Increasing ‘Orientalism’ in Turkey’s Foreign Policy?
Dirk Rochtus
Lessius University College, Antwerp/ Belgium
Abstract
Die Türkei entwickelt gerade eine neue außenpolitische Strategie, „Strategic Depth (Strategische Tiefe)“ genannt, mit dem Ziel, nicht nur mit dem Westen sondern auch mit den muslimischen Nachbarstaaten zusammenzuarbeiten. Die Türkei konsolidiert auf diese Weise ihre Position in der traditionellen Einflusssphäre aus Osmanischer Zeit. Aufgrund ihres religiöseren
Hintergrundes fällt es der AKP-Regierung leichter, ihre Fühler in dieser größeren Region auszustrecken als dies den bisherigen kemalistischen Entscheidungsträgern möglich war. Der Enthusiasmus für einen Beitritt zur EU scheint abgekühlt zu sein. Bedeutet dies zusammen mit
der an Israel geäußerten Kritik, dass die Türkei sich vom Westen wegbewegt? Die Meinungen darüber sind geteilt: Einige Analysten sprechen von einem neuen „Orientalismus“, während andere sagen, die Türkei verfolge nur eine Politik der „Komplementarität“. Sogar der
Nahe Osten möchte den Westen nicht aufgeben. Die Lösung könnte darin liegen, dass die
Türkei als sowohl dem Westen als auch dem Osten zugehörig gesehen wird.
Turkey is developing a new foreign policy called the ‘Strategic Depth’ through which she
wants to deal not only with the West but also with the Muslim neighbouring states. So Turkey
is consolidating her position in her traditional influence sphere stemming from Ottoman times. Due to its more pious background it may be easier for the AKP government to throw out
its feelers in that broader region than the old Kemalist establishment. The enthusiasm for accession to the European Union seems to have cooled down. Does this in combination with the
criticism on Israel mean that Turkey is drifting away from the West? Opinions are divided:
some analysts talk about a new ‘Orientalism’, whereas others say that Turkey is just conducting a policy of ‘complementarity’. Even the Middle East does not want to give up the West.
The solution might be that Turkey is seen as belonging to the West as well as to the East.
Turkey is displaying an enormous dynamism in her foreign policy since the Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi (AKP) or Justice and Development Party swept to power in November 2002. The
‘new activism’ reminds one mutatis mutandis to the 30s of the Twentieth Century. Turkey
then restored her relations with Greece, concluded several regional security pacts and became
member of the League of Nations. The 20s and 30s were a period that in the words of Willi-
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am Hale was characterized by ‘Resistance, Reconstruction and Diplomacy’ 1 . All this was very important and necessary at the time, yet did not affect the course of world history.
Nowadays one is witnessing an active Turkish foreign policy, which in these times of globalization could have more effect on world politics. The Middle East and the Caucasus, in which
Turkey is engaging herself, are sources of tension and sorrow but also of opportunities in
world politics. Regional stability, security and energy are at stake now. Turkey once was considered to be a bulwark of the West. Today she appears as a ‘beacon of light’ in that part of
the world that is still vexed by instability and even terror. As a whole the Middle East still is
perceived in Turkey as backward, as a ‘swamp’ even, to quote an anonymous AKP-mayor of
the Antalya province in an interview with the International Crisis Group in January 2010:
‘They asked us to cut off our beards for Europe and we did […] Now they are trying to drive
us into the swamps of the Middle East. I can’t accept that we did all these efforts for Europe
for nothing’ 2 .
Ankara is closing treaties with one country after another in the Middle East, like Iraq, Iran,
and Syria. Yet there is a big difference with the 30s. At that time the recently created republic
of Turkey was despite her pro-Western leanings an isolated country at the periphery of the
West and remained rather inactive on the international scene. The Turkish elites saw their
country still being surrounded by enemies who would be keen to dismantle the republic (see
the Sèvres-trauma, a reminder of the Treaty of Sèvres dating back to the year 1920 and providing the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire). Indeed, what seemed to confirm the elites
in their rather paranoid thinking, ‘Stalin’s territorial demands to cede the north-eastern Turkish provinces of Kars and Ardahan prompted Turkey to seek full affiliation with the West’ 3 .
