Jewish state and an outpost of European socialist thought which centered upon secularism.
The seismic shift in Turkey's national identity came only in the past decade when the long ignored peasant population of the Anatolian highlands moved to the urban centers of Ankara and Istanbul in large enough numbers to form an effective political base for the AKP, a party whose roots ran deeply into the rich soil of political Islam. When the internal migrants, searchers for a better life, joined with the equally ignored Muslim clerical establishment, it became possible to organize the discontented and marginalized new arrivals into a potent political base. This, in turn, brought the AKP to power--a power it has developed further by defanging the military and the secular elites of the cities.
The shift of Israeli politics from the secular left to the ethno-religious right started back in 1977 when Likud tapped the pool of resentment felt within significant segments of the Israeli population. By melding a new coalition of expansive hyper-nationalists, new immigrants, and the more religiously minded, Likud was able to gain power. As the years went by, the nationalist and religiously observant right was strengthened in numbers by arrivals from the Soviet Union, and, after the collapse of that state, its ruins.
The movement to the right was accelerated by the First Intifada and the consequent bloodletting imposed by the Palestinian terrorists. This reaction on the part of the Israeli public was to be expected. Terror is normally counterproductive. With every suicide bomber, every rocket, every new outrage, the median of Israeli politics moved more and more into the right hand lane.
The external pressure joined with the Second Intifada to push Israelis even more into the harsh and uncompromising position of national identity based on the juncture of Jewishness and Israeli-ness. This dynamic was fully predictable as pressure consolidates political will long, long before it fractures it. In this context, it is easy to see why the ill-advised efforts by the Obama administration to put the screws to Israel generally and the Netanyahu government in particular were counterproductive failures.
The result is the current loggerheads relation between mirror image politicians--Erdogan and Netanyahu--along with the daggers drawn nature of Turkish-Israeli relations. A larger consequence of national identities based on the merger of ethnic and religious definitions is looming as the "Arab Spring" rolls into Fall, a Fall which will be marked with a very early freeze.
Democracy is dangerous. The power of this truth informed the thinking of the authors of the US Constitution and Bill of Rights. Democracy is nothing more or less than the popular expression of whatever fad, fancy, or fantasy can be employed effectively to move voters to mark one person's name preferentially.
Among the many fads, fancies, and fantasies which can be employed to this end, none are more powerful than nationalism and religion. The advocates of political Islam in Egypt, in Libya, in Tunisia, and elsewhere in the Arab Muslim states know this perfectly. Knowledge need only to be put into action.
In the classic treatment of revolution, Anatomy of Revolution, the author makes a key point. Although only ancient offensive insurgencies were considered in this book, the power of this one observation has been enhanced by each and every revolution which has succeeded in the post-World War II years.
The point?
Revolutions move to the extreme. That is to say, the group with the most radical agenda for change following the overthrow of the old regime will win. The reasons for this inevitable move to the extreme are few and simple. The more extreme the group, the more sweeping will be the changes contained in its agenda. In addition, the more extreme groups are tightly organized, their action plan is simple, easy to understand, and addresses fundamental fears and aspirations held by the majority of the public.
The Muslim Brotherhood, the Salifists, and others advocating political Islam are all tightly organized. All have agendas which are virtually interchangeable, making group merger thinkable. And, most importantly, all have action plans which are predicated on the strictures and requirements of Islam as well as the notions of dignity and pride resident in nationalism.
In all the countries involved in the dramatic events of the past nine months, the advocates of political Islam enjoy great advantage over their secular opponents. Not only are the assorted groups well organized and possessed of a radical agenda, all make profound appeals to both Islam and national pride. "Stand tall, you are Egyptian" is a chant virtually identical to the more recent, "Stand tall, you are Muslim."
The necessary inference from what has been observed and reported throughout the Mideast and North Africa is simply that Egypt, Libya, and perhaps others will move to the totalistic national sense of self which has been in play in Turkey and Israel. One implication of this trajectory is that Turkey will fail to reestablish the Ottoman Empire. Another, far more disturbing one considering all that has been at work in the Israeli political system is that war will become far more likely in the near to mid-term.
The next war will sneak up on the West. This is to be expected. The elites of the West generally discount nationalism as a spent force, a ancient relic which has outlived whatever usefulness it once may have possessed. At the same time, the Western elites of politics, the media, and academia pretend that religion does not exist as a real force in the lives of people and the policies of governments.
In the US, in the West, the leaders of state and molders of opinion alike will not see what is happening on the Arab streets and states alike. What will not be seen, cannot be prevented.
Pleasant thought, eh?
The target of Turkey's ever more intemperate attacks has likewise reinvented its sense of national identity on the merging of religion and nationalism. When founded, Israel was both a Jewish state and an outpost of European socialist thought which centered upon secularism.
The seismic shift in Turkey's national identity came only in the past decade when the long ignored peasant population of the Anatolian highlands moved to the urban centers of Ankara and Istanbul in large enough numbers to form an effective political base for the AKP, a party whose roots ran deeply into the rich soil of political Islam. When the internal migrants, searchers for a better life, joined with the equally ignored Muslim clerical establishment, it became possible to organize the discontented and marginalized new arrivals into a potent political base. This, in turn, brought the AKP to power--a power it has developed further by defanging the military and the secular elites of the cities.
The shift of Israeli politics from the secular left to the ethno-religious right started back in 1977 when Likud tapped the pool of resentment felt within significant segments of the Israeli population. By melding a new coalition of expansive hyper-nationalists, new immigrants, and the more religiously minded, Likud was able to gain power. As the years went by, the nationalist and religiously observant right was strengthened in numbers by arrivals from the Soviet Union, and, after the collapse of that state, its ruins.
The movement to the right was accelerated by the First Intifada and the consequent bloodletting imposed by the Palestinian terrorists. This reaction on the part of the Israeli public was to be expected. Terror is normally counterproductive. With every suicide bomber, every rocket, every new outrage, the median of Israeli politics moved more and more into the right hand lane.
The external pressure joined with the Second Intifada to push Israelis even more into the harsh and uncompromising position of national identity based on the juncture of Jewishness and Israeli-ness. This dynamic was fully predictable as pressure consolidates political will long, long before it fractures it. In this context, it is easy to see why the ill-advised efforts by the Obama administration to put the screws to Israel generally and the Netanyahu government in particular were counterproductive failures.
The result is the current loggerheads relation between mirror image politicians--Erdogan and Netanyahu--along with the daggers drawn nature of Turkish-Israeli relations. A larger consequence of national identities based on the merger of ethnic and religious definitions is looming as the "Arab Spring" rolls into Fall, a Fall which will be marked with a very early freeze.
Democracy is dangerous. The power of this truth informed the thinking of the authors of the US Constitution and Bill of Rights. Democracy is nothing more or less than the popular expression of whatever fad, fancy, or fantasy can be employed effectively to move voters to mark one person's name preferentially.
