Turkey’s Dilemmas in the Middle East: the Kurdistan Regional Government and ISIS
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Assistant Professor, Department of International Relations, Bilkent University (Turkey)
Upon the rise of the Justice and Development Party (JDP) to power in 2002, Turkey embarked on an activist foreign policy in the Middle East. Minister of Foreign Affairs Ahmet Davutoğlu, who was previously Prime Minister Erdoğan’s chief foreign policy adviser, argued in his famous book Strategic Depth that the Middle East was a natural environment for Turkey, both for geopolitical and historical-cultural reasons. Therefore, Ankara could not detach itself from political developments in the region.
The Rise and Fall of the Turkish “Trading State” in the Middle East: Increasing Cooperation and Regional Integration Following the Arab Spring
Upon the rise of the Justice and Development Party (JDP) to power in 2002, Turkey embarked on an activist foreign policy in the Middle East. Minister of Foreign Affairs Ahmet Davutoğlu, who was previously Prime Minister Erdoğan’s chief foreign policy adviser, argued in his famous book Strategic Depth that the Middle East was a natural environment for Turkey, both for geopolitical and historical-cultural reasons. Therefore, Ankara could not detach itself from political developments in the region [1].
Over the past decade, Turkish soft power in the Middle East has significantly increased. Examples of Turkey’s increasing use of soft power include Turkish Parliament’s refusal to grant permission for American troops to use Turkish territory right before the invasion of Iraq in 2003, Prime Minister Erdoğan’s support for the Palestinian cause on various international platforms and the JDP’s policy of siding with opposition movements against authoritarian rulers in the Arab Spring, other various cultural and economic factors have also been behind this new policy. Alongside an increase in its political activism, Turkey has strengthened its economic presence in its southern neighborhood through a growing amount of Turkish investments and exports. In a famous article on Turkey’s economic activity in the Middle East as well as other regions, Professor Kirisçi of the Brookings Institution argues that Turkish foreign policy has been transformed drastically and dramatically, now resembling what political scientist Richard Rosecrance [2] refers to as the “trading state” in his influential book [3]. This has entailed a shift from a coercive and security-oriented approach to the region, which dominated the country’s policy in the 1990s, to one that has been more friendly and pragmatic towards Turkey’s southern neighbors.
Turkey has strengthened its economic presence in its southern neighborhood through a growing amount of Turkish investments and exports.
Turkey’s exports to Middle Eastern countries increased from $7.9 billion in 2004 to $42 billion in 2012. Turkey was so confident in its regional economic policies that it even proposed the formation of a Levant free trade zone to include Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey. Through regional integration, Turkey could not only move the erosion of trade barriers forward, but also foster the formation of a zone of peace among brotherly nations of the region, eventually paving the way for greater political cooperation. The uprisings that would later on be titled the ‘Arab Spring’ would shake the grounds on which Turkish foreign policy activism in its southern neighborhood rested. For Turkey, the path to leadership in the Middle East undoubtedly passed through political stability in its neighboring states. Without hesitation, Turkey sided with the masses in supporting the toppling of autocratic leaders in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and Syria. Yet, it soon became clear that Turkey would have to make critical choices in the post-Arab Spring Middle East. These choices involved trade-offs between Turkey’s traditional foreign policy principles and adapting to the new realities in Syria and Iraq.
Turkey is currently facing two inevitable challenges in its immediate neighborhood. First, because Iraq is increasingly returning to the brink of state failure and disintegration, Turkey has to make a strategic choice between its traditional support for international norms – such as sovereignty and territorial integrity – and Kurdish independence. Second, Turkey has to find a balance between its strong support for opposition forces in Syria and the newly-emerging radical Islamist threat in its southern neighborhood. ISIS will not only destabilize the region, but also poses an immediate and serious threat to Turkey’s domestic population.
Kurdistan Regional Government: a Reliable Political and Economic Partner?
Despite initial domestic concerns, Turkey has been a staunch supporter of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). Although in the 1990s, Turkey supported Iraq’s Kurds against the outlawed Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK), it was also skeptical of the Kurdish struggle for greater autonomy due to Turkey’s historically driven domestic security and national identity concerns. As a result of Turkey’s three decade-long problem of Kurdish separatism, Mosul and Kirkuk have traditionally been symbols of Turkish nationalism, because they were included in the Turkish “National Oath” of 1920 [4].