Since the Helsinki Summit of 1999 Turkey is an applicant member state of the European Union, but today she is not only focused anymore on the West. Really new is the fact that Ankara
has become also very active in the Middle East, in a region which for a big part once was
ruled by the Ottoman Empire. Behind this lies the policy of ‘Strategic Depth’ (Stratejik derinlik), a concept of Ahmet Davuto÷lu, a professor who was appointed as foreign minister of
Turkey on 1 May 2009. The doctrine of Strategic Depth ‘emphasizes the importance of Turkey’s Ottoman past and its cultural and historical ties with the Balkans, the Middle East and
Central Asia [...] The doctrine also suggests that Turkey should counterbalance her ties to the
West by establishing multiple alliances.’ 4 So it is about broadening and deepening Turkey’s
ties with areas and regions which are not part of the Western world (with exception of the
above mentioned Balkans), taking into account the historic and geopolitical framework in
which the Ottoman Empire as predecessor of the Republic of Turkey was embedded. Davuto÷lu legitimates this policy by asserting that ‘[…] the unique combination of our history and
geography brings with it a sense of responsibility … a call of duty arising from the depths of
a multi-dimensional history for Turkey.’ 5
increasing ‘orientalism’ in turkey’s foreign policy?
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Turkey’s new foreign policy is also being called a ‘zero-problems-with-neighbours’ policy.
No one should lose in the words of Davuto÷lu: ‘We don’t believe in polarization or isolation.
We believe that problems can be solved in dialogue’. 6 Turkey is distancing herself from the
old policy of ‘win-lose’ outcomes which was characteristic for what professor Kemal Kiriúci
describes as the old Hobbesian way of thinking. 7 Security crises with the neighbours have
now to be solved solely through dialogue and diplomacy.
The policy change came first already in the mid-eighties when Prime Minister Turgut Özal
(later president from 1989 until his death in 1993) ‘pursued a policy of opening new markets
and modernizing the economy’. 8 The AKP government took up this change, directing
foreign policy also towards the Middle East. As such there is nothing wrong with a policy of
laying contacts with the neighbours in the Middle East, yet because one is not used to this
approach, observers and policymakers in the West are asking themselves whether the zeal
with which Ankara is conducting this policy is not proof of a drifting away of Turkey from
the West. According to Amanda Akçakoca Turkey’s close ties ‘have also often been
perceived by the West as a sign that Turkey is turning away from her traditional allies,
especially since they were shaped at a time when Ankara’s relations with both the US and the
EU have been strained’. 9 In other words, the question is whether Turkey by becoming
diplomatically more active in the Middle East is not also leaning towards more ‘Orientalism’
in the sense of being more influenced by Middle Eastern ways of thinking.
Two elements seem to foster this critical perception of Turkey as ‘drifting away from the
West’: On the one hand Ankara has given the impression, during the last years, of not being
enthusiastic about the EU – prime minister Erdo÷an for instance did not visit Brussels for four
years (between 2005 and January 2009), on the other hand the relations between Turkey and
Israel have deteriorated, at least they do not look so bright anymore as they used to do. When
the country governed by a party with religious roots at the same develops good relations with
Syria, Iraq and even Iran, the critics start to fear Turkey is not only drifting away from the
West, but is also becoming more oriental and even Islamic. What is more, the German Marshall Fund’s annual Transatlantic Trends survey found out the following results: ‘Turkish
public opinion seems to reflect the country’s new focus on the Middle East. Compared with
last years’ results, the percentage of Turks who said Turkey should act in close cooperation
with the countries of the Middle East on international matters doubled to 20%. This was accompanied by a nine-point decline in those who said Turkey should cooperate with EU
countries (13%) […] In 2008, a Turkish majority (55%) felt Turkey has such different values
from the West that Turkey is not part of the West. By 2008 this percentage dropped to 48%
but was still more than those who agreed that Turkey has enough common values with the
West to be part of it (30%).’ 10 The combination of all these factors (less willingness among
the Turks to see their country cooperate with the West and their feeling of having other valu-
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es) makes people in the West – academics, policymakers, political observers – worry about
the character of Turkey and the path she is going to follow.