Among the many fads, fancies, and fantasies which can be employed to this end, none are more powerful than nationalism and religion. The advocates of political Islam in Egypt, in Libya, in Tunisia, and elsewhere in the Arab Muslim states know this perfectly. Knowledge need only to be put into action.
In the classic treatment of revolution, Anatomy of Revolution, the author makes a key point. Although only ancient offensive insurgencies were considered in this book, the power of this one observation has been enhanced by each and every revolution which has succeeded in the post-World War II years.
The point?
Revolutions move to the extreme. That is to say, the group with the most radical agenda for change following the overthrow of the old regime will win. The reasons for this inevitable move to the extreme are few and simple. The more extreme the group, the more sweeping will be the changes contained in its agenda. In addition, the more extreme groups are tightly organized, their action plan is simple, easy to understand, and addresses fundamental fears and aspirations held by the majority of the public.
The Muslim Brotherhood, the Salifists, and others advocating political Islam are all tightly organized. All have agendas which are virtually interchangeable, making group merger thinkable. And, most importantly, all have action plans which are predicated on the strictures and requirements of Islam as well as the notions of dignity and pride resident in nationalism.
In all the countries involved in the dramatic events of the past nine months, the advocates of political Islam enjoy great advantage over their secular opponents. Not only are the assorted groups well organized and possessed of a radical agenda, all make profound appeals to both Islam and national pride. "Stand tall, you are Egyptian" is a chant virtually identical to the more recent, "Stand tall, you are Muslim."
The necessary inference from what has been observed and reported throughout the Mideast and North Africa is simply that Egypt, Libya, and perhaps others will move to the totalistic national sense of self which has been in play in Turkey and Israel. One implication of this trajectory is that Turkey will fail to reestablish the Ottoman Empire. Another, far more disturbing one considering all that has been at work in the Israeli political system is that war will become far more likely in the near to mid-term.
The next war will sneak up on the West. This is to be expected. The elites of the West generally discount nationalism as a spent force, a ancient relic which has outlived whatever usefulness it once may have possessed. At the same time, the Western elites of politics, the media, and academia pretend that religion does not exist as a real force in the lives of people and the policies of governments.
In the US, in the West, the leaders of state and molders of opinion alike will not see what is happening on the Arab streets and states alike. What will not be seen, cannot be prevented.
Pleasant thought, eh?
Thursday, September 8, 2011
What Is Erdogan Smoking?
The Islamist-leaning jefe grande of the AKP and prime minister of Turkey, Recip Erdogan, is proving to be something of a regional loose cannon. It is one thing to demand an apology from Israel for the badly mishandled boarding of the Mavi Marmora, but it is a far different matter to threaten war.
Make no mistake about it, the bellicose prime minister's promise/threat to provide naval cover for future "aid" flotillas headed for Gaza is the next best thing to a declaration of war against Israel. Erdogan might not like it, but the Israeli blockade of Hamas ruled Gaza does conform with international law as well as the customs of war at sea. That inconvenient truth has been made clear time after time, most recently in the Palmer Report. The report severely criticized the Israelis for the conduct of the blockade but emphasized that the blockade per se was and is totally legal.
This means that any Turkish naval units convoying the "aid" vessels would be seeking to break an internationally recognized and legal blockade by armed force. That is a pretty good operational definition of war. Perhaps the huffing and puffing PM did not realize that as he allowed his mouth to run away from adult supervision, but if the Turkish navy shoots, the Israelis will shoot back, just as sure as it is hot as hell in Texas.
Having made the promise/threat, the AKP government now had best hope that no pro-Palestinian group will take up the offer. Given that the "humanitarian" NGO behind the Mavi Marmora flotilla has very close ties to the government, it may be expected that at least that group, IHH, will be controllable. But there are many other entities willing to use the specious cover of humanitarian aid convoys to embarrass Israel and, given the Erdogan commitment, perhaps start a war which will end the Zionist menace once and for all.
Certainly there are enough entities, including both state and non-state actors, which fervently desire an end to Israel. Of these, most would be willing to manipulate a face off between Turkey and Israel into the long hoped for War of the Final Solution. Erdogan's promise/threat darn near invites some group to do just that.
There is the chance that Erdogan was motivated not only by his ambition to recreate the Ottoman Empire in an updated form but also by an exaggerated belief that his navy could simply intimidate the Israelis into allowing the Turk protected "aid" convoy to steam unimpaired to port in Gaza. The Turkish navy is much larger than its Israeli counterpart. The TCG has eight former US Perry class frigates as well as more modern classes including eight MEKO vessels. The Turks also can deploy an impressive number of smaller combatants headed by six French built corvettes.
The Israeli navy is small in comparison. However the almost microscopic coastal defense oriented IDF naval forces include three highly competent Dolphin class submarines whose tube launched missiles constitute a serious threat to any surface opponent. Far more importantly, any confrontation between Turk and Israeli would occur within very easy range of the Israeli land based air force. The Turks have no credible way of countering the Israeli air threat. Period.
Israeli air dominance means it is game, set, and match to those fighting under the blue and white flag of Israel.
Erdogan is apparently too busy contemplating his diplomatic brilliance to remember the hortatory advice which ended the sci-fi classic, The Thing, "Watch the skies!"
The Islamist PM has also overlooked the vast difference between impressing the Arab street with anti-Israeli oratory (very good) and saber rattling (which scares the hell out of the same street.) Turkey has gained a whale of a lot of traction in the Mideast by cocking a snoot at Israel by way of words and diplomatic rupture. This does not mean the Arabs or their governments, either new or old, are hoping for a return of the Ottoman Empire under any guise. Nor are all hands thrilled by the prospect of a new regional war whether initiated by intent or miscalculation.
The same dynamics and considerations apply to the second of Erdogan's promises/threats. The expansive, not to say delusional, PM also declared that the Turks will guarantee the maritime commons and subsea resources against Israeli exploitation. This is a more comprehensive commitment than the convoying of humanitarian flotillas. At the same time, it places the Turks in a more vulnerable position by greatly enlarging the possibility of starting a war of miscalculation. It also places Turkey in the role of regional semi-hegemon pretending that no one can drill below the water of the Eastern Mediterranean without Ankara's remit. This is a preposterous assertion which will alienate not only the government of Cyprus but a host of others as well.
Alienation takes many forms. And, alienation can have a host of consequences, none of which is positive from Ankara's perspective.
For example, the present Egyptian government (the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces) may be happy with the new military agreement between itself and Turkey. It may be pleased with the prospect of joint military, naval, and air exercises to be held early next year. But, neither SCAF nor any successor government other than one dominated by the more extreme Salifists would be thrilled by a joint war against Israel. After all, the Egyptians are a lot closer to Israel and know from experience what that can mean if the bullets fly and the bombs fall.
