Analysis
March 18, 2009
Summary: Despite the
dramatic walkout by Turkey’s
prime minister from the World
Economic Forum at Davos, U.S.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
recently made the announce-
ment that President Barack
Obama will visit the country next
month. With the recent election
of Obama, the United States
seems to be favoring dialogue
over confrontation, allowing
for more cooperation on a
variety of issues that includes
rapprochment between the
United States and Iran to curb
Tehran's nuclear ambitions,
reducing Western dependency
on Russian gas, and stabilizing
Iraq following U.S. withdrawal of
troops.
As Turkey's international profile
rises as it embraces its role as a
regional peacemaker, are Turkish-
American relations entering a
"golden era"?
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Turkey and Obama: A Golden Age in Turkish
U.S. Ties?
by Amberin Zaman1
ANKARA — When U.S. Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton announced that
President Barack Obama would visit
Turkey next month during her recent
trip to Ankara, even the most seasoned
pundits were caught off guard. It was
widely assumed that Turkish Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s
vitriolic attacks against Israel capped
by his famous walkout from the World
Economic Forum last month at Davos
had dented Turkey’s chances of ever
becoming the first predominantly
Muslim nation to host the new U.S.
president.2 Set against rising anti-U.S.
feelings and its cozy ties with Iran,
Russia, and Sudan, the Davos affair
prompted a flurry of editorials fretting
over whether Turkey was turning its
back on the West.
Turkey’s President Abdullah Gül told
me en route to an economic sum-
mit in Tehran on March 10 that such
concerns were utterly unfounded and
that Obama’s visit was no surprise at
all. Relaxed and confident, Gül asserted
that the U.S.-Turkish relationship had
entered a new phase that went well
beyond bilateral ties. “Our interests
coincide over a wide spectrum of issues
in a broad region…our will to cooper-
ate is stronger than ever,” said Gül. Dur-
ing the same trip, Ahmet Davutoglu,
1
Amberin Zaman is the Turkey correspondent for The Economist and writes a weekly column for the Turkish daily Taraf. The
views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the German Marshall Fund of the
United States (GMF).
2
See "Turkey after Davos: Risks, Opportunities, and an Unpredictable Prime Minister" by Amberin Zaman, On Turkey series,
http://www.gmfus.org/onturkey.
top foreign policy advisor to Erdoğan,
went further to say that "Turkish-
American relations are entering a
golden era." The United States now has
a president who, like Ankara, favors
dialogue over confrontation-and who,
like Ankara, believed the Iraq invasion
was a poor idea. This will allow cooper-
ation on a host of areas: rapprochement
between the United States and Iran to
curb Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, reduc-
ing Western dependency on Russian
gas by opening pipelines through the
Caucasus and Turkey, and stabilizing
Iraq as American troops pull out.
All this may sound fanciful, but in
recent years, Turkey’s international
profile has been on the rise. It has
embraced the role of regional peace-
maker seeking to mend fences between
Israel and Syria, between Hamas and
Fatah, and between Syria and Saudi
Arabia. Its close ties with the West,
crowned by the start of membership
talks with the European Union in
2005, and its outreach to the Muslim
world during Erdoğan’s seven years in
power has placed it in the pole position.
Strategically wedged between the oil
rich former Soviet states in Central Asia
and Azerbaijan on the one hand and
the Middle East on the other, Turkey
is touting itself as an alternative corri-
Analysis
dor for Western bound energy supplies. Meanwhile, Turk-
ish goods are flooding supermarkets from Iran to Northern
Iraq. And Turkish has become a kind of lingua franca thanks
to the growing popularity of Turkish soap operas that keep
viewers across the region glued to their screens. Starting with
its overtures to Iran, the Obama administration has decided
to cash in. In exchange, it must use its influence with Europe
and especially with France to push for Turkey’s EU member-
ship. This means helping to break the deadlock over Cyprus.
In Tehran, Turkey’s clout was in evidence when Gül became
the first NATO member leader to be received by Iran’s spiritual
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the number one power in the Islamic
Republic. Wary of upsetting Iran’s prickly leaders, Turkey
rejected the label of mediator. Indeed, it is unrealistic to
assume that Turkey alone can persuade Iran to freeze its
nuclear weapons program. But as Gül pointed out, Khamenei
listened “very carefully” to what he had to say as did Iran’s
President Mahmud Ahmedinajad during separate hour-long
meetings. Members of Gül’s entourage said the Iranians
abstained from their usual anti-American rants, which is
equally encouraging. Turkey’s overriding message to Iran
was to accept the olive branch being extended by the Obama
administration, warning of the dangers any rejection might
entail. After 30 years of clerical rule, Iran remains woefully
backward. (An operator at a five-star hotel in Tehran, who
barely spoke English, was clueless when I asked him how to
make an international call.) An early test of Gül’s pitch will
be whether Iran accepts a U.S. invitation to a meeting of
Afghanistan’s neighbors and countries contributing to the
NATO-led stabilization mission there that will be held in The
Hague later this month. In the public sphere, Iran shows little
signs of softening. A breakthrough between the United States
and Iran is unlikely until after Iran’s presidential elections
in June. Yet, in the meantime messages between the two are
likely to be passed back and forth by Turkey in an effort to lay
the groundwork for eventual rapprochement. Turkey may not
be a mediator, but it is a credible go-between.