March 1 of 2003, the day that the Turkish parliament decided not to allow US troops to transit
Turkey on their way to invade Northern Iraq, was already seen as a setback on the pro-Western commitment of Turkey. According to Riccardo Perissich, Executive Vice-President of
the Council for the United States and Italy and former Director General for the Internal Market and Industry in the European Commission, ‘the drift in Turkey’s foreign policy started
well before clear opposition to membership emerged within Europe. The main turning point
was the invasion of Iraq, when the US grossly underestimated her impact on Turkey’s strategic interests.’ 11 Professor ølter Turan believes that ‘public attitudes regarding external relations are shaped largely by what the government does’, and so he thinks that the support of the
Turkish people for closer relations with the Middle East reflects ‘increasing support for the
government’s policies rather than a change in public opinion’ 12 . From what happened on
March 1 of 2003, one could however also derive the conclusion that the Turkish parliament as
the representation of the people’s will prompted or at least encouraged the government to
change the direction of its policy since then.
The way Turkish-Israeli relations have developed under Erdo÷an might prove the weight of
popular mood on Turkish politics. The more Erdo÷an fulminated against Israel, the more popular he became among the Turks. The Turkish-Israeli relationship constitutes the mirror of
the Turkish-Arab one. When Ankara looks for better contacts with the West, this is at the expense of the Middle East; when Ankara is disappointed about Europe or the USA, as it occurred some times in the last years, the relations with Tel Aviv have to stand the racket. The ideology of the people in power of course also plays a role: the present AKP-government lives
on Muslim solidarity. Prime Minister Erdo÷an erupted in outrage again at the end of May
2010 when Israeli commandos, determined to stop a flotilla sailing from Turkey to Gaza, killed eight Turkish citizens. The accident of timing – Turkey voted against UN-sanctions
against Iran – gave the impression that Turkey viewed Iran as a friend and Israel as an enemy.
It looked as if Turkey with her policy of ‘zero problems with neighbours’ was prepared to
alienate her old friends in the West in order to pacify countries in the region, including the
most radical among them. The New York Times Reporter Thomas Friedman wrote that Turkey seems intent on ‘joining the Hamas-Hezbollah-Iran resistance front against Israel.’ 13
Analyst Hugh Pope however believes that Turkey’s vote in the UN-Council was not meant as
‘a rebuke to the UN, which supported sanctions; it was meant as a measure to build confidence with Tehran, which the Turkish government thought Washington supported.’ 14 The
fear that Turkey would turn her back to the EU, the USA or Israel might be inspired by the
perception that the relations with the West have always been excellent and that what happens
now, would be exceptional. That is not the case. Turkey and the USA already had strained relations in the 60s, one should remember the ‘Johnson Letter’ when US President Lyndon
increasing ‘orientalism’ in turkey’s foreign policy?
97
Johnson in the course of tensions in Cyprus in 1964 warned Turkish Prime Minister øsmet
ønönü that the other members of NATO ‘have not had a chance to consider whether they have
an obligation to protect Turkey against the Soviet Union if Turkey takes a step which results
in Soviet intervention’ 15 . Disappointment about the EU is an old complaint; one has only to
think back to the Luxembourg Summit in 1997, when the EU thought of Turkey not yet being
ready for the status of applicant member. The motive of exclusively anchoring in the West
does not count anymore, as Turkey is looking for good contacts with the Muslim states in her
neighbourhood, but the military-technological know-how of Israel is still of some service to
the Turks. The relations between Ankara and Tel Aviv are too deep that they just would snap
because of political troubles.