Every Arab state is too preoccupied currently with internal problems to seek a war. If a war of miscalculation would ensue after a Turk-Israeli shoot out at sea, there would be few Arabs rushing to the frontline. The Turks would find themselves rather alone in the matter.
Erdogan (who now deserves the Joe Biden Award) has no choice in the real world now other than to back down. Fortunately for him the walking back can be done quietly. He and the AKP will lose a bit of street cred, but that is preferable to losing a war.
Make no mistake about it, the bellicose prime minister's promise/threat to provide naval cover for future "aid" flotillas headed for Gaza is the next best thing to a declaration of war against Israel. Erdogan might not like it, but the Israeli blockade of Hamas ruled Gaza does conform with international law as well as the customs of war at sea. That inconvenient truth has been made clear time after time, most recently in the Palmer Report. The report severely criticized the Israelis for the conduct of the blockade but emphasized that the blockade per se was and is totally legal.
This means that any Turkish naval units convoying the "aid" vessels would be seeking to break an internationally recognized and legal blockade by armed force. That is a pretty good operational definition of war. Perhaps the huffing and puffing PM did not realize that as he allowed his mouth to run away from adult supervision, but if the Turkish navy shoots, the Israelis will shoot back, just as sure as it is hot as hell in Texas.
Having made the promise/threat, the AKP government now had best hope that no pro-Palestinian group will take up the offer. Given that the "humanitarian" NGO behind the Mavi Marmora flotilla has very close ties to the government, it may be expected that at least that group, IHH, will be controllable. But there are many other entities willing to use the specious cover of humanitarian aid convoys to embarrass Israel and, given the Erdogan commitment, perhaps start a war which will end the Zionist menace once and for all.
Certainly there are enough entities, including both state and non-state actors, which fervently desire an end to Israel. Of these, most would be willing to manipulate a face off between Turkey and Israel into the long hoped for War of the Final Solution. Erdogan's promise/threat darn near invites some group to do just that.
There is the chance that Erdogan was motivated not only by his ambition to recreate the Ottoman Empire in an updated form but also by an exaggerated belief that his navy could simply intimidate the Israelis into allowing the Turk protected "aid" convoy to steam unimpaired to port in Gaza. The Turkish navy is much larger than its Israeli counterpart. The TCG has eight former US Perry class frigates as well as more modern classes including eight MEKO vessels. The Turks also can deploy an impressive number of smaller combatants headed by six French built corvettes.
The Israeli navy is small in comparison. However the almost microscopic coastal defense oriented IDF naval forces include three highly competent Dolphin class submarines whose tube launched missiles constitute a serious threat to any surface opponent. Far more importantly, any confrontation between Turk and Israeli would occur within very easy range of the Israeli land based air force. The Turks have no credible way of countering the Israeli air threat. Period.
Israeli air dominance means it is game, set, and match to those fighting under the blue and white flag of Israel.
Erdogan is apparently too busy contemplating his diplomatic brilliance to remember the hortatory advice which ended the sci-fi classic, The Thing, "Watch the skies!"
The Islamist PM has also overlooked the vast difference between impressing the Arab street with anti-Israeli oratory (very good) and saber rattling (which scares the hell out of the same street.) Turkey has gained a whale of a lot of traction in the Mideast by cocking a snoot at Israel by way of words and diplomatic rupture. This does not mean the Arabs or their governments, either new or old, are hoping for a return of the Ottoman Empire under any guise. Nor are all hands thrilled by the prospect of a new regional war whether initiated by intent or miscalculation.
The same dynamics and considerations apply to the second of Erdogan's promises/threats. The expansive, not to say delusional, PM also declared that the Turks will guarantee the maritime commons and subsea resources against Israeli exploitation. This is a more comprehensive commitment than the convoying of humanitarian flotillas. At the same time, it places the Turks in a more vulnerable position by greatly enlarging the possibility of starting a war of miscalculation. It also places Turkey in the role of regional semi-hegemon pretending that no one can drill below the water of the Eastern Mediterranean without Ankara's remit. This is a preposterous assertion which will alienate not only the government of Cyprus but a host of others as well.
Alienation takes many forms. And, alienation can have a host of consequences, none of which is positive from Ankara's perspective.
For example, the present Egyptian government (the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces) may be happy with the new military agreement between itself and Turkey. It may be pleased with the prospect of joint military, naval, and air exercises to be held early next year. But, neither SCAF nor any successor government other than one dominated by the more extreme Salifists would be thrilled by a joint war against Israel. After all, the Egyptians are a lot closer to Israel and know from experience what that can mean if the bullets fly and the bombs fall.
Every Arab state is too preoccupied currently with internal problems to seek a war. If a war of miscalculation would ensue after a Turk-Israeli shoot out at sea, there would be few Arabs rushing to the frontline. The Turks would find themselves rather alone in the matter.
Erdogan (who now deserves the Joe Biden Award) has no choice in the real world now other than to back down. Fortunately for him the walking back can be done quietly. He and the AKP will lose a bit of street cred, but that is preferable to losing a war.
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Yes, Bibi, Great States Do Apologize
The apparent center of gravity in the current degradation of relations between Turkey and Israel is the failure of the latter to offer an acceptable, formal apology for the nine deaths which occurred at the hands of IDF personnel during the encounter between Israel and the utterly bogus "relief" flotilla headed by the Mavi Marmora. The Palmer Report concluded that while Israel had international law and custom on its side as regarded the naval blockade of the Gaza Strip, the enforcement of the blockade as well as the resultant deaths constituted an egregious act of overreach.
The incident on board the ship handed anti-Israeli elements, including the Islamist leaning AKP government of Turkey a heaven sent opportunity to make much propaganda at the expense of the Jewish state. In this context the Turks have demanded repeatedly that Israel not only provide compensation for those wounded and killed by IDF members but also provide an acceptable apology. Israel has agreed to compensation but has balked over the idea of an apology. Prime minister Netanyahu has maintained that doing so would damage Israeli public morale among other sinister things. In this he has been backed (or exceeded) by the always ready to breath fire foreign minister, Lieberman. The far right of the Israeli political spectrum has been monolithic in the rejectionist stance adopted by Netanyahu.
It seems that the Netanyahu government believes that an apology for an action seen as being defensive in nature and not overdone in view of the provocations offered by activists on board the Mavi Marmora who were armed with bludgeons and similar weapons would somehow lessen Israel in the eyes of its citizens and the world generally. This is an utterly specious notion.
