Turkey's Changing Stance and Paradoxes over the Libyan and Syrian Crises

Abstract

1 Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies Vol. XXXVI, No.4, Summer 2013 Turkey’s Changing Stance and Paradoxes over the Libyan and Syrian Crises Muhsin Baran* Introduction The current uprising in the Middle East, the Arab Spring, has been sui generis with respect to the exclusive support from the masses and large protests against the regimes in the related countries. The primary reason for such spectacular public backing lies in the demands for change by the peoples of the region. Since these demands were closely related with democracy, the western world, particularly the United States, was expected to devote close attention to this issue and contribute to toppling these regimes. The support from the western world was well below these expectations as the United States and its allies only launched a military intervention in Libya. Other states, namely Tunisia, Yemen, Egypt and Syria, were assisted in different forms rather than direct military intervention. Turkey’s attitudes towards a foreign intervention were a bit blurred in the beginning. No sooner was a military operation launched by the western world on Libya, than Turkey insistently stressed the danger of third parties’ military interventions in the region and urged that, first and foremost, the internal dynamics should be backed rather than going ahead with a direct military intervention. However, it was not long before when Turkey shifted from its past opposition to a military intervention in Libya and backed the operation indirectly. This new stance was based on the grounds of the rising number of casualties. Turkey’s stance during the Syrian crisis was similar to that of Libya. As the civil war became more brutal and the death toll seemed likely to reach *Muhsin Baran is a PhD candidate at Uludağ University, Department of International Relations. His research interests are the Middle East, Kurdish issue, discourse analysis and Critical Security theories. He has been writing his dissertation on relations between Turkey and Kurdistan Regional Government. 2 an alarming level, Turkey called for a military intervention led by international organizations to stop the bloodshed. The reluctance of the western world due to the Islamist factions in the Syrian opposition and the vetoes of Russia and China in the United Nations Security Council blocked a military intervention in this country. Turkey’s new stance started to be severely criticized by both the secular main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) and Nationalist Action Party (MHP) as this new policy was different from traditional Turkish foreign policy. The zero problems with neighbor’s policy developed by Ahmet Davutoğlu, the current Minister of Foreign Affairs of Turkey, was criticized and recast sarcastically by the Turkish opposition as the zero neighbors policy. The ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Parti) was blamed for turning once friendly regional states into new foes and deviating from traditional Turkish foreign policy. Apart from the internal opposition, there were serious criticism from regional states such as Iran, Iraq and Russia, for they held Turkey partly responsible for the instability and civil war in Syria. Turkey’s new stance demanding a foreign intervention in Syria was paradoxical with respect to the Islamist identity of the ruling AK Party and Turkey’s treatment of Kurdish opposition in Syria. Calling for non-Islamic third party interventions in a Muslim state contradicted the Islamic approach, which has always urged the unity of the Muslim world. The exclusion of the Kurdish opposition whilst patronizing and arming all other factions including those believed to have connections with al-Qaida was another paradox. This study provides an analytical discussion on Turkey’s paradoxes over the Libyan and particularly Syrian crises. It starts with a brief description of Turkey’s traditional foreign policy during the Cold War era. Then the new policy shaped by Davutoğlu, a renowned professor of International Relations, is explained. Following this, Turkey’s new stance and the paradoxes affiliated with this shift during the Libyan and Syrian crises is discussed in the context of the Arab Spring. The study ends with a conclusion that the foreign policy of a state, as in the case of Turkey, is primarily dependent on national interests. (I) A New Paradigm in Turkish Foreign Policy...