Drifting away from the West? One could ask oneself now whether the critical voices about a
Turkey drifting away from the West are indeed legitimated by the motives of the AKP-government and its actions in the field of domestic and foreign policy. For one thing is sure: the
Kemalist state does not exist anymore the way it used to do as a purely pro-Western and
secular state. Turkey is becoming another country due to reforms which have been carried
through in the course of the last years. These reforms have been welcomed by the European
Union as a condition for opening the negotiations on the acquis communautaire with the candidate member state that Turkey is since the Helsinki summit of December 1999. Many reforms are formally seen in line with Western values or Western concepts of democracy and
basic rights. That does however not automatically mean that the kind of society that Turkey is
heading to is a Western kind of society. Again one can hear a widespread fear that Turkey as
a society will become more influenced by religion and religion-based conservative values.
Hürriyet columnist Mustafa Akyol thinks that this fear is exaggerated, when he says that ‘the
AKP is not imposing “shariah” on Turkey, but it is helping conservative Muslims to be more
influential in public life. The secularists are shocked by this change, which they see as the end
of the good-old hyper-secular Turkey’. At the same time basing himself on documents of the
WikiLeaks archives he is quoting the U.S. Ambassador Ross Wilson who in 2006 said that
“[The party’s] record to date describes a center-right, conservative party with Islamic roots
that has modestly advanced … Westernization and modernization.” 16
Domestic and foreign policy cannot be thought of each other as being separated domains. Foreign policy often is the translation towards the outside world of what is living on in the society, within the nation. M. Hakan Yavuz, associate professor at the University of Utah, sees
the AKP as completely different from the former Islamic Welfare Party, being the ‘outcome
of the transformation of liberal Islam, directed by four socio-political factors: the new Anatolian bourgeoisie, the expansion of the public sphere and the new Muslim intellectuals, the Copenhagen criteria, and the February 28 soft coup.’ 17 In the last years the emergence of new
elites in the field of politics and socio-economic life, the so-called ‘Anatolian tigers’, has
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challenged the traditional ruling Kemalist classes based in the big cities. The periphery as it
used to be called has pushed forward into the centre. The old Kemalist elites have lost a lot of
their influence, and where they did not, a kind of Kulturkampf is being fought, be it not as
radical anymore as in the recent past. The media have grown more liberal, so that public opinion and public debate started to play a bigger role in society. Economic life has been liberalized, so that free market thinking replaces etatism, one of the Altı Ok of Kemalism (the famous Six Arrows). The class of business people wants to open new markets, and as the old
economic elites in østanbul dominate the trade with the EU, the upcoming elites push towards
markets in the neighbourhood, the Middle East, the Gulf Region, Russia, and Central Asia.
The policy that the so-called Anatolian Tigers support is ‘based on open markets and engagement abroad with a distinct cultural bias rooted partially in Islam and partially in simple conservative values.’ 18 So, foreign trade policy is looking toward new markets, some of them in
the ‘Orient’.
Another fact with far-reaching consequences is that the military has been subdued by the
AKP-government to more civilian control. It looks as if the AKP cannot be constrained anymore, or as Soner Ça÷aptay writes: ‘Not long ago, some would have expected the military
and the secular echelon of Turkish society to intervene to guide Turkey on the right path. This
is not the case anymore. The AKP’s de-Kemalization has included civilianization, limiting
the role of the army in the state’s affairs, and has done so on the premise of an alleged
coup.’ 19
This also influences foreign policy, making it paying more attention to what the American
political scientist Joseph S. Nye coined as ‘soft power’. Diplomacy, dialogue, the convincing
power of the own socio-political model are becoming more important in the relations with
other states. The basic structures of state and society have changed, and so has foreign policy.