Without hesitation, Turkey sided with the masses in supporting the toppling of autocratic leaders in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and Syria.
During the 1990s, Turkish Armed Forces organized several cross-border operations with thousands of troops used against the PKK in order to curb its armed capacity and economic power. Contrary to the security-dominated approach of the 1990s, the successive JDP governments have viewed the region as an opportunity to increase Turkey’s economic and political influence in the aftermath of the American invasion of Iraq in 2003 [5]. While Turkish construction companies were re-building the Kurdish region and Turkish exports were flooding Kurdish towns, the president of KRG, Masoud Barzani sought Turkish against the authoritarian and exclusionary policies of the central governments in Baghdad [6]. Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki would frequently accuse Turkey of helping the Kurds bypass the central government in multi-billion dollar energy projects. Due to its high current account deficit, which is mainly from the result of its dependence on oil and natural gas imports, Ankara has been willing to help Erbil, the capital of KRG, in return for cheaper access to energy. In early June, Ankara and KRG signed a 50-year energy deal that would export Kurdish oil to world markets through Turkey. Apparently, Kurdish oil plays an important role in the JDP’s plan for making Turkey an energy hub.
Celebration of Novruz in Diyarbakir,
Turkey, 2013.
For Turkey, Kurdish identity at home and abroad does not pose an existential threat to its security anymore.
Soon after this deal was signed, Ankara’s relations with Erbil reached a turning point. Right after the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) took control of the northern town of Mosul, Kurdish pashmarga forces filled the power vacuum in Kirkuk on June 12th 2014 as central Iraqi forces fled the town. Throughout the republican period and also in the early years of JDP governments, Kirkuk has been the symbol of Turkey’s priorities or “redlines” in Iraq. Home to several hundreds of thousands of Turkmens – the Turks’ kinsmen in Iraq – Kirkuk is also an oil-rich city. Since 2003, Turkey has advocated that Kirkuk should remain under the control of the central government and that forced population exchanges – to change the population ratio in favor of the Kurds and against the Turkmen – should be blocked. Various observers have argued that Ankara was forced to ignore – or maybe actually supported – Kurdish control in Kirkuk against the ISIS threat. Without a doubt, this is a major shift for Turkey’s official position towards Iraq in general and towards the KRG in particular. Although we will never know the true story surrounding Kirkuk, it is obvious that the KRG now controls one of the most strategic positions in the entire Middle East, moving it a step closer to independence from Baghdad.
What should also be mentioned is that the ongoing Kurdish expansion process in Turkey goes hand-in-hand with Turkey’s warm relations with Iraqi Kurdistan. For Turkey, Kurdish identity at home and abroad does not pose an existential threat to its security anymore. The portion of Turkey’s Kurdish population who vote for the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party will be the tiebreaker in the upcoming presidential elections in the event that no candidate wins victory in the first round. In the most recent local elections held in March 2014, Erdoğan’s JDP received 45% of the votes, which would not secure victory in the first round if a similar number of votes were to be gained in the next round. Therefore, the ongoing conflict resolution process with the PKK and the promise of improved relations with Kurds of Iraq and Syria will be an asset for Erdoğan’s campaign.
Today Turkey has to make a choice – a choice that might fundamentally shift its foreign policy practices and also shake the foundations of the Turkish foreign minister’s already-fading “zero-problems with neighbors” policy.
