The International
Herald Tribune
Turkey tries to balance
influence and confidence
With region in crisis,
even some at home fear Ankara is a bit too brash
DAN BILEFSKY, December
24, 2011
As many praise
Turkey's newly assertive leadership, there are concerns that its self-confidence could tip into
arrogance and aggravate allies and foes at a critical time.
FULL TEXT
''We feel a strong
pride in our strength and influence, much as we did during the Ottoman days.''
Yet, even as many in
Washington and Europe praise Turkey's newly assertive leadership, such
brashness is prompting some concerns both at home and abroad that
the nation's giddy sense of self-confidence could tip into arrogance and
aggravate allies and foes at a critical time.
its long-term goal of obtaining
regional power status
Ankara faces a raft of
foreign policy challenges on its doorstep, any one of which could derail its
long-term goal of obtaining regional
power status. An increasingly outsized national ego, analysts say,
has already frayed ties with Europe. On Thursday, Ankara recalled its
ambassador from Paris after France voted to criminalize the denial of the
genocide of up to 1.5 million Armenians between 1915 and 1918 by the Ottoman
Turks.
And with talks to join
the European Union hopelessly stalled, many Turks have greeted the euro crisis
with barely concealed glee, saying Europe has rejected them because they are
Muslim.
Three neighboring
countries
Closer to home, three
of the most volatile states in the world - Syria, Iraq and Iran - are
lined up along Turkey's southern and eastern borders. Syria is already in a
state of civil war and Iraq seems to be flirting once again with sectarian
strife and dissolution. Throw in the longstanding Kurdish problem and an Iran
that erupted in 2009 and now may be descending into economic chaos, and the
possibilities of regional destabilization, mass refugee flows and even war do
not seem terribly remote.
Turkey on the rise
politically
Facing such threats,
analysts and diplomats say, Turkey needs to resist the temptation to gloat and
swagger. Soli Ozel, professor of international relations at Kadir Has
University in Istanbul, said that the European and American economic decline,
coupled with the Arab Spring, was emboldening Turkey as it evolves into the
model of democracy for the Arab world.
''Turks are saying,
'We are now on the rise, you are running out of steam and we don't have to take
any stuff from Westerners,''' he said. But he added: ''There is a fine line
between self-confidence and hubris.''
Turkey and its
charismatic prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, could be forgiven for
displaying some vanity. He has overhauled a country once haunted by military
coups into a regional democratic powerhouse. He is so popular in the Arab world
that there has been a surge in babies named Tayyip.
On the rise economically
While Turkey's economy
surges - growing by 8.2 percent in the third quarter, second only to
China in the world - Europe is sputtering; Greece, a long-time rival, has been
flattened by the sovereign debt crisis. With its new clout as a leader in a
region long dominated by the United States, this large Muslim country of 79
million people has also been basking in its role as the voice of regional
indignation against Syria and chastising Israel.
Earlier this month a
deputy prime minister boldly lectured Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. that
it was Turkey, and not the struggling economies of the United States and
Europe, that would win the 21st century.
Challenge on diplomatic
front
Indeed, for all of
Turkey's recent achievements, its aim of having ''zero problems''
with its neighbors has shown few successes.
Turkish officials
tried in vain for months to persuade President Bashar al-Assad of Syria
to halt his violent crackdown against civilians, before finally turning against
him. Turkey has been unable to resolve conflicts with Cyprus and Armenia.
Its recent decision to host a NATO radar installation has rankled Iran.
Relations with Israel collapsed after Israeli troops killed nine people
aboard a Turkish flotilla trying to break the blockade of Gaza.
In September, the
limits of Turkey's appeal as a political model were laid bare when Mr. Erdogan
told the Egyptian satellite channel Dream TV that secularism was not the enemy
of religion and Egypt should embrace a secular constitution. A spokesman
in Egypt for the Muslim Brotherhood party, which won first-round parliamentary
elections there, told the Egyptian daily Al Ahram that Mr. Erdogan was
interfering in Egyptian affairs. (Mr. Erdogan's aides said the term secularism
had been mistranslated as atheism.)
Nor were many Kosovar
Albanians amused in August when Turkey's minister of education, Omer Dincer,
asked his Kosovo counterpart to remove offending paragraphs from history
textbooks, which he said insulted the Ottoman Turks. Local historians protested
that Turkey was trying to whitewash centuries of Ottoman subjugation.
The perils of standing
in Turkey's way became abundantly clear at the United Nations during the annual
General Assembly meeting of world leaders this autumn.
Mr. Erdogan was on the
fourth floor of the general assembly hall when he learned that the Palestinian
president, Mahmoud Abbas, whom he ardently supports, was making his address
demanding full U.N. membership for Palestine. When Mr. Erdogan rushed to the
nearest entrance to take Turkey's seat on the main floor, a security guard refused
to let him pass. When Mr. Erdogan pressed forward, a loud scuffle erupted that
was audible four floors below.
One Western diplomat
noted that ''the Turks were literally throwing their weight around.''
Counter-argument
Yet Turkey's many
defenders say the West cannot expect the country to play regional leader
and then criticize it when it flexes its muscles. Moreover, they note, the
country is entitled to defend its dignity.
At the Cannes summit
meeting of the G-20 major economies in November, cameras showed Mr. Erdogan
suddenly kneeling down when he noticed a sticker of the Turkish flag on the
floor to mark the position where he was supposed to stand for a group photo,
near President Barack Obama.
He gently folded it
and put it in his pocket.