The first reason for declaring the Netanyahu stance specious is simply that the raid was poorly conceived and even more poorly executed. It seems preposterously arrogant that the raid's planners and commanders did not anticipate any armed resistance to the IDF boarding party. Did these experienced military officers really, really believe the activists sponsored by a group with a long record of hostility to Israel would not seek a confrontation? Or, were they of the view that the simple arrival of the dreaded IDF would cause an instant collapse of will on the part of the activists? Either flies in the face of both experience and realistic military planning.
To put it bluntly, the boarding was as badly botched as, for example, the special operations force attempt in Somalia twenty years back which resulted in Blackhawk down. The IDF blew it pure and simple when they mounted the assault. This is not a mark against the troops who fast roped down to decks filled with men ready and eager for a violent confrontation, men who were willing to court and accept death at the hands of the IDF, men willing to be martyrs for the faith and the cause.
Apologizing for your own side's errors is no shame--only a transient embarrassment for those in charge. Admitting that better thinking, better planning, better timing, better methods and tactics would have resulted in a death free takeover of the ship is no sin, no humiliation, but rather an expression of a willingness and capacity to learn from mistakes.
The second reason the Netanyahu posture is specious not to say vacuous is simply that great nations can and do apologize. By this the Geek does not mean the bogus exercises of mea culpa engaged in by President Obama for American "transgressions" both real and imagined but in all cases resident in the far distant past. No, the Geek means such examples as that provided by General Stanley McChrystal, sitting, legs crossed, feet bootless, on the rug covered floor of an Afghan stone hut apologizing for fatalities inflicted by forces under his command upon civilians, upon members of the family in whose house he sat.
The humble, human gesture of offering apologies for lives cut short in no way humiliated the general, nor the forces in his command, nor the nation in whose service he and his people fought. Rather, it demonstrated that a great and powerful country disposing military force of nearly unlimited power could admit it did inadvertent wrong, wreaked unintended havoc and death--and, most importantly, could acknowledge and apologize for it.
Unlike General McChrystal, there will be no need for Mr Netanyahu to face the kin of those who died at the hands of the IDF. Mr Netanyhu will not have to take off his shoes, sit on the floor, and personally say, "I am truly sorry for the deaths my men caused and the pain inflicted upon you by our actions. Mr Netanahu can do the job by written words, words carefully crafted by diplomats and vetted by politicians, words which can be totally insincere provided they do not read as such. It can be an antiseptic charade without any requirement for the direct person-to-person dynamic which involved McChrystal.
True, the Turks will crow over an apology. The Erdogan government will distort it, use it to advance Turkey's status in its ambitious plan of a neo-Ottoman Empire. That will be to the shame of Ankara not Israel. And, it is debatable that the resultant propaganda will be any more destructive of Israel's interests than is the ongoing festering crisis of diplomacy and trade.
Best of all, the issuance of an apology puts the ball back in the Turk's court. The apology would place the onus on Ankara to put up or shut up, to restore the status quo ante or admit the whole issue was false, a gambit intended to put Israel on the unending defensive, a way to back out of the previous policy of cooperation between the two countries. This manner of clarification is in Israel's interest, is it not?
Get a grip, Mr Netanyahu! An apology is in your interests. It is in the better interests of your country. Offering one will not diminish Israel; it will buff the country's image and status around the world and in the US. It will not even bruise your ego. It might even enhance your sense of self. It will have been you who called the Erdogan bluff.
The incident on board the ship handed anti-Israeli elements, including the Islamist leaning AKP government of Turkey a heaven sent opportunity to make much propaganda at the expense of the Jewish state. In this context the Turks have demanded repeatedly that Israel not only provide compensation for those wounded and killed by IDF members but also provide an acceptable apology. Israel has agreed to compensation but has balked over the idea of an apology. Prime minister Netanyahu has maintained that doing so would damage Israeli public morale among other sinister things. In this he has been backed (or exceeded) by the always ready to breath fire foreign minister, Lieberman. The far right of the Israeli political spectrum has been monolithic in the rejectionist stance adopted by Netanyahu.
It seems that the Netanyahu government believes that an apology for an action seen as being defensive in nature and not overdone in view of the provocations offered by activists on board the Mavi Marmora who were armed with bludgeons and similar weapons would somehow lessen Israel in the eyes of its citizens and the world generally. This is an utterly specious notion.
The first reason for declaring the Netanyahu stance specious is simply that the raid was poorly conceived and even more poorly executed. It seems preposterously arrogant that the raid's planners and commanders did not anticipate any armed resistance to the IDF boarding party. Did these experienced military officers really, really believe the activists sponsored by a group with a long record of hostility to Israel would not seek a confrontation? Or, were they of the view that the simple arrival of the dreaded IDF would cause an instant collapse of will on the part of the activists? Either flies in the face of both experience and realistic military planning.
To put it bluntly, the boarding was as badly botched as, for example, the special operations force attempt in Somalia twenty years back which resulted in Blackhawk down. The IDF blew it pure and simple when they mounted the assault. This is not a mark against the troops who fast roped down to decks filled with men ready and eager for a violent confrontation, men who were willing to court and accept death at the hands of the IDF, men willing to be martyrs for the faith and the cause.
Apologizing for your own side's errors is no shame--only a transient embarrassment for those in charge. Admitting that better thinking, better planning, better timing, better methods and tactics would have resulted in a death free takeover of the ship is no sin, no humiliation, but rather an expression of a willingness and capacity to learn from mistakes.
The second reason the Netanyahu posture is specious not to say vacuous is simply that great nations can and do apologize. By this the Geek does not mean the bogus exercises of mea culpa engaged in by President Obama for American "transgressions" both real and imagined but in all cases resident in the far distant past. No, the Geek means such examples as that provided by General Stanley McChrystal, sitting, legs crossed, feet bootless, on the rug covered floor of an Afghan stone hut apologizing for fatalities inflicted by forces under his command upon civilians, upon members of the family in whose house he sat.
The humble, human gesture of offering apologies for lives cut short in no way humiliated the general, nor the forces in his command, nor the nation in whose service he and his people fought. Rather, it demonstrated that a great and powerful country disposing military force of nearly unlimited power could admit it did inadvertent wrong, wreaked unintended havoc and death--and, most importantly, could acknowledge and apologize for it.
Unlike General McChrystal, there will be no need for Mr Netanyahu to face the kin of those who died at the hands of the IDF. Mr Netanyhu will not have to take off his shoes, sit on the floor, and personally say, "I am truly sorry for the deaths my men caused and the pain inflicted upon you by our actions. Mr Netanahu can do the job by written words, words carefully crafted by diplomats and vetted by politicians, words which can be totally insincere provided they do not read as such. It can be an antiseptic charade without any requirement for the direct person-to-person dynamic which involved McChrystal.
True, the Turks will crow over an apology. The Erdogan government will distort it, use it to advance Turkey's status in its ambitious plan of a neo-Ottoman Empire. That will be to the shame of Ankara not Israel. And, it is debatable that the resultant propaganda will be any more destructive of Israel's interests than is the ongoing festering crisis of diplomacy and trade.