Today Turkey has to make a choice – a choice that might fundamentally shift its foreign policy practices and also shake the foundations of the Turkish foreign minister’s already-fading “zero-problems with neighbors” policy [7]. The real issue at stake is the reliability of KRG as a strategic partner for Turkey in the Middle East. Iraq is now Turkey’s second biggest export market after Germany and a considerable percentage of these goods do to Kurdistan. Yet, there is no reliable data as to what percentage of Turkey’s exports go to Kurdistan and what percentage to the rest of Iraq. Supporting an independent Kurdish state may damage Turkey’s economic capacity within the larger state of Iraq. Another issue in Ankara’s relations with Erbil will be the security and well-being of the Turkmen population. Iraqi Turkmen, who suffered during the Saddam era just like the Kurds did, ended up with very few political gains in the post-Saddam period. According to a recent report by Turkish daily Hürriyet, Turkmens facing the threat from ISIS have been ‘left for dead’ in the Iraqi desert. Whether Erbil will do much to protect Turkmen towns and villages from the deadly attacks of ISIS remains a substantial question. Finally, as Nick Butler of King’s College London very well put it in the Financial Times, although the Kurdish region looks very profitable for Turkish and Western investors at the moment, the greater risk will arise in the medium term as a possible Iraqi civil war will undoubtedly bring to a halt the economic boom in the region. In Butler’s words, “what company is going to invest billions of dollars at the height of a civil war?” [8]. Turkish support for Kurdistan might look profitable right now, but potential clashes between Erbil and Baghdad can also push Turkey back to its security-oriented traditional outlook towards the region.
Turkey is now paying a heavy price as its goal of toppling the Assad regime has created a new political environment in which its nearly 900 km-long border with Syria is under constant threat.
Recently, in his column in Turkish Daily Sabah, Erdoğan’s foreign policy adviser and deputy undersecretary Ibrahim Kalin wrote, “keeping Iraq together under a new political and security structure is key to keeping the Middle East together” [9]. Currently, no regional or major power is capable of shaping Iraqi politics in order to re-establish political order and peace. Added to this are Turkey’s already-problematic relations with Syria and the ongoing civil war in that country. Turkey’s southern neighbors will continue to pose challenges to Davutoğlu’s strategic vision. Turkey’s choices will only determine the intensity of these new geopolitical challenges.
ISIS: a New Foe for Turkey in the Region?
Recep Erdogan speaks in front of Taksim
square.
On June 10 2014, Turkey’s Consulate General in Mosul was attacked by ISIS militants, which resulted in the kidnapping by the latter of Turkey’s consul general and the consulate personnel, along with their families. As of today, dozens of Turkish citizens are still being held captive by ISIS. Western media outlets have criticized the Turkish government for having helped to create the ongoing chaos in Iraq. Turkey has long been accused of letting jihadist fighters pass through its territory to join the ranks of anti-Assad forces in Syria. It would be an over-simplification to place the blame solely on Ankara for the radicalization of the civil war in the region. As the history of jihadist radicalization has already demonstrated at various times in history, civil wars and government repression only exacerbate support for violent groups acting in the name of Islam. Yet, what is certain is that Turkey is now paying a heavy price as its goal of toppling the Assad regime has created a new political environment in which its nearly 900 km-long border with Syria is under constant threat. The difficulty, if not the impossibility, of distinguishing terrorists from civilians only adds to the complexity. Having been hesitant to take a side in an armed conflict in the Middle East, Ankara’s regional policy now has to take into account the new ISIS factor.
It has recently been argued that an independent Kurdish state and a Kurdish-controlled Northern Syria might be a buffer between Turkey and its troubled south, preventing radical Islamism and political disorder from spreading to Turkey by “providing a wall against ISIS infiltration” [10]. One wonders whether even that is even possible with Mosul – a large city very close to Turkey – under the control of the well-trained and organized ISIS. Turkey’s Kurdish card builds on the assumption that Erbil and the Kurdish pashmarga will be reliable and strong actors capable of providing order in the region. However, there is no guarantee that the pashmarga are ready to engage in armed conflicts with ISIS at a time when the KRG’s relations with Baghdad are also strained.
Turkey is facing a dilemma; while it has to support the anti-autocratic movement in Syria and elsewhere in the region, it also has to defeat – or at least not lose against – a new foe in the broader region, the radical Islamists.
Currently Turkey is facing a dilemma; while it has to support the anti-autocratic movement in Syria and elsewhere in the region, it also has to defeat – or at least not lose against – a new foe in the broader region, the radical Islamists. With ISIS on the rise, the strengthening of radical tendencies in Syria and Iraq is becoming irreversible. No matter what Turkey chooses to do, radicalization and political disorder will mark the future of its southern neighbors.