For the West this could be of big interest as some analysts hope that Turkey would become an
‘anchor of soft power for Western ideas about democracy, human rights, and economic exchange, producing regional security rather than being at the receiving end, as was the case,
when Turkey was frozen into the Western bloc’. 20
One should not look at foreign policy through a black-and-white specter or consider it as something static. It is true that Turkish foreign policy until the end of the Cold War was focused
on the West. Turkey wanted to become part of the West and in order to be accepted as member of several international organizations after the Second World War she even embraced plural democracy, i.e. the multiparty system. Being an outpost of the West she remained lonely
in the region. This also explains why Turkey sought contact with Israel, that country also being Western-minded and a ‘strange’ element in the region. The Turkish-Israeli relations were
a result of the cultural and political affinities that Turkey and Israel share, together with a
‘common sense of otherness’ in a region dominated by Arab culture. 21 Despite this regional
loneliness Turkey laid contacts, from the 60s on, with the Arab states. Economic reasons
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99
(new markets, the oil boom), but also disappointment about the American Cyprus policy explain this rapprochement. 22 Yet mutual distrust between Turks and Arabs could not be wiped
away that easily.
The end of the Cold War brought about a reassessment of Turkish foreign policy. On the one
hand this reduced ‘Ankara’s dependence on Washington for its security. At the same time, it
opened up new opportunities in areas that had previously been neglected or were off limits to
Turkish policy, particularly the Middle East and the Caucasus and Central Asia.’ 23 Some
thought about an own Turkish way: Turkey as a model and a leader for the Turkic states
which had gained independence from the Soviet Union that had ceased to exist. Other ones
wanted Turkey to continue being attractive and valuable to the West. The question was how
this was to be realized. If Turkey would be a model for other Islamic states, her attractiveness
for the EU might grow. For a country standing with one foot in Europe and the other one in
the Middle East this was important especially at the time when Harvard professor Samuel
Huntington published his famous article and later his book on the ‘Clash of Civilizations’. 24
Policymakers in Turkey conceived of Turkey as of a bridge, indeed a bridge, but not yet giving free way to the East, a bridge under construction in fact. The strategic environment changed also with the Second Iraq War in 2003. The war removed the dangerous regime of Saddam and this on its turn gave Iran the chance of fulfilling her ambitions of becoming a stronger regional player. It became necessary for Ankara to lay contacts with Iraq, not only for
economic reasons, but also out of fear that the Kurdish autonomous region in the north of Iraq
might inspire the Turkish Kurds to asking for more autonomy. Talking with Iran also became
inevitable because of trade, energy, security as ‘Turkey’s commercial and political interests in
Iran are far more extensive than those of the U.S. or European powers.’ 25
Since Syria expelled PKK-leader Öcalan in 1999 under Turkish pressure, relations between
Ankara and Damascus have also become better. Damascus also started to see Turkey as a facilitator for relations with the West, especially the EU, and even as a mediator with Israel.