Best of all, the issuance of an apology puts the ball back in the Turk's court. The apology would place the onus on Ankara to put up or shut up, to restore the status quo ante or admit the whole issue was false, a gambit intended to put Israel on the unending defensive, a way to back out of the previous policy of cooperation between the two countries. This manner of clarification is in Israel's interest, is it not?
Get a grip, Mr Netanyahu! An apology is in your interests. It is in the better interests of your country. Offering one will not diminish Israel; it will buff the country's image and status around the world and in the US. It will not even bruise your ego. It might even enhance your sense of self. It will have been you who called the Erdogan bluff.
Monday, September 5, 2011
Turkey's Foreign Policy--Clever Calculation Or Flat Out Stupid
Until very recently, the announced foreign policy of Turkey under the Islamist leaning AKP has been one of "zero problems" with its regional neighbors. This exercise in fantasy started to crumble under the bitter winds of the "Arab Spring."
Ankara did not know whether to go with the new flow or stand resolutely alongside the embattled regimes of Hosni Mubarak and Muammar Qaddafi. The Erdogan government blew first hot and then cold on the uprisings in Bahrain. The name of the Turkish diplomatic game regarding Syria was vacillation.
After a long period of agonizing indecision, Ankara finally did come down on the side of the Egyptian protesters. Then, after more of the same, the Turks reluctantly sided with the Libyan rebels. In the latter case, it is not trivial to note that Ankara robustly opposed the use of force--either to protect civilians or to provide the anti-government forces with an air capacity.
Only after the longest possible period of watching and waiting did the Erdogan government come out publicly against Bashar al-Assad. The delay and equivocation in this case was due to a powerful desire in Ankara not to damage their rapprochement with Tehran. Possibly this was enhanced by the pending announcement of the decision to host the basing of the new American X band radar on Turkish soil, a move which would raise the hackles of the ayatollahs.
The alternative to irritating Iran over Syria was to court further distancing from the majority of the Arab street which was strongly supportive of the "Arab Spring" movements and saw the Syrians as martyrs to the cause of freedom. Biting the bullet, Erdogan and his fellow Islamists denounced the Assad regime as having lost Turkish governmental "confidence."
The Syrian demarch was too little too late to satisfy the pro-freedom groups proliferating in the Mideast to the disadvantage of Ankara's desire to recreate the Ottoman days. At the same time, the twin moves of condemning Syria and accepting the X band radar did infuriate the ayatollahs and their frontmen. By poor timing, the Turks fell between the two stools and emasculated the "zero problems" gambit.
The effect has been to put more pressure on Erdogan to take the strongest possible anti-Israel stance. Only by Israel baiting of the highest sort could Turkey hope to keep or rebuild its stature not only on the Arab street but within the chanceries of the region.
The attractions of playing the Israel card are self-evident. Erdogan came to prominence in 2009 by stalking off the stage at Davos while loudly accusing Israel president Peres of being a "murderer." The next year the Israelis enhanced Erdogan's status as the champion of the Palestinians by a heavy handed but legal stopping of the bogus aid flotilla with nine fatal casualties among those on board the lead ship. Ever since that day, the Erdogan government has made rich PR hay by flogging the dead horse of the Mavi Marmora. Most recently his demand for an apology has been reinforced by a downgrading of diplomatic relations between Israel and Turkey with highly positive results among the denizens of the Arab street.
The escalation of the diplomatic contretemps has assured Turkey's "zero problems" is not only defunct but stinkingly so. The sickly sweet smell of death hangs around Turkey's regional diplomacy.
As if alienating the Iranians, the Israelis, the Libyans, the Egyptians, and the Syrians was not enough, Ankara has undertaken a number of high casualty attacks by air and artillery against targets in Iraqi Kurdistan. The series of air strikes and artillery stonks was purportedly in retaliation for an ambush conducted on Turkish soil by members of PKK, the long lived Kurdish insurgent group seeking the creation of a true Kurdish state.
It is true that PKK has sanctuary in Iraqi Kurdistan. So does the group PJK which has been waging low intensity war against the Iranians. It is this geographic and political locus which gives Tehran and Ankara a coinciding national interest. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps stages the same sort of hyperactive response to guerrilla attacks as does the Turkish army.
Stripped to its essentials, both Turkey and Iran have been waging undeclared international war against Iraq. While the Shia dominated pseudo-government in Baghdad sheds no tears for dead Iraqi Kurds, the recent attacks by Turkey have produced an unacceptable number of civilian deaths and, thus, have cast doubt upon the Baghdad government's will and ability to guarantee the integrity of its national borders. This is a very poor idea just months before the final expulsion of the Americans from Iraq.
One more problem for the Turks "zero problems" approach to regional life.
It is not out of line to wonder when the Iraqi Kurds will say, "Enough is enough" and move robustly to protect their own population regardless of what the Shias of Baghdad may want. The Kurdish peshmerga are numerous, well armed, very well motivated, and reasonably well armed. They have the advantage of fighting on home ground in terrain which favors the defense.
The Turks have deployed a regimental sized combat group near to the Iraqi border. This as well as recent oratory from Erdogan's boys seems to indicate a ground assault may be in the offing. The Turks have done this in the past with limited results--if any. In the past they have gotten away with incursions but may find the going far more difficult in the future--if the Kurds allow the peshmerga to return fire.
Of course, this will present the Obama administration with a very real challenge. They will have to placate the Turks, if such is possible. They will have to deter the Kurds, if such is possible. They will have to work overtime to prevent a defacto split of Iraq into an Arab Iraq and a Kurdish Kurdistan. Given that the US has no leverage in Baghdad and the Turk's decision to allow basing of the X band radar gives them the whip hand, it is difficult to see what the US can do in the event the Turkish army moves into Iraqi Kurdistan and meets resistance from the provincial militia.
The "zero problems" stance bodes well to be replaced in reality with a "problems everywhere" policy. The Deep Thinkers of the AKP have to decide where Turkey's national interests reside. True, it would be best for Ankara if it could be the balancing point between the West and the Muslim states of the Mideast and Central Asia, but it seems the reach of Turkish ambitions far outstrips the competence of its policy grasp. Thus, it seems appropriate that the Turks decide if it is better for their longer term interests to back down and align with the West as has been the case for the past sixty plus years or side with the mullahs, the ayatollahs, the imams of the Muslim states including Iran and Pakistan but against the Saudis and the other Gulf countries.
Erdogan is obviously a good politician in the context of Turkey. But, like other good politicians he has made the mistake of conflating public adulation with total support. As Woodrow Wilson learned nearly a century ago at Versailles, there is a world of difference between cheers on the street and cutting effective policy deals with foreign leaders. Applause is nice, but policy success is much better.