Presidential Elections and the Future of Turkish Foreign Policy in the Middle East
On August 10, 2014, Turkish citizens will go to polls to elect Turkey’s next president. The three candidates of the presidency are: JDP’s candidate Prime Minister Erdoğan, the opposition’s joint candidate, a professor and former diplomat, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoğlu, and finally, pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party’s co-chair Selahattin Demirtas. For Turkey’s two largest opposition parties, the Republican People’s Party and Nationalist Action Party, the government has made huge mistakes in overlooking the Islamist threat which emanated from the Syrian civil war, relying too much on Erbil and undertaking a Sunni Islamist foreign policy vision rather than embracing all social and political sides. Now, it is too late for Ankara to try to prevent the radicalization of the opposition forces in Syria or curb ISIS’s unstoppable rise (which already has not really been under its control). Also, as described above, Ankara seems to have picked the Kurds as its best allies in the region. If Erdoğan emerges victorious from these presidential elections, it is highly likely that he will consolidate Turkey’s current strategy towards Syria and Iraq. If everything is taken into account together, the above-mentioned Kurdish dimension, the threat from ISIS and the self-reinforcing nature of Turkey’s stance against the Assad regime all make it clear that the current course of foreign policy will be continued under Erdoğan’s presidency.
No matter who is elected Turkey’s new president, regional developments will be obstacles for Turkey’s efforts to return its earlier economic and political influence.
Yet, again, no matter who is elected Turkey’s new president, regional developments will be obstacles for Turkey’s efforts to return its earlier economic and political influence. The rise of Turkish soft power and influence as a trading state in the Middle East was only made possible due to stability in the region. The Arab Spring has demonstrated that Davutoğlu’s and Erdoğan’s conceptions of Turkey’s role in the region do not always coincide with regional complexities. To put it more correctly, Turkey will have to pick sides in the post-Arab Spring Middle East, which might make the “zero-problems with neighbors” doctrine obsolete. Stability and peace, which currently look like impossible goals, are prerequisites for Turkey’s regional capabilities.
It is true that these crises might eventually turn out to be moments of geopolitical opportunity; this might be what the Turkish government has in mind. Turkey might very well emerge as a more powerful state in the region out of these new circumstances. Yet, in a region like the Middle East, no political actor can be sure what developments the future will bring.
1. Ahmet Davutoğlu, Stratejik Derinlik: Türkiye’n in Uluslararası Konumu (Strategic Depth: Turkey’s International Position), (Istanbul: Küre, 2001).
2. Richard Rosecrance is currently adjunct professor at Harvard University.
3. Richard Rosecrance, The Rise of the Trading State: Commerce and Conquest in the Modern World (New York: Basic Books, 1986).
4. The “National Oath” was a set of principles adopted by the Chamber of Deputies of the Ottoman Parliament in February 1920. It aimed to bring back the former Ottoman territories with a Turkish majority under full Turkish control, including today’s Western Thrace in Greece, the Republic of Turkey and roughly Iraqi Kurdistan, including Mosul and Kirkuk. The “National Oath” would become the manifesto of the National Government in Ankara led by Mustafa Kemal (later Atatürk) during the Turkish War of Independence (1919-1922).
5. Soner Cagaptay, “Turkey’s Kurdish Buffer: Why Erdogan is Ready to Work with the Kurds”, Snapshot, Foreign Affairs, 1 July 2014
6. Masoud Barzani has been the president of the Kurdistan Regional Government since 2005. He is also the leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party.
7. For detailed explanation of the “zero problems with neighbors” principle, see; http://www.mfa.gov.tr/zero-problems-in-a-new-era.en.mfa
8. Nick Butler, “Oil and an Independent Kurdistan”, Financial Times Blogs, 20 July 2014; http://blogs.ft.com/nick-butler/2014/07/20/oil-and-an-independent-kurdistan/?
9. Ibrahim Kalin, “To Keep the Middle East together, Don’t Let Iraq Split Up”, Daily Sabah, 20 June 2014.
10. Soner Cagaptay, “Yesterday’s Enemies, Tomorrow’s Friends?”, The Majalla, 9 July 2014; http://www.majalla.com/eng/2014/07/article55250505
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