Turkey’s efforts to help melt the ice between the ayatollahs
and the United States may well be founded on Iran’s
determination to acquire nuclear weapons, but in Iraq the
opportunities for Turkish-American partnership are huge.
Turkey is the main transit hub for the flow of logistical
supplies to U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Its interven-
tion helped persuade the Sunni Arabs to take part in the
Iraqi elections. Pentagon planners hope to rotate troops out
through Turkey when the withdrawal from Iraq starts.
2
Yet, in order to be a long-term player in a post-U.S. Iraq,
Turkey needs to overcome its fears about perceived Kurd-
ish dreams of independence and fix its relations with Iraq’s
Kurdish leaders. The impending U.S. withdrawal has left
the Iraqi Kurds feeling vulnerable. Turkey is the Kurds’ sole
outlet to the West. Not surprisingly, they have become more
pliant. Over the past year, Turkish and Iraqi Kurdish officials
have been quietly discussing a deal for disarming rebels of
the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) who has led a 25-year
separatist campaign against Turkey. The PKKs targets have
included innocent civilians prompting the United States and
the European Union to label it a terrorist organization. The
presence of some 3,000 to 5,000 PKK fighters in Northern
Iraq remains the main point of contention between Ankara
and the Kurdistan regional government. Senior Turkish
officials say the Iraqi Kurds have been doing a lot more in
recent months to restrict the PKK’s movements and its access
to food and weapons. There is now talk of extraditing PKK
leaders to European countries willing to give them asylum,
for some 1,500 PKK fighters who are not Turkish nationals
to lay down their weapons and melt into Iraqi Kurdistan,
and for the remaining forces to return to Turkey. Ankara is
also pressing the Iraqi Kurds to drop their claims to the oil
rich province of Kirkuk. Turkey fears that its inclusion in the
Kurdish run region would enable the Kurds to declare inde-
pendence and reinforce separatist passions among its own 14
million strong Kurdish population. The bigger threat to the
Kurds comes from Iraq’s Shia and Sunni Arabs, who contest
their claims over Kirkuk. The potential for conflict is huge.
Turkey and the United States must work together to broker
a formula for the province that can satisfy all sides. A U.S.-
Iranian thaw would encourage Iran to leverage its influence
over the Shia to cement a deal.
Yet, there is one issue that could bust this virtuous cycle.
During his election campaign, Obama pledged that once in
office he would recognize the “Armenian genocide” on the
April 24 anniversary of the mass killings of the Ottoman
Armenians. He is under immense pressure from Armenian
Americans to honor his pledge. They are lobbying the U.S.
Congress to adopt a draft resolution sponsored by
Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff that labels the 1915
events as genocide. Turkey is threatening to retaliate should
the resolution be passed. Options on the table might include
restricting U.S. access to the Incirlik airbase in southern Tur-
key, which remains critical to operations in Iraq and Afghani-
stan. The sole formula to avert another potential train wreck
in U.S.-Turkish relations would be for Turkey to establish dip-
Analysis
lomatic ties and re-open its border with Armenia, preferably
before April 24. For the past year, helped by Swiss mediators,
Turkish and Armenian diplomats have been sorting out the
details of an agreement that among other things calls for
a joint commission of historians to examine the events of
1915. After much hesitation Turkey finally agreed to fold the
genocide question into a broader set of issues to be taken up
by the two sides. Turkish officials insist that the “the techni-
cal aspects” of the agreement are complete. Turkey appears to
have also persuaded Azerbaijan that friendship with Armenia
will arm Ankara with further leverage with which resolve
the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute and curb Russian meddling
in the Southern Caucasus. Should Yerevan sign-off on the
deal it could be announced when Turkey’s Foreign Minis-
ter Ali Babacan goes to Yerevan on April 16 for a Black Sea
economic meeting. Davutoglu’s vision of a “Golden Age” of
U.S.-Turkish collaboration could just come true.
Amberin Zaman, Correspondent, The Economist
Amberin Zaman is the Turkey correspondent for The Economist and
writes a weekly column for the Turkish daily Taraf.
About the German Marshall Fund of the United States
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