Turkey's foreign policy

Is Turkey turning?

Turkey is rethinking its place in the world

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Readers' comments


Manish Thakur

Message to Turkey: The EU is not the same as the "West"

Turkey can be a country of the West, even if it is not part of the EU. Norway has no intention of joining the EU and no one thinks it is non-Western. The US and Canada dont need association with the EU to feel part of the West. The EU may be made up exclusively of European Christians, but not all of Europe's Christians are part, or want to be part, of the EU eg Russia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Romania etc - Orthodox countries which are equally as valid a part of Western civilization as the Catholic/Protestant countries of the EU.

It is in the West's interest that Turkey remains anchored to it. The West therefore needs to make the Turks comfortable that membership in the EU is not the same thing as being part of the West.


Fahrettin Tahir

Jean baptiste

Europe has always had Turkish speaking inhabitants.In the era of the volkerwanderung from 4th century on these people, then under names like uz, petchenegs, cumans etc settled in the Balkans and central europe (hungary, Slovakia).

One of the best compilations of the ancient Turkish language is the Codex Cumanicus, prepared on instructions of the Archbishop of Estergom (Hungary) describing the Cuman language spoken at that point in Hungary and neighboring countries. The book was used for missionary activities and describes a language people from Turkey can still understand.

The mediaeval Kingdom of Bulgaria was for 1000 years a state of Christian Turks and Slavs. When this country was islamized in the 14th century Europen Turkey was born.

Despide Genocide and mass deportations in the 19th and beginning 20th centuries the territories of this State are still the areas populated by Turks.

Turkey itself, the Ottoman Empire was born as "The Islamic State of Rome" in the 11th century. Turkey is the Islamized Rome. The Roman language, which the English call Greek, is still spoken in Turkey among other peoples by the PM Erdogan as a mother language.

That is what 1500 years of history have produced. It won't be changed by a couple of fanatics shouting "Moslems go to hell."


Turkey has been in Europe for a good 500 years and look what a mess they left behind in the Balkans. Turkey and Europe don’t go well together.

Jean Baptiste

The Economist has apparently made the decision that Turkey is part of Europe, since all Turkish maatters are included in the Europe section, when it should be in the Middle East section. Turkey as often been called a bridge between Europe and the Middle East, and might be something in between, but Europe is not.


Europe's Rejection of Turkey
Europe opened membership discussions with Turkey in 2005 - there is a long list requirments and while Turkey has made progress, it simple hasn't fulfilled the requirements, full stop end of story. No diplomatic relations with an EU member state, and serious restrictions on freedom of speech in particular as things stand are insurmountable obstacles. Germany and France are against Turkish membership definetly, and with the problems with Bulgaria and Romania, and 'enlargement fatigue' means the EU will be tough on the entry of a county Turkey's side. And of course would countries like France and Germany would do if Turkey actually met the membership criteria would be interesting.

On the Turkish side the goverment is telling the population and everyone who will listen that the problem is the EUs rejection of Turkey, rather than Turkey's own failure to meet the entry criteria. Now its been said loud enough and frequently enough that no matter how simplistic and incorrect, it is becoming standard lore - and now even its in the economist.

Behind the scenes, government official and diplomats in Ankara, and EU enlargement peoplin in Brussels all say noone thinks Turkey will join EU in the forseeable future but that the EU-Turkish relationship is important whatever happens, and that standardising, laws, regulations and processes is in everyones interests. We now though have a new poster campaign across Turkey with Erdogan's face and "on the road to Europe".

The fundamental question is whether Erdogan and the AK party are using the democratising necessary to join the EU to get rid of the laws that have put them in jail and removed them from office in the past. Then use popular backlash to Europe's rejection to reorientate Turkey away from Europe and towards the Islamic World.

Turkey, people forget,needs NATO more than NATO needs Turkey, though, because it could never defend itself against Russia, that's why it joined in the 50s when Stalin was demanding territorial concessions from Turkey.


Turkey *should* be rethinking its place in the world, and thankfully there is finally an elected government there that is able to do that.

