Turkey As A Us Security Partner

Since the creation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949, America's security partnership with Turkey has been a strategic asset that both parties value. Now, however, trends in the greater Middle East, in Turkish security policies, and within Turkish society itself appear to be eroding the commonality of interests that constitutes the foundation of that partnership. Left unchecked, these trends could diminish U.S. influence in Turkey and increase instability in the Middle East. This monograph explores the dynamics of the evolving U.S.-Turkish security relationship and their implications for U.S. foreign and security policies.

Turkey is a rising regional and global power facing, as is the United States, the challenges of political transitions in the Middle East, bloodshed in Syria, and Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons. As a result, it is incumbent upon the leaders of the United States and Turkey to define a new partnership "in order to make a strategic relationship a reality," says a new Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)-sponsored Independent Task Force.

The strategic relationship between the United States and Turkey is over. While Turkey remains formally a NATO ally, it is not a partner of the United States. The United States should not be reluctant to oppose Turkey directly when Ankara undermines U.S. policy.

Turkey remains at a key geostrategic crossroads for U.S. security interests in Europe, the Middle East, and Central Asia. Yet, there is a perceived divergence of strategic interests between the United States and Turkey which was exacerbated by domestic political quarreling between the Islamist-led government of Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan and the Turkish General Staff. The June change in government, which saw the resignation of Erbakan, is unlikely to resolve these differences. Membership in the European Union (EU) and the Western European Union (WEU) are key foreign policy goals for Turkey's secularist Eurocentric generals. Although the prospects for admission are slim for now, Turkish military and civilian officials place a high priority on trade and investment opportunities to be gained from EU membership. The Turkish government had backed away from efforts to link support for NATO enlargement to Turkish acceptance as a full member in the EU. Nonetheless, Turkey is not enthusiastic about NATO enlargement and may push for a substantial pause after the first round or make another effort at linkage.

The dissolution of the Soviet Union brought with it the end of Turkey's traditional security role of defender of NATO's southern flank. To redefine the Turkish-US security relationship, President Bill Clinton announced in 1999 that the US and Turkey had a "strategic partnership." The hollowness of that pronouncement became apparent on 01 March 2003 when the Turkish Parliament decided to deny the US military access to Iraq from Turkish territory. That decision has thrown into question the nature, as well as the importance, of the US-Turkish strategic partnership. This paper explains the post Cold War internal and regional changes affecting Turkey's current and future security decision making. The paper also argues that Turkey will remain central to U.S. security goals in the Middle East. This is primarily due to the NATO initiatives Turkey has adopted and Ankara's economic and security influence in its region. Finally, the paper recommends that an enduring strategic partnership with Turkey be built upon effectively addressing Turkey's number one security concern, the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) safe areas in northern Iraq.

Until a few years ago, the relationship between Washington, DC, and Ankara, Turkey, was perennially troubled and occasionally terrible. Turks strongly opposed the U.S. 2003 invasion of Iraq and have subsequently complained that the Pentagon was allowing Iraqi Kurds too much autonomy, leading to deteriorating security along the Iraq-Turkey border. Disagreements over how to respond to Iran's nuclear program, U.S. suspicions regarding Turkey's outreach efforts to Iran and Syria, and differences over Armenia, Palestinians, and the Black Sea further strained ties and contributed to further anti-Americanism in Turkey. Now Turkey is seen as responding to its local challenges by moving closer to the West, leading to the advent of a "Golden Era" in Turkish-U.S. relations. Barack Obama has called the U.S.-Turkish relationship a "model partnership" and Turkey "a critical ally." Explanations abound as to why U.S.-Turkey ties have improved during the last few years. The U.S. military withdrawal from Iraq removed a source of tension and gave Turkey a greater incentive to cooperate with Washington to influence developments in Iraq. Furthermore, the Arab Awakening led both countries to partner in support of the positive agenda of promoting democracy and security in the Middle East. Americans and Turks both want to see democratic secular governments in the region rather than religiously sanctioned authoritarian ones. Setbacks in Turkey's reconciliation efforts with Syria, Iran, and other countries led Ankara to realize that having good relations with the United States helps it achieve core goals in the Middle East and beyond. Even though Turkey's role as a provider of security and stability in the region is weakened as a result of the recent developments in Syria and the ensuing negative consequences in its relations to other countries, Turkey has the capacity to recover and resume its position. Partnering with the United States is not always ideal, but recent setbacks have persuaded Turkey's leaders that they need to backstop their new economic strength and cultural attractiveness with the kind of hard power that is most readily available to the United States. For a partnership between Turkey and the United States to endure, however, Turkey must adopt more of a collective transatlantic perspective, crack down harder on terrorist activities, and resolve a domestic democratic deficit. At the same time, Europeans should show more flexibility meeting Turkey's security concerns regarding the European Union, while the United States should adopt a more proactive policy toward resolving potential sources of tensions between Ankara and Washington that could significantly worsen at any time.

