Cagri Erhan JTW Columnist printable version send your friend

Monday, 21 December 2009

One of the most important headlines of the Erdogan-Obama meeting in White House was, without a doubt, collective fight against terrorism.

High level formal visits have always been crucial in Turkish-American relations. Similar to US President Obama’s visit to Turkey in April as his first foreign visit, Prime Minister Erdogan’s visit to US raised great expectations. It is clear that incidents such as PKK’s killing of our seven soldiers, withdrawal of Turkish Ambassador in Washington Nabi Sensoy back to Turkey, the mining accident took place in Bursa, closure of DTP by the Constitutional Court, have prevented Erdogan’s visit to come forward in the Turkish domestic agenda as expected. 

We also have to keep in mind, however, that the lack of interest towards this visit compared to the prior ones, is not only about the busy domestic agenda of Turkey but also about its lack of originality in terms of content.

One of the most important subjects of the Obama-Erdogan meeting was, indeed, the collective fight against terrorism. It was quite eye catching that in spite of their positive comments towards Turkish Government’s democratic opening plan, US administration did not mention anything about implementing harsher measures against PKK’s existence in Northern Iraq.

It can be observed that Obama, similar to the former President Bush, adopts a hesitant attitude about this issue. Even though Obama proclaimed US intention to send additional forces to Afghanistan in order to fight Taliban and Al-Qaeda just a few days ago. He seems to think Turkish fight against terrorism can be only successful through soft power measures.

Unrealistic

Quite interesting is the US President’s suggestion that the neutralization of terrorists in the Qandil Mountains located in the de facto occupied Iraq’s northern part, is possible through the democratic initiative. He is also the one who couldn’t come up with any better idea than sending more soldiers to the region, in spite of the statements made by the commander of US military forces in Afghanistan and US’ Kabul Ambassador about the insufficiency of deployment of additional troops in the region to solve the problem. In addition to his disregard towards the military dimension of Turkish fight against terrorism, the terrorist activities of PKK which took place during the visit has shown how distant Obama is to the realities of Turkey which he regards as a “model partner”. On the other hand, Ankara also cannot be too persistent about US action against the terror in Northern Iraq. Turkey refused –on justifiable reasons - Obama’s demand to send combatant forces to Afghanistan. Even if Ankara was persistent, it is highly unlikely that US would be willing to engage in another armed conflict in Iraq after the designation of a date for withdrawal. As it was stated in this column before, US plan towards the Northern Iraq is clear: increasing the Kurdish autonomy, creating an almost independent state structure, forging a friendly relationship between Turkey and this entity; ending armed activities of the terrorist organization for gaining Turkey’s friendship and implementation of civilian reforms in Turkey in order to push the organization to stop armed activities. 

The US’ Plan Was Impeded

The US plan could not be realized as it can be seen. Due to the existence of PKK’s raison d’être as carrying out armed attacks and the reluctance of the leadership of the organization to create an environment for its liquidation, US plan was not fully realized. In this environment of PKK’s continuing terrorist attacks that create an upheaval in society, it cannot be expected from the government to continue the reform process or to form friendly relations with the Northern Iraq.

Yet, the Armenian opening was another issue which the two leaders discussed. A new development about this issue was also non-existent. Prime Minister has personally stated that the protocol aiming to institute diplomatic relations and to open up the borders between Armenia and Turkey can only be ratified by the parliament after the Armenian withdrawal from the occupied territories of the Azerbaijan. As this is the case, it is highly unrealistic from the perspective of the US President to expect any further steps by the Turkish government. In fact, Turkey has already done its best not to be regarded as the uncompromising one by the international community - even with the risk of alienating Azerbaijan. Now it is Armenia’s responsibility to take a step. If the US President is genuinely supporting the Turkish-Armenian rapprochement, he should pressurize the administration in Yerevan instead of expecting more from Turkey. As well as there is no clear reason to expect such an move towards Armenia, with less than 5 months to 24th of April, a guarantee is not taken that Obama will not use address the 1915 incidents as “genocide” this time.

Ambiguity Continues

It is surprising after 7 months since it was articulated in TBMM (Turkish Grand National Assembly) that the term “Model Partnership” is still not entitled to any specific meaning. “Model partnership” is nothing but a substitute for the term strategic partnership, used since the middle of 1990’s. The term “strategic partnership” was also not specified for 10 years and consequently the US and Turkey entitled different meanings to the term. Bureaucrats, journalists and academicians contemplated upon the meaning of it for years. Since April, “Strategic Partnership” is replaced with “Model Partnership” but still not specified in any ways.

In January the first year of US President’s term will be completed. We will comprehensively analyze Obama’s performance in his first year in another article. But considering the first year of Obama, as a commander in chief whose armies fighting presumably for peace (!) in multiple places of the world. And he has also received the Nobel Peace Prize, we could not fully comprehend what sort of a foreign policy attitude he followed and whether he would go beyond day to day basis and promote reforms that would serve to the global peace. The same ambiguity is also relevant for the Turkish-American relations. As long as Obama doesn’t take certain priorities of Turkey into regard, labels such as “Model Partnership” would not have any meaning.  

Prof. Dr. Çagri Erhan: Coordinator of USAK and the President of USAK-Transatlantic Research Center.

*This article was first published on December 8, 2009 at the Diplomatik Muhakeme column of Türkiye Newspaper.

Translated by Uzay Aysev