Politics is the art of the possible

Submitted by Mozere (United Kingdom), Feb 19, 2013 at 07:22

Erdogan is the best politician and orator that the Turkish political scene produced since Inonu in 1960s. He is a realist not a dreamer even though he has his dreams. Note his backtracking in the case of Libya where he went from being an opponent of NATO to its active collaborator within a week.

He knows politics is the art of the possible,he realises he must be friendly with the west the source of its finance and most important market for the Turkish economy whose expansion is a must for the wealth of Turkey ,hence the continuing support of the voters.A hostile Turkey would be economically vulnerable unlike Iran with its oil income.

A lot of Turks advocate joining the Shanghai five,but this is problematic due to many reasons,most important ones being;

a) Russia will not want a strong Turkey as this will undermine Russian influence in central Asia and more importantly in the Caucusus and Azerbaijan.Russia would only admit Turkey if it is willing to be a client state and defer unconditionally to Russian designs in the Caucusus.

b) being in Shanghai five will mean being friendly with Iran and concede leadership in the ME to shia Iran and going against the Saudi Arabia and the gulf states,hardly the acts of a would be champion of sunni Arabs

c) in any future conflict in Cyprus and its gas fields(if any gas to be found), Russia will stand behind the Greeks ,not only as Orthodox Christian brothers,also as beneficiaries of Greek Cypriot money laundering ,and a possible Russian naval base.

d) Russians will back the Armenian Republic as a means of manipulating Azerbeijan and Turkey.

Turkey will need western technology to defend itself in a dangerous part of the world.Turkey is in no position to create its own high tech in the near future as its woeful education system is geared to produce,in the words of Mr E.,a religious generation and not a free thinking generation able to analyse and question.After school hours children are encouraged to spend hours in Quran courses rather than developing sporting and scientific skills,hence the shocking shortage of internationally renown sportspeople and scientists from a not poor nation of 75 million.

In conclusion Turkey and the West are bound by common interests to be somewhat reluctant allies.The West gains by thwarting the Russian and Iranian threats to its interests in the region.

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".