The resignation in June of Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, leader of the Islamist Refah Party-and the collapse of the government he headed with Deputy Prime Minister Tansu Ciller-ended, at least for the moment, the confrontation between the Islamists and the Turkish General Staff, avowed guardians of the secular legacy of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. However, the conflict could resurface because the differences between the two are deepseated; involving Turkish national identity, political philosophy, social policy, security, and foreign relations. Whatever the result, the crisis will have profound implications for the strategic relationship with the United States. The Turkish General Staff will expect U.S. support, and it is unlikely to heed warnings that its actions place Turkey's fragile democracy at risk.

The study of politics in Turkey : new horizons and perennial pitfalls / Güneş Murat Tezcür -- Democratization theories and Turkey / Ekrem Karakoç -- Ruling ideologies in modern Turkey / Kerem Öktem -- Constitutionalism in Turkey / Aslı Ü. Bâli -- Civil-military relations and the demise of Turkish democracy / Nil S. Satana and Burak Bilgehan Özpek -- Capturing secularism in Turkey : the ease of comparison / Murat Akan -- The political economy of Turkey since the end of World War II / Şevket Pamuk -- Neoliberal politics in Turkey / Sinan Erensü and Yahya M. Madra -- The politics of welfare in Turkey / Erdem Yörük -- The political economy of environmental policymaking in Turkey : a vicious cycle / Fikret Adaman, Bengi Akbulut, and Murat Arsel -- The politics of energy in Turkey : running engines on geopolitical, discursive, and coercive power / Begüm Özkaynak, Ethemcan Turhan, and Cem İskender Aydın -- The contemporary politics of health in Turkey : diverse actors, competing frames, and uneven policies / Volkan Yılmaz -- Populism in Turkey : historical and contemporary patterns / Yüksel Taşkın -- Old and new polarizations and failed democratizations in Turkey / Murat Somer -- Economic voting during the AKP era in Turkey / S. Erdem Aytaç -- Party organizations in Turkey and their consequences for democracy / Melis G. Laebens -- The evolution of conventional political participation in Turkey / Ersin Kalaycıoğlu -- Symbolic politics and contention in the Turkish Republic / Senem Aslan -- Islamist activism in Turkey / Menderes Çınar -- The Kurdish movement in Turkey : understanding everyday perceptions and experiences / Dilan Okcuoglu -- The Transnational Mobilization of the Alevis of Turkey : from invisibility to the struggle for equality / Ceren Lord -- Politics of asylum seekers and refugees in Turkey : limits and prospects of populism / Fatih Resul Kılınç and Şule Toktaş -- A theoretical account of Turkish foreign policy under the AKP / Tarık Oğuzlu -- US-Turkey relations since WWII : from alliance to transactionalism / Serhat Güvenç and Soli Özel -- Turkey and Europe : historical asynchronicities and perceptual asymmetries / Hakan Yılmaz -- Turkey's foreign policy in the Middle East : an identity perspective / Lisel Hintz -- Turkey and Russia : historical patterns and contemporary trends in bilateral relations / Evren Balta and Mitat Çelikpala -- Citizenship and protest behavior in Turkey / Ayhan Kaya -- Gender politics and the struggle for equality in Turkey / Zehra F. Kabasakal Arat -- Human rights organizations in Turkey / Başak Çalı -- Truth, justice, and commemoration initiatives in Turkey / Onur Bakiner -- The politics of media in Turkey : chronicle of a stillborn media system / Sarphan Uzunoğlu -- The AKP's rhetoric of rule in Turkey : political melodramas of conspiracy from "ergenekon" to "mastermind" / Erdağ Göknar -- The transformation of political cinema in Turkey since the 1960s : a change of discourse / Zeynep Çetin-Erus and M. Elif Demoğlu -- Political music in Turkey : the birth and diversification of dissident and conformist music (1920-2000) / Mustafa Avcı.

Amid continued threats to U.S. national security and interests emanating from the Middle East, the promise of partnership and cooperation with Turkey will remain—as it has for the past two administrations—an alluring option for American policymakers. It is incredibly unlikely, however, that the U.S.-Turkish relationship can yield any strategic benefit at this point. The incoming administration, rather than remain bound by an increasingly infeasible commitment to a U.S.-Turkish partnership, should recognize the reality and profundity of the challenges confronting Turkey, recalibrate relations to increase U.S. leverage, and focus its energy on the ongoing erosion of Turkish democracy.