Turkey, as a part of her Middle Eastern peace policy, had been organizing direct talks between Syria and Israel in May 2008 on the basis of the Madrid Conference principle in order
to solve the Golan Heights dispute. Yet even Turkish commentators raise the question whether Ankara will be able to maintain an unbiased and impartial role in the region after its decisions in October 2009 to postpone Israel’s participation in the joint air-force exercise and announce a similar cooperation with Syria. 26
So Turkey started to slip into relations with countries that it had seen as ‘difficult’ neighbours
until then. The domestic situation encouraged the Turkish policymakers to act this way. They
did so because they wanted it too. It is not only a matter of necessity, but also of a strong ambition. The style and the substance of Turkish foreign policy changed, but it is not sure whether this is pointing at a fundamental change. The Israeli professor Efraim Inbar is speaking
about Turkey’s approach to Iran as ‘demonstrating an Islamic coloration of Turkey’s foreign
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policy’. 27 Former U.S. diplomat Charles Freeman thinks ‘there are imperial aspirations in
Turkey for the first time in more than a century’. 28 Davuto÷lu seems to confirm this thought
by declaring that ‘Turkey’s geography and history has loaded Turkey with special responsibilities’ 29 and that ‘We want to contribute to the foundation of a lasting order in our region. If
by Pax Ottomana you mean such an order … it wouldn’t be wrong.’ 30
The Center for American Progress states that ‘References to Muslim creed and Ottoman history allow the government to project regional influence as well as confidence – and at the
same time place it outside the Kemalist tradition’. 31 It is exactly this of which Soner Ça÷aptay
is afraid: ‘The party [=AKP ] has already worked to uproot the Kemalist-nationalist element
of Turkish identity, a dangerous move in the post-9/11 environment, where adherents of a politically-defined Muslim identity are especially prone to viewing the world in a Huntingtonian
fashion. Subsequently, one can expect the party to follow policies explicitly contrary to those
of the U.S., Europe, and the West on a variety of issues ranging from Iran’s nuclearization to
Arab-Israeli peace, conflict in Sudan, and practically any problem involving Muslims.’ 32
Other analysts like Ian O. Lesser do not believe that Turkey is turning away from the West:
‘The real issue is the recalibration of Turkey’s Euroatlantic relations, not a turning away from
the West – a meaningful shift but not a revolutionary one.’ 33 Suat Kınıklıo÷lu, the AKP-expert for foreign policy, even brings forward the concept of ‘complementarity’: ‘Since 2002,
the AK Party has pursued a vigorous regional policy that aims to correct an anomaly of the
Cold War era. Far from being a choice, this is a necessity because of our geography. Our outreach to our neighbours is not done at the expense of our relationship with the West. On the
contrary, it is complimentary to it. Interpreting our regional policy as a shift in our orientation
misses the sophistication behind our efforts to stabilize a troubled neighbourhood.’ 34 The political commentator Semih ødiz of Hürriyet also sees Turkey being urged by her geography to
search for better understanding with her neighbours, and that has not only to do with a common religious background (because the signing of protocols with Armenia e. g. was detrimental to her relations with her ally Azerbajan, a Turkic and Muslim nation): ‘The simple fact is
that while Israel remains in a static position, and on a permanent war footing in terms of her
neighbours, Turkey has been trying over the past decade to improve her ties with her neighbours, some of whom – like Syria – had also brought Ankara to the brink of war due to the
support provided for PKK terrorists. […] The simple fact is that many Israelis live in a bubble, assuming that their country is somewhere in North America – perhaps even one of the
states in the U.S. – and therefore there is no need to take overall regional stability into consideration.’ 35
The question remains whether the anti-Western resentment under the Turkish people would
not go separate ways and then push the foreign policy of the AKP-government in another direction? According to what Ça÷aptay writes in his Open Letter to the then President Elect
Obama this danger is not imaginary: ‘This is the rare country in which anti-Western state-
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101
ments actually matter because they help shape people’s identity. Since the AKP assumed power in 2002, the Turks have not heard anything positive about the West from their leadership.’ 36 Western leaders however tend to stick to Turkey’s Western mission. A good example
is to be found in the speech president Obama delivered on his visit to Ankara on 6 and 7 April
2009, where he broke a lance for tighter cooperation between Turkey and the USA. He called