Well, just one more problem for the "zero problems" guy.
Ankara did not know whether to go with the new flow or stand resolutely alongside the embattled regimes of Hosni Mubarak and Muammar Qaddafi. The Erdogan government blew first hot and then cold on the uprisings in Bahrain. The name of the Turkish diplomatic game regarding Syria was vacillation.
After a long period of agonizing indecision, Ankara finally did come down on the side of the Egyptian protesters. Then, after more of the same, the Turks reluctantly sided with the Libyan rebels. In the latter case, it is not trivial to note that Ankara robustly opposed the use of force--either to protect civilians or to provide the anti-government forces with an air capacity.
Only after the longest possible period of watching and waiting did the Erdogan government come out publicly against Bashar al-Assad. The delay and equivocation in this case was due to a powerful desire in Ankara not to damage their rapprochement with Tehran. Possibly this was enhanced by the pending announcement of the decision to host the basing of the new American X band radar on Turkish soil, a move which would raise the hackles of the ayatollahs.
The alternative to irritating Iran over Syria was to court further distancing from the majority of the Arab street which was strongly supportive of the "Arab Spring" movements and saw the Syrians as martyrs to the cause of freedom. Biting the bullet, Erdogan and his fellow Islamists denounced the Assad regime as having lost Turkish governmental "confidence."
The Syrian demarch was too little too late to satisfy the pro-freedom groups proliferating in the Mideast to the disadvantage of Ankara's desire to recreate the Ottoman days. At the same time, the twin moves of condemning Syria and accepting the X band radar did infuriate the ayatollahs and their frontmen. By poor timing, the Turks fell between the two stools and emasculated the "zero problems" gambit.
The effect has been to put more pressure on Erdogan to take the strongest possible anti-Israel stance. Only by Israel baiting of the highest sort could Turkey hope to keep or rebuild its stature not only on the Arab street but within the chanceries of the region.
The attractions of playing the Israel card are self-evident. Erdogan came to prominence in 2009 by stalking off the stage at Davos while loudly accusing Israel president Peres of being a "murderer." The next year the Israelis enhanced Erdogan's status as the champion of the Palestinians by a heavy handed but legal stopping of the bogus aid flotilla with nine fatal casualties among those on board the lead ship. Ever since that day, the Erdogan government has made rich PR hay by flogging the dead horse of the Mavi Marmora. Most recently his demand for an apology has been reinforced by a downgrading of diplomatic relations between Israel and Turkey with highly positive results among the denizens of the Arab street.
The escalation of the diplomatic contretemps has assured Turkey's "zero problems" is not only defunct but stinkingly so. The sickly sweet smell of death hangs around Turkey's regional diplomacy.
As if alienating the Iranians, the Israelis, the Libyans, the Egyptians, and the Syrians was not enough, Ankara has undertaken a number of high casualty attacks by air and artillery against targets in Iraqi Kurdistan. The series of air strikes and artillery stonks was purportedly in retaliation for an ambush conducted on Turkish soil by members of PKK, the long lived Kurdish insurgent group seeking the creation of a true Kurdish state.
It is true that PKK has sanctuary in Iraqi Kurdistan. So does the group PJK which has been waging low intensity war against the Iranians. It is this geographic and political locus which gives Tehran and Ankara a coinciding national interest. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps stages the same sort of hyperactive response to guerrilla attacks as does the Turkish army.
Stripped to its essentials, both Turkey and Iran have been waging undeclared international war against Iraq. While the Shia dominated pseudo-government in Baghdad sheds no tears for dead Iraqi Kurds, the recent attacks by Turkey have produced an unacceptable number of civilian deaths and, thus, have cast doubt upon the Baghdad government's will and ability to guarantee the integrity of its national borders. This is a very poor idea just months before the final expulsion of the Americans from Iraq.
One more problem for the Turks "zero problems" approach to regional life.
It is not out of line to wonder when the Iraqi Kurds will say, "Enough is enough" and move robustly to protect their own population regardless of what the Shias of Baghdad may want. The Kurdish peshmerga are numerous, well armed, very well motivated, and reasonably well armed. They have the advantage of fighting on home ground in terrain which favors the defense.
The Turks have deployed a regimental sized combat group near to the Iraqi border. This as well as recent oratory from Erdogan's boys seems to indicate a ground assault may be in the offing. The Turks have done this in the past with limited results--if any. In the past they have gotten away with incursions but may find the going far more difficult in the future--if the Kurds allow the peshmerga to return fire.
Of course, this will present the Obama administration with a very real challenge. They will have to placate the Turks, if such is possible. They will have to deter the Kurds, if such is possible. They will have to work overtime to prevent a defacto split of Iraq into an Arab Iraq and a Kurdish Kurdistan. Given that the US has no leverage in Baghdad and the Turk's decision to allow basing of the X band radar gives them the whip hand, it is difficult to see what the US can do in the event the Turkish army moves into Iraqi Kurdistan and meets resistance from the provincial militia.
The "zero problems" stance bodes well to be replaced in reality with a "problems everywhere" policy. The Deep Thinkers of the AKP have to decide where Turkey's national interests reside. True, it would be best for Ankara if it could be the balancing point between the West and the Muslim states of the Mideast and Central Asia, but it seems the reach of Turkish ambitions far outstrips the competence of its policy grasp. Thus, it seems appropriate that the Turks decide if it is better for their longer term interests to back down and align with the West as has been the case for the past sixty plus years or side with the mullahs, the ayatollahs, the imams of the Muslim states including Iran and Pakistan but against the Saudis and the other Gulf countries.
Erdogan is obviously a good politician in the context of Turkey. But, like other good politicians he has made the mistake of conflating public adulation with total support. As Woodrow Wilson learned nearly a century ago at Versailles, there is a world of difference between cheers on the street and cutting effective policy deals with foreign leaders. Applause is nice, but policy success is much better.
Well, just one more problem for the "zero problems" guy.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
A Slick Trip Down The Islamist Tubes?
The Islamist AKP has gained an apparent unassailable superiority over the armed forces of Turkey. The shocking simultaneous "early retirement" of the military chief of staff and three other service commanders over the weekend seemed to have put the final nail in the coffin of the military's role as the ultimate guarantor of Turkish secularism and the legacy of Ataturk.
The act came on the eve of the semi-annual meeting of the combined armed forces senior leadership with the head of the civilian government, the prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and has been seen by many observers, Turkish as well as foreign, as a welcome sign of Turkey having become a normal democracy where civilian supremacy over the military is a given. In the past, there has been a great deal of discomfort in the US and Western Europe over the periodic military excursions out of the barracks and into the presidential palace. The European Union (or at least France) demanded that the armed forces be defanged as a prerequisite for membership.
