Türkiye’s balancing act by not taking sides in the Ukraine war is an excellent example of how a country should behave in a multipolar world.
Way back on Sep 20 in an interview with the PBS news outlet, Turkish President Tayyip Recep Erdogan said a settlement in the Ukrainian conflict would require Russia to return all “invaded” lands to Ukraine.
“If peace is going to be established in Ukraine, of course, the return of the land that was invaded will become really important. This is what is expected. This is what is wanted,” he said.
Adding that “no invasion can be justified,” but acknowledging that at the same time, “prior to the breaking out of this conflict, many things had happened, a solution, therefore, won’t be found in “person to the one side entirely and defending the other,” Erdogan said.
“We are not going to defend a single leader. But, instead, we have to be looking for a conclusion that will satisfy all parties involved,” he stressed.
At the start of the war, Türkiye was the first to contribute arms and equipment to Ukraine, in line with its responsibility as a Nato member country, and also with the good bilateral relationship it has had with Ukraine since before the war.
Also, it quickly closed the Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits to military vessels within days of the start of the war, not so much to prevent Moscow from reinforcing its fleet, but rather to prevent escalation in the Black Sea.
It refuses until today to participate in the sanctions against Russia because of its belief that the only legitimate sanctions Türkiye will observe are sanctions that are mandated by the UN Security Council, and not the US-mandated or EU-mandated ones.
Erdogan seems to understand that sanctions that are solely based on ruining a country’s economy so that colour revolution can take place which will pave the way for a regime change is an undemocratic and unjust sanction that will not only cause the innocent citizens of the country concerned to suffer but will also boomerang on the countries that initiate and participate in that sanctions.
In doing all these we can see that Erdogan is just doing what a leader should do – taking care of Türkiye’s interest so that the well-being of each and every Turkish citizen is guaranteed.
And he doesn’t do all these at the expense of other countries. He even has humanity in mind when he initiated the Black Sea Grain Initiative with the UN and played a mediator role to end the Ukraine war.
While the US has been plotting his downfall based on a video that resurfaced recently where US President Joe Biden has detailed what looks like a “handbook” for a regime change in Turkey via the electoral process, as far back as late last year, Ankara was chosen as the venue for the heads of the American and Russian foreign intelligence services – the CIA’s Bill Burns and Sergey Nariskin of the SVR – to discuss “threats against international security, starting with the use of nuclear weapons”, Erdogan’s office has said then.
But instead of recognising the useful, neutral role that Türkiye has played all this while, the US and its Western allies are hell-bent to see Erdogan go.
A few weeks before the May 14 election, the mainstream US and Western media turned out in full force and had a field day in meddling in the election by running anti-Erdogan articles, which more or less looked like the first salvo in implementing Joe Biden’s “handbook” of a regime change in Türkiye through the election process.
In particular, the cover story of the London-based magazine, the Economist, with its front cover picture of pins that said “Save Democracy” and “Erdogan Must Go” was patently anti-Erdogan.
For weeks before the election, opinion polls of the West that were manipulated to show opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu winning the election were trumpeted throughout Türkiye and the world.
Views of US and Western analysts that predicted the two powerful earthquakes which struck southern Türkiye in February, killing more than 50,000 people, would hurt Erdogan’s chances of re-election on May 14 gained prominence as the election date neared