by Joel Gehrke, Washington Examiner
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan could help Russia in multiple ways if he continues to undermine the effectiveness of NATO from within the transatlantic alliance, according to diplomats and analysts.
“He will continue to play a spoiler role within NATO,” Aykan Erdemir, a former Turkish lawmaker at the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told the Washington Examiner. “That makes him extremely useful to Russia.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin has cultivated a relationship with Erdoğan in recent years, taking advantage of the Turkish leader’s frustration with the U.S. strategy to defeat the Islamic State in Syria by partnering with Kurdish militias that he regards as a terrorist threat. Now Erdoğan seems willing to help Putin in multiple theaters, not only by attacking U.S. partners in Syria but by welcoming two members of the Russian-dominated legislature in Crimea to Istanbul on Sunday.
“I think this is the first major blow to [unity concerning] Ukraine’s territorial sovereignty,” said a Central European diplomat, who requested anonymity from the Washington Examiner to comment on friction between NATO members. “Erdoğan even greeted them personally.”
Turkey previously has drawn praise from State Department officials for playing a “very helpful” role in opposing Russian aggression against Ukraine. Erdoğan extended that olive branch amid an offensive in northern Syria that endangered U.S. military forces and delivered a significant victory for Putin, who has long sought an American withdrawal from Syria.
“It’s not a good sign,” said the Central European diplomat. “It just helped achieve Russia’s biggest strategic goal to divide the West and to divide the alliance. And this division is already real.”
Turkey’s assault on the Kurdish militias drew criticism from NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, although the civilian head of the security bloc emphasized that NATO doesn’t have a formal role in the Syria conflict.
“Many NATO Allies are very critical and are condemning the military operation in Northern Syria,” Stoltenberg said Tuesday. “I am concerned about how this can further escalate the tensions in the region, how it can further destabilize the region and the human suffering. And not least, I’m concerned about the consequences for our, for the gains we have made in fighting our common enemy Da’esh [ISIS].”
Defense Secretary Mark Esper will lobby at a defense ministerial next week for NATO allies “to take collective and individual diplomatic and economic measures in response to these egregious Turkish actions,” while President Trump has announced a plan to raise tariffs on Turkey and sanction various officials involved in the operation.
But Esper’s browbeating might have necessary limits, given Turkey’s strategic value. Turkey hosts U.S. forces at Incirlik Air Base, and Erdoğan controls the second-largest military within NATO. Turkey also controls the chokepoint between the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea. That waterway, the Bosporus Strait, is the only route to the open ocean from the Russian and Ukrainian ports on the Black Sea.
“He has a strong political-diplomatic voice where he can remind Erdoğan of the value of the alliance and the expectations of being an ally,” a former U.S. ambassador to NATO, speaking on condition of anonymity out of deference to current officials, told the Washington Examiner. “Nobody wants to push this so far that Turkey as an ally is at risk.”
That view is shared even by Erdoğan’s staunchest critics, suggesting a consensus that Western allies have to manage the relationship even if it means giving Putin the opportunity to stoke discord within NATO.
“I think that’s exactly the role Putin has ascribed to him, meaning he would like Turkey to remain in NATO but as a spoiler,” Erdemir said. “So the key question here is how to deal with Erdoğan, and then, meanwhile how to maintain the other half of Turkey that is aligned more or less with the transatlantic values.”