The recent mass resignation must be taken in conjunction with the ongoing trial of nearly three hundred past and present senior commanders (ten percent or so of the entire flag officer complement) on charges which are at best politically motivated and most likely fabricated in whole or major part. The massive series of arrests over the past year or so constituted the AKP's direct attack on the military, which was the only plausible obstacle to permanent Islamist domination of Turkish politics.
The armed forces and AKP have been at daggers drawn since the once-banned AKP won power in 2002. The military missed its chance to send the Islamists packing in the wake of the narrow electoral victory mainly out of regard for EU sentiments and a proper regard for the benefits of EU membership. As the years slipped by, the chances for a military coup slipped away until they were lost beyond any hope in the most recent election where AKP took no prisoners at the polls.
Erdogan had made much of his stated intent to pursue EU membership even though it was more than slightly obvious that France would spare no effort to block the application. The economic success of the AKP has been based not on trade with the EU but upon increased ties with the Mideast and the Turkish speaking Central Asian Republics. In the process, a new class of very rich middlemen and entrepreneurs drawn from urban migrants originating in the Anatolian highlands has become a key component of the AKP base. These new millionaires join with displaced peasants in the slums of Istanbul and Ankara and "conservative" clerics to provide the electoral majority.
The rivals to the AKP drive to the east have been the senior officers of the armed forces along with the "traditional" business and commercial elite of Istanbul. The military has at its upper ranks men who are far more Western in their outlook, far more liberal in their views as well as far more educated than the mass of the political class and the new moneyed class. Their instinctive perspective is Western. That of AKP and its base runs to the East, to the Muslim marches of Central and Northwest Asia--and the states of the old Ottoman Empire.
The seemingly decisive victory of AKP over the inheritors of Ataturk is not universally welcomed in Turkey. There are more than a few Turks who fear that without the army as a counterweight there will be no limits on Erdogan and AKP. There is an undercurrent of apprehension that now the Islamists will be free to pursue the goal of reestablishing the old caliphate with all that implies. Others, unsurprisingly, pooh-pooh that notion and welcome AKP confining the armed forces to a subordinate role and, thus, allowing a return to the values and norms of the pre-Ataturk era.
Very few Turks are aghast at the new diplomatic muscle enjoyed by Ankara in the Mideast and Central Asia. Likewise, very few resent the new economic options brought by the "Ost politik" practiced by Erdogan. Other than some trepidations over Turkey's ever closer ties to Shia Iran, there have been few complaints over the foreign policy of Erdogan and company. There is definitely majority support for the very hard line drawn by Erdogan over Israel, particularly the IDF takeover of the Mazi Marmora "humanitarian relief" ship over a year ago.
The net effect has been the tilting of the longstanding conflict between nationalist and Islamist, secularist and Islamist in favor of the latter. For the moment this is just jake with the majority of Turks. But, there is likely to be a quick withdrawal of support for AKP should there be heavy handed attempts to "purify" Turkish society of "infidel" aspects. So far, the party has been sensitive to this dynamic and has moved only slowly to "Islamify" Turkey.
Almost overlooked in the political discussions of the resignations has been another, critical subject: The impact of Turkey's Muslim oriented "Ost politik" on NATO. In as much as Turkey's membership in the alliance has been considered, it has been in the boilerplate terms of "NATO's second largest army." As if size matters.
Turkey's large army is also quite irrelevant to NATO in the post-cold war period. Not only is the army incapable of any effective action outside of Turkey, it has not shown any particular utility in the local "forever war" against the Kurdish defensive insurgency. Pace NATO public statements (or those of Admiral Mullen), the armed forces of Turkey are totally irrelevant to NATO today and into the future.
The armed forces of Turkey, while large, are also largely immobile, poorly trained, indifferently equipped, overly expensive, a drain on the Turkish fisc, and a political drag on the alliance. The new Erdogan ministry strongly opposed the US driven invasion of Iraq making much political hay from proclaiming the operation as a "war on Islam and Muslims." In addition, the Turks have been a major non-participant in the NATO mission in Afghanistan. And, the AKP government bitterly opposed the no-fly zone and its follow-on in Libya.
There is no reason not to believe that Turkey has passed along critical NATO information to Iran as a part of its charm offensive with Tehran. The same may be true regarding the opposition in Afghanistan and, possibly, Libya. Having Turkey in NATO today is tantamount to having the Italy of Mussolini sitting in on the Anglo-American Combined Chiefs of Staff during World War II.
If it is true, as it appears to be, that the Islamists have won in Turkey, the time has come to restructure NATO without Ankara. The hoary alliance is at a difficult crossroads. There is looming, embarrassing failure in Libya joining with the rush for the exit in Afghanistan to undercut any lingering credibility accruing to it. Given further that most NATO members have shown an ability to hit the funding targets akin to the performance of a visually impaired sniper, the time is now to rethink the alliance. The time is now to contemplate the impossible: The dissolution of NATO.
It is questionable whether or not NATO has any utility or even relevance to the world of now and tomorrow where the major enemy of any and all civilized states are the advocates of violent political Islam. The best way for civilized states to counter the threat resides not with NATO or any other Cold War artifact but rather with "coalitions of the willing," ad hoc structures of states with coinciding national interests which perceive the threat from violent political Islam or the challenges presented by any particular failed, failing, or hollow state in similar ways.
As George H.W. Bush showed during the Gulf War, the ad hoc coalition can work well provided the necessary preliminary diplomatic work is done with care. Even George W. Bush's ham handed counterparts worked reasonably well. In comparison, the NATO effort in Libya has been an example of how not to go about the task. While this can (correctly) be blamed on the relative absence of the US from the shooting war, the real lesson to be learned is that the effort was not undertaken by a genuine coalition of the willing.
The AKP has taken Turkey away from the West. Its lurch to the lands of Islam is understandable and even forgivable. It is, after all, a choice made by the Turkish electorate--at least up to a point. We can have no beef about it.
Rather, we should embrace the Turkish policy. We should use the stimulus to take a long hard look at the role of NATO in our alliance system, and jettison it as currently constituted unless a very strong argument can be made for its continuation. The inclusion of Turkey was contextual to the cold war; it has no permanent root in the Atlantic community. This is the geographical, cultural, and political reality. We should admit it with at least as much honesty as have the Turks.
The ideological and political blocs of the world have reformed since the end of the bi-polar world. Turkey has recognized this. The AKP has acknowledged bluntly that religion and language ties trump the artifacts of global alliance politics. Erdogan and company have chosen their side.
The US and Western Europe can and should do no less.