However, this "rethinking" is more of a process of rediscovering its long-neglected geo-political location between the East and the West than one of "turning" away from anyone.

For most of its history, Turkish Republic has aspired to be part of the western world;
it has been one of the earliest members of the post-WWII civilian and military organization formed in the West. Although this relationship has benefited both Turkey and the West, it has come at the expense of Turkey's relations with many of its immediate neighbors and other parts of the world.

Turkey is now rediscovering that it has long borders with Syria, Iraq, Iran, and some of the former Soviet Republics with which it has many historical, cultural, and linguistic ties. It is finding out that there are emerging powerhouses to the east that it can trade with, and the whole continent of Africa that it can help and in turn get help from.

This widening of Turkey's horizons does not imply that it is turning its back on the West, as has been suggested by some in the neocon circles. These voices cannot tolerate a more powerful and independent Turkey in the region, and they are trying to hide their real fears along these lines behind a campaign of "Turkey is turning its back on us!"

Actually Turkey still wants to be part of the EU and the West, but without neglecting its neighbors. Every country determines its relations with the rest of the world based on its own self-interests. This is true of the US, Germany, Israel, China and others. Why expect Turkey to behave differently?


And so the superficial turkish mask of modernity falls and the ugly grimace of islam is revealed.

Thank God the prospect of Turkey joining the EU seems increasingly remote.

Europe doesn´t need Turkey. If Erdogan wants to rock the Casbah with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and become his merry chum that´s just fine and dandy in my book.

Oh and it´s simply hypocritical and ludicrous to make a fuss about palestinian persecution while at the same time throwing a tantrum every time anybody speaks of Turkey´s holocaust of the Armenians.


It is unbelievable that The Economist ignores the elephant in the room: the AK is an Islamist party and therefore has an Islamist agenda.
Turkey is turning away from the West not because of the EU or Israel, but because its ruling party wants to take Turkey back to a past it never had. It's using Israel to support its powerbase and to isolate the Turkish army. M.Yakut (11-June) is completely right in his comments.

And what does "mildly Islamist" really mean? What's next Economist: calling the Putin regime "mildly democratic"?


It depends on the Eu and some obsessive countries in the union whether Turkey should pursuit its europe-focused policy; in meantime, Turkey should improve its realtionship with its naturel allies and brothers, who are 'some' Arab countries and our ethnic borthers Turkic countries from asia to africa.

with respect to obsessive countries, which are blind in strategic respects, it is only greece and its big brothers France that has an increasing muslim population,and 'partially' Germany that has got remarkable Turkish population that dislike Turkey, but still we shold re-think our place in the world; neither greece+ south cyprus nor France will be our rival in a few years in all areas, cuz they all think locally and therefore give rise to think the Eu in that direction, but the world is changing and there will be no place for who thinks locally; for example 4 countries Syria,Turkey,Lebanon and Jordan have established a new group, which is just a start and i'm sure that the group will expand into other countries.by the way, The eu will soon discuss its role in the world and to accept Turkey into the union without putting forward unfair conditions, but i think they should not be worried, cuz there is south cyprus , greece and France to help The Eu compete with china, india, brazil etc. in the global world.


Davutoğlu's dogma envisions Turkey in the top 10 richest nations by 2023, Turkey's centennial.

He sees two main obstacles:
1. The Kurdish issue
2. The fight between secularists and mild islamists

Both huge problems for a country whose constitution was drafted by the generals in 1980.

For a list of the entire picture see EU's TURKEY 2009 PROGRESS REPORT: http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/pdf/key_documents/2009/tr_rapport_2009_e...

Turkey feels better in the East. Proud. It is a model "democracy" to all the monarchies and totalitarian regimes to its East. Noone cares if its "democracy" has a fourth pillar, the military, that in the name of Kemalism (whatever that means) "guides" and "protects" the other three, the executive, legislative and judiciary.

Turkey's relation to western democracy is equivalent to a Catholic nun's with a Japanese sumo wrestler.

We have to agree with Davutoğlu on one thing: Turkey will be an entirely new country by 2023.