Turkey a ‘bridge between the Islamic World and the West’ and expressed his sympathy for
Atatürk’s visions. This metaphor does not correspond to the reality, not to forget anyway the
fact that one cannot ‘live’ on a bridge. As Mehmet Ö÷ütçü and Jonathan Clarke say: ‘Today,
Turkey is less of a bridge and more of a dynamic regional hub in a rapidly changing world
where a fundamental power shift is taking place towards Asia and away from the West. […]
Our suggestion is that Western officials should accept this new reality not as a challenge but
as a positive development. If they stop treating Turkey as a biddable client providing useful
transit services (as implied by the bridge metaphor) and instead recognize Turkey’s autonomous status and far-reaching national interests, a far healthier basis for future relations between Turkey and her Western allies will emerge. […] One way or another, a resurgent Turkey is rewriting the rules of the power game in the Middle East, Eurasia and Southeast Europe. It is doing so in a positive and non-confrontational manner that, when seen through this
new “hub” lens, accords well with Western interests in the troubled regional geography in
which Turkey lies at the center.’ 37
The crisis in the Turkish-Israeli relations clashes with the zero-problems-with-neighbours policy of Ankara and is giving food to the suspicion, rightly or wrongly, that Turkey would like
to exchange the West for the Muslim World. Accession to the EU remains state policy, declared the Turkish president Abdullah Gül in October 2009. The rapprochement to the Middle
East does not exclude the European vocation. Milliyet senior foreign affairs commentator Sami Kohen states: ‘The EU remains the main incentive for the reform process […]. Let’s not
forget that our priority is the West. But our posture in the world is enhanced by this policy [of
Middle East activism].’ 38
Conclusion
Not without a certain self-consciousness the Turks use to say that the EU needs Turkey more
than the other way round. They mean that the EU would not be able to become a ‘global player’ without Turkish EU-membership. One cannot deny that Turkey is important because of
her strategic position, securing the energy transfer from the Middle East to the West and providing stability in the wider region. That the EU is not yet a ‘global player’, is rather due to
the cacophony within her own ranks – and the Lisbon Treaty tries to correct this defect by
creating the function of a ‘High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs’ – than to the
institutional absence of Turkey. As far as security is concerned, one could assume that Turkey’s NATO-membership is enough to provide a climate of security and eventually a ‘privi-
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leged partnership’ – which, however, is being rejected by Turkey - would also do for enhancing stability and democracy. There is however a tendency in international politics to make
NATO- and EU-membership coincide. In that sense the critical attitude of Ankara towards Israel, a ‘friend’ of the West, especially of the USA, is not benefiting to her European vocation.
AKP politicians are comparing the foreign policy of Turkey with the European Union project
as a way of creating a zone of peace and stability, of abolishing the borders in this sense that
people to people relations would be improved. Even the Middle East does not want Turkey to
give up the West. What makes Turkey attractive to Arab states, is on the hand the cultural
closeness (see the reference to the Muslim creed and the shared history, despite the mixed
feelings) and on the other hand Turkey’s closeness to Europe. Hasan Kanbolat, director of the
Centre for Middle East Strategic Studies (ORSAM) in Ankara brings the view of Turkey’s
neighbours to the point: ‘They saw a culture close to them, but also close to Europe. The closer we get to Europe, the closer the Middle East wants to get to us.’ 39 So when Turkey is applying EU standards, it becomes attractive as, indeed, a bridge, or better a ‘model’. The more
Turkey is active in the East, and the stronger it is there, the more it will be taken seriously in
the West. 40 What matters for Turkey is not that it belongs either to the West or the East, but
to both, to the West as well as to the East.
1
William Hale: Turkish Foreign Policy 1774-2000, London-Portland, OR 2002², 44-78.
2
Turkey and the Middle East: Ambitions and Constraints. Crisis Group Report N° 203, 7 April 2010, footnote 235.
3
Dietrich Jung with Wolfango Piccoli, Turkey at the Crossroads. Ottoman Legacies and a Greater Middle East, Lon-
don & New York 2001, 136.
4
F. Stephen Larrabee: Turkey’s New Geopolitics, in: Survival, vol. 52, no. 2, April-May 2010, p. 159.
5
Ahmet Davuto÷lu, ‘Turkish Foreign Policy and the EU in 2010’, Turkish Policy Quarterly 2009, Vol. 8, N° 3, p. 12.
6
‘Wir wollen Ordnung’, Der Spiegel, 22 June 2009, pp. 110-112, quote after Ekrem Eddy Güzeldere, Turkish Fo-
reign Policy: From “Surrounded by Enemies” to “Zero Problems”, C-A-P Policy Analysis, 1/2009, p. 15.