The act came on the eve of the semi-annual meeting of the combined armed forces senior leadership with the head of the civilian government, the prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and has been seen by many observers, Turkish as well as foreign, as a welcome sign of Turkey having become a normal democracy where civilian supremacy over the military is a given. In the past, there has been a great deal of discomfort in the US and Western Europe over the periodic military excursions out of the barracks and into the presidential palace. The European Union (or at least France) demanded that the armed forces be defanged as a prerequisite for membership.
The recent mass resignation must be taken in conjunction with the ongoing trial of nearly three hundred past and present senior commanders (ten percent or so of the entire flag officer complement) on charges which are at best politically motivated and most likely fabricated in whole or major part. The massive series of arrests over the past year or so constituted the AKP's direct attack on the military, which was the only plausible obstacle to permanent Islamist domination of Turkish politics.
The armed forces and AKP have been at daggers drawn since the once-banned AKP won power in 2002. The military missed its chance to send the Islamists packing in the wake of the narrow electoral victory mainly out of regard for EU sentiments and a proper regard for the benefits of EU membership. As the years slipped by, the chances for a military coup slipped away until they were lost beyond any hope in the most recent election where AKP took no prisoners at the polls.
Erdogan had made much of his stated intent to pursue EU membership even though it was more than slightly obvious that France would spare no effort to block the application. The economic success of the AKP has been based not on trade with the EU but upon increased ties with the Mideast and the Turkish speaking Central Asian Republics. In the process, a new class of very rich middlemen and entrepreneurs drawn from urban migrants originating in the Anatolian highlands has become a key component of the AKP base. These new millionaires join with displaced peasants in the slums of Istanbul and Ankara and "conservative" clerics to provide the electoral majority.
The rivals to the AKP drive to the east have been the senior officers of the armed forces along with the "traditional" business and commercial elite of Istanbul. The military has at its upper ranks men who are far more Western in their outlook, far more liberal in their views as well as far more educated than the mass of the political class and the new moneyed class. Their instinctive perspective is Western. That of AKP and its base runs to the East, to the Muslim marches of Central and Northwest Asia--and the states of the old Ottoman Empire.
The seemingly decisive victory of AKP over the inheritors of Ataturk is not universally welcomed in Turkey. There are more than a few Turks who fear that without the army as a counterweight there will be no limits on Erdogan and AKP. There is an undercurrent of apprehension that now the Islamists will be free to pursue the goal of reestablishing the old caliphate with all that implies. Others, unsurprisingly, pooh-pooh that notion and welcome AKP confining the armed forces to a subordinate role and, thus, allowing a return to the values and norms of the pre-Ataturk era.
Very few Turks are aghast at the new diplomatic muscle enjoyed by Ankara in the Mideast and Central Asia. Likewise, very few resent the new economic options brought by the "Ost politik" practiced by Erdogan. Other than some trepidations over Turkey's ever closer ties to Shia Iran, there have been few complaints over the foreign policy of Erdogan and company. There is definitely majority support for the very hard line drawn by Erdogan over Israel, particularly the IDF takeover of the Mazi Marmora "humanitarian relief" ship over a year ago.
The net effect has been the tilting of the longstanding conflict between nationalist and Islamist, secularist and Islamist in favor of the latter. For the moment this is just jake with the majority of Turks. But, there is likely to be a quick withdrawal of support for AKP should there be heavy handed attempts to "purify" Turkish society of "infidel" aspects. So far, the party has been sensitive to this dynamic and has moved only slowly to "Islamify" Turkey.
Almost overlooked in the political discussions of the resignations has been another, critical subject: The impact of Turkey's Muslim oriented "Ost politik" on NATO. In as much as Turkey's membership in the alliance has been considered, it has been in the boilerplate terms of "NATO's second largest army." As if size matters.
Turkey's large army is also quite irrelevant to NATO in the post-cold war period. Not only is the army incapable of any effective action outside of Turkey, it has not shown any particular utility in the local "forever war" against the Kurdish defensive insurgency. Pace NATO public statements (or those of Admiral Mullen), the armed forces of Turkey are totally irrelevant to NATO today and into the future.
The armed forces of Turkey, while large, are also largely immobile, poorly trained, indifferently equipped, overly expensive, a drain on the Turkish fisc, and a political drag on the alliance. The new Erdogan ministry strongly opposed the US driven invasion of Iraq making much political hay from proclaiming the operation as a "war on Islam and Muslims." In addition, the Turks have been a major non-participant in the NATO mission in Afghanistan. And, the AKP government bitterly opposed the no-fly zone and its follow-on in Libya.
There is no reason not to believe that Turkey has passed along critical NATO information to Iran as a part of its charm offensive with Tehran. The same may be true regarding the opposition in Afghanistan and, possibly, Libya. Having Turkey in NATO today is tantamount to having the Italy of Mussolini sitting in on the Anglo-American Combined Chiefs of Staff during World War II.
If it is true, as it appears to be, that the Islamists have won in Turkey, the time has come to restructure NATO without Ankara. The hoary alliance is at a difficult crossroads. There is looming, embarrassing failure in Libya joining with the rush for the exit in Afghanistan to undercut any lingering credibility accruing to it. Given further that most NATO members have shown an ability to hit the funding targets akin to the performance of a visually impaired sniper, the time is now to rethink the alliance. The time is now to contemplate the impossible: The dissolution of NATO.
It is questionable whether or not NATO has any utility or even relevance to the world of now and tomorrow where the major enemy of any and all civilized states are the advocates of violent political Islam. The best way for civilized states to counter the threat resides not with NATO or any other Cold War artifact but rather with "coalitions of the willing," ad hoc structures of states with coinciding national interests which perceive the threat from violent political Islam or the challenges presented by any particular failed, failing, or hollow state in similar ways.
As George H.W. Bush showed during the Gulf War, the ad hoc coalition can work well provided the necessary preliminary diplomatic work is done with care. Even George W. Bush's ham handed counterparts worked reasonably well. In comparison, the NATO effort in Libya has been an example of how not to go about the task. While this can (correctly) be blamed on the relative absence of the US from the shooting war, the real lesson to be learned is that the effort was not undertaken by a genuine coalition of the willing.
The AKP has taken Turkey away from the West. Its lurch to the lands of Islam is understandable and even forgivable. It is, after all, a choice made by the Turkish electorate--at least up to a point. We can have no beef about it.
Rather, we should embrace the Turkish policy. We should use the stimulus to take a long hard look at the role of NATO in our alliance system, and jettison it as currently constituted unless a very strong argument can be made for its continuation. The inclusion of Turkey was contextual to the cold war; it has no permanent root in the Atlantic community. This is the geographical, cultural, and political reality. We should admit it with at least as much honesty as have the Turks.
The ideological and political blocs of the world have reformed since the end of the bi-polar world. Turkey has recognized this. The AKP has acknowledged bluntly that religion and language ties trump the artifacts of global alliance politics. Erdogan and company have chosen their side.
The US and Western Europe can and should do no less.
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