Article
from
International Herald Tribune
Many would argue that supporting Turkey's democratically elected leader would be a good thing in itself, especially if it leads to a solution in Cyprus. Doing so when it may get the United States what it wants on Iraq is surely only good sense.
The United States wants two things from Turkey in the event of war on Iraq. First, the use of air bases like Incirlik. Second, permission to transport troops through Turkey to establish a northern front. If Turkey cooperates, the war will be shorter and all of the attendant suffering less.
The Bush administration has not yet got what it wants, largely because the Iraq issue is being used as a weapon in a wider political battle between the new Turkish government, effectively led by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and the establishment made up of senior bureaucrats, the military and the unelected president, Ahmet Necdet Sezer. The underlying problem is that the Turkish people do not want to assist an attack on Iraq, and neither side wants to tell them that they should.
Yet Turkey would benefit from cooperating. A shorter war would spare Turkey's weak economy, and if Ankara cooperates it could count on American economic help and a voice in the ordering of postwar Iraq. If Turkey stands aloof, the war will happen anyway and the pain will be much worse. In the calculus of self-interest, this is not a hard decision.
In the realm of humanitarianism, Turkey's neighbors, the Iraqis, are suffering under the sanctions against Baghdad. Since it is hard to imagine how Saddam Hussein could persuade any American president to remove the sanctions and permit him to remain in power, the only ethical solution is to remove him, by war if necessary.
Continuing the status quo merely imposes the costs of containing Saddam -- an American security imperative -- on the Iraqi people. I can say personally that this argument has traction with ordinary Turks.
The issue for the United States, then, is whether it can persuade any Turkish leader to tell the Turkish people something they do not want to hear: that both self-interest and sympathy for suffering Iraqis argue that Turkey should support an American attack.
The one man with enough political capital to pull this off is Erdogan, the leader of the victorious party in November's elections. Like Turgut Ozal, Turkey's last leader with any vision, Erdogan is bold and clear-sighted. It was Ozal who single-handedly brought Turkey into the American camp for the 1991 Gulf War, despite powerful opposition from the Turkish military.
Unfortunately for the United States, Erdogan has other problems to deal with besides persuading Turks to support a war they detest.
Despite his party's victory, he was disqualified as prime minister because he had been convicted in 1998 of reciting a poem that a court said incited religious hatred. Parliament passed constitutional amendments that would allow him to serve, but President Sezer vetoed them. Parliament then passed the amendments again, so Sezer had to go along. Now Erdogan plans to run for Parliament, and thus become prime minister, in February.
Erdogan also faces opposition because he wants to negotiate a solution to the partition of Cyprus based on proposals by the United Nations secretary-general, Kofi Annan. He understands that Ankara's past support of Rauf Denktash, who controls the Turkish Cypriot area of the island, is a barrier to Turkey's membership in the European Union. Sezer and the military unequivocally back Denktash even though he has become increasingly unpopular. That means preservation of the status quo.
Erdogan understands that Turkey has to make internal reforms to qualify for the European Union. But to eliminate torture and corruption, as demanded by EU criteria for membership, he will have to tread on many establishment toes.
To do all this, he needs his supporters solidly behind him. Volunteering to tell them that they have to swallow a war with Iraq cannot seem attractive. His choice is unenviable: spend his political capital to help America and risk defeat on other fronts, or offend America and take the consequences.
Where does this leave the Bush administration? It needs to recognize two things. First, Erdogan is not in this predicament by accident -- his opponents put him there. Second, this is a political problem, not a diplomatic one. Erdogan's opponents could not win the support of the Turkish people or the Parliament for a war on Iraq even if they wanted to. The political solution is for Washington to offer Erdogan its clear and unequivocal backing across the board. Then maybe he will feel secure enough to spend his political capital.
Many would argue that supporting Turkey's democratically elected leader would be a good thing in itself, especially if it leads to a solution in Cyprus. Doing so when it may get the United States what it wants on Iraq is surely only good sense.
The writer conducts research on Turkey as an affiliate of the Caspian studies program at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government.