7
Kemal Kiriúci, ‘Turkey’s foreign policy in turbulent times’, European Union Institute for Security Studies (EUISS),
Chaillot Paper, N° 92, September 2006.
8
Michael Werz, The New Levant. Understanding Turkey’s Shifting Roles in the Eastern Mediterranean, Center for
American Progress, May 2010, p. 3.
9
Amanda Akçakoca, Turkish foreign policy – between East and West?, European Policy Centre, October 2009.
10
German Marshall Fund of the United States et alia, Transatlantic Trends, Key Findings 2010, Section Five: Turkey
and the West – Drifting Away, 2010, p. 23-26.
11
Riccardo Perissich, Turkey and the EU: A play in search of a script, EuropEos Commentary, No. 5/28 September
2010, Centre for European Policy Studies, Brussels 2010, p. 3.
12
ølter Turan, “Somebody Loves Me, I wonder Who?”, Analysis on Turkey, German Marshall Fund of the United
States, October 14, 2010, p. 2-3.
increasing ‘orientalism’ in turkey’s foreign policy?
103
13
Thomas Friedman, ‘Letter from Istanbul’, The New York Times, 15 June 2010.
14
Hugh Pope, Pax Ottomana, Foreign Affairs, November/December 2010, p. 169.
15
Quoted in Hale, see endnote 1, p. 149.
16
Mustafa Akyol, How ‘Islamist’ is the AKP?, Hürriyet, 3 December 2010.
17
M. Hakan Yavuz, Secularism and Muslim Democracy in Turkey, Cambridge Middle East Studies 28, Cambridge
2009, p. 78.
18
Henri J. Barkey, Turkey’s Moment of Inflection, Survival, vol. 52 no. 3, June-July 2010, p. 40.
19
Soner Ça÷aptay, ‘Turkish exceptionalism?’, Hürriyet, 28 November 2010.
20
See endnote 8, p. 5.
21
A. Makovsky, ‘Israeli-Turkish relations. A Turkish “periphery strategy”?’, in H.J. Barkey (ed.), Reluctant Neigh-
bor. Turkey’s Role in the Middle East, United States Institute of Peace Press, Washington D.C. 1996, pp. 147-170.
22
See endnote 3, p. 139.
23
See endnote 4, p. 158.
24
Samuel Huntington, Clash of Civilizations. The Remaking of the New World Order, New York 1996, 368 pp.
25
Turkey’s Crises over Israel and Iran, Crisis Group Europe Report N° 208, September 2010, p. 11.
26
Ça÷ıl M. Kasapo÷lu, ‘Is Turkey jeopardizing its mediator role in the Middle East?’, Hürriyet, 21 October 2009.
27
Efraim Inbar, ‘Israeli-Turkish Tensions and beyond’, in: „Turkish Political Quarterly“ 3/2009, p. 42.
28
Crisis Group interview, former U.S. diplomat Charles Freeman Washington D.C., November 2009, see endnote 2,
p. 26.
29
Davuto÷lu, CNN Türk, 25 November 2009.
30
Davuto÷lu, CNN Türk, 25 November 2009.
31
See endnote 8, p. 6.
32
Soner Ça÷aptay, ‘Turkish exceptionalism?’, Hürriyet, 28 November 2010.
33
Ian O. Lesser, ‘Do we understand Turkey?’ http://www.gmfus.org//doc/Lesser_Turkey_Analysis_0209_final.pdf.
34
Quoted in Today’s Zaman, February 8, 2009.
35
Hürriyet, October 22, 2009.
36
Soner Ça÷aptay, ‘The Most Anti-American Nation’, in: Newsweek, 24 November 2008.
37
Hürriyet, December 6, 2009.
38
Sami Kohen, Istanbul Policy Centre Speech, 7 December 2009.
39
Crisis Group Interview, Ankara, 10 February 2010, see endnote 2.
40
Crisis Group Interview with a senior Turkish official, Washington D.C., November 2009, see endnote 2.