Joe Marlowe

What is both amazing and pathetic is that even as the foolishness of EU policy toward Turkey becomes more and more apparent, you still see postings here of the same small-minded, selfish, and short-sighted views that have led the current situation.

(It shouldn't be a surprise. These are, after all, the countries that could not bestir themselves sufficiently militarily fifteen years ago decisively to put down genocide in Bosnia. No, the Americans had to do that for them.)

This is a huge strategic blunder.

Just imagine the current situation if Turkey had been inside the EU for the last 20 years, instead of being continually turned away with petty humiliations.

Some people just never learn.

Small-minded, selfish, and short-sighted.
Three of the four* defining characteristics of the EU.

(*The fourth is anti-democratic.)


Erdogan may well be an islamist politician, but he has certainly been the most democratic leader Turkey has had in a long time. After decades of fascistic control of the country by the ultra-nationalist armed forces, which purport to be the true defendants of the nation, secularism and the spirit of Ataturk, Erdogan has managed to limit and reduce the influence of these sinister powers, using the demands of the EU as a tool to achieve this. Indeed, no country under such direct control of its military would ever be accepted in the EU.

The Turkish military nationalistic fervor has been behind many direct attacks against democracy. The so-called "Derin Devlet", or "Deep State", the government in the shadows that, Gladio-style, fought to keep the nation clean of undesirables: communists, islamists, separatists... while at the same time cozying up with the organized crime and the heroine industry.

The Kurdish conflict, that Israeli defenders have suddenly remembered these days, was mainly fought by these ultra-nationalist elements, recurrently by dirty-war means.

Ironically, these far-right Human Right-abusers were the staunchest allies of Israel for the past decades, and Israel collaborated with them against the Kurdish "terrorists" on numerous occasions.

With the Ergenekon case and other blows to the Derin Devlet, the military establishment has lost much influence on the country (as any democracy should be), and thus Erdogan has been able to carry out sensible internal and foreign policies. Israeli-cheerleaders may indulge now in howling about Turkey's oppression of the Kurds and the occupation of Northern Cyprus, but they disingenuously avoid mentioning that it was their close allies in the military who insisted in these policies, and that until Erdogan managed to erode their power, it wasn't possible to carry out more conciliatory policies (his AK party passed a partial amnesty to reduce penalties faced by many members of the PKK who had surrendered to the government, and in 2009, he announced a plan to help end the quarter-century-long conflict that has cost more than 40,000 lives, allowing the Kurdish language to be used in all broadcast media and political campaigns, and restore Kurdish names to cities and towns that have been given Turkish ones.). If they are not conciliatory enough yet, it is precisely for fear of a violent reaction of the military if the government "sells out".

Israel's vicious attacks at Erdogan and Turkey in the last weeks are simply a hypocritical attempt to smear the one leader that has proved to be brave enough to stand up to their brutal and arrogant behavior, and call as spade a spade.


This is a silly question to ask "Is Turkey turning?" and state "Turkey is not rethinking its place in the world."

Turkey's leaders of the day knew exactly where to take Turkey, where should it be and they were very clear and out spoken about that when they were young.

They just played the safe until they got the wind their back.

They used the "soft belly" of universal democracy and human rights to advance with their well known but unspoken goals.

They knew the western concepts such as "aliases", "roles" and "visualization" well and with which they were able to "hide" their intentions very well.

Turkey's leaders of Today with the great help of ex-leftists, post modern liberals and like minded intellectuals propelling the leaders of Turkey to the destination for which the leaders of Turkey have been yearning to reach.

That means Turkey is saying bye bye to developing universal democracy, human rights, liberal thought, pluralism, individual wellness, universal gender equality, rule of law, scientific thinking, realism, rationalism, freedom, and the like progressive values and concepts.

And, Turkey is welcoming regressive Mohammedan imperialistic values, totalitarianism, monarchy, dogmatic thought, gender inequality, divisions in the society (mimicking plural democracy but it is really not), paternalism, slavery (in the sense of submitting to someone, and the like regressive values and concepts.

Turkey has turn its face to the regressive and darkness since 2005 when the leaders of today's Turkey felt the power in their hands.


Why Turkey is turning away from the West? Koz it has never been West" in the first place!
It was the big project of Kemal to be "West" but that's because he was half-Turkish (mother was Slav) so ironically if he was living in today's Turkey he would not be considered a true/pure Turk!
Pity he liked booze so much and died young from liver cirrhosis!
And if the US had not protected Turkey from Stalin, who wanted to punish Turkey for its dirty role in WWII, F Tahir and Co would be living in exile in Siberia today!
Maybe you can brainwash most people in Turkey, but not in Europe - so no matter how much support you have from the UK and the US (whom you accuse of crimes in Iraq afganistan etc - true - whilst supporting them at the same time)Europeans will not accept Turkey with its today's fascist attitudes. That's why you turn East, no other choice!

Fahrettin Tahir

Turkey kept out of WW 2.

Turkish diplomats in France helped save Turkish Jews from concentration camps. An act Jews recognize.

Nazi Gold is nonsense.


Fahrettin Tahir,

thanks for that brief history lesson.

Since you seem to know so much about Turkey's "2000 years of good relations with Jews" why don't you enlighten us on Turkey's role during WWII?

I would be particularly interested to hear about Turkey's (non) participation in WWII especially its shameful "Non-Aggression and Neutrality" pact signed with the Nazis on 18 June 1941,(whilst the rest of us Europeans were fighting and DYING), but then again who cares about history, right...?

Also, when are you guys going to return the Nazi gold you stole?

Have you read the U.S. State Department's Eizenstat Report on Allied Relations and Negotiations With Turkey yet or are you going to run away from this one too?

Just in case, here's that link again: http://www.state.gov/www/regions/eur/rpt_9806_ng_turkey.pdf

Remember, this is not some product of someone's imagination but the result of a US investigation. I would urge you to have a look at the footnotes where you can find all the evidence you need.

Let me know when you have, so we can discuss it especially Turkey's looting of Nazi gold (in many ways that is the best part and one that really captures Turkey's attitude).

You cannot deny history.

Fahrettin Tahir


Until Mr Erdogan came along Turks had about 2000 years of good relations with Jews.

Mr Erdogan is picking a fight with Jews precisely because he now has in Mr Kilicdaroglu a domestic foe who will win the elections against his corrupt AKP of the new rich merchants getting ever richer.

Neither Jews nor Turks will let one man ruin their historically good relations.


why is the economist surprised that demonstrating Turks were holding posters of Hitler??
Turkey was afterall a key ally of the Nazis!!!
Israel should have known better than to befriend such a country


Fahrettin Tahir,

we're going round in circles...

I will repeat myself:

So, back to the facts (yes, they actually matter), please name ONE (yes just ONE) UN resolution, EU or Council of Europe decision or announcement that talks about this so called "murdering" of Turkish Cypriots.

If you name ONE, (come on, just one...) then come back here.

I, however, can name several resolutions condemning Turkey's atrocious humans rights record.

I'm still waiting for your reply...

Der Perfesser

Turkey has every right to be seriously concerned. America's policies, under the instigation of Israel, are edging the Middle East ever closer to nuclear war.

Brazil's and Turkey's attempt to obtain a peaceful solution were probably the last viable initiative aimed at steering Iran towards a non-nuclear policy.

Iran gets the A-bomb. Several. That is now inevitable, since this aggressive U.S. foreign policy is not going to work. So Iran gets attacked by Israel and its totally-attached ally the U.S.

Bang. Bang. Israel goes up in smoke. Iran gets badly hit. War. War everywhere in the Middle East. The Turks get nuclear fall-out. The US is bankrupted, but is physically unaffected. The world economy is stuffed, and there are reverberations for generations. No oil. Nuclear fallout. Possibly the entire Gulf oil fields go up in flames,leading to a winter.

Alternatively Iran is attacked before they get nukes. War, war. The Middle East goes up in flames, and maybe there is nuclear fall-out. The US is bankrupted. There is no oil. Winter etc. Just as bad as Iran with nukes.

Sounds likely? How about before it is too late make a genuine attempt to treat with Iran, even at the expense of Israel? It is for their own welfare, - more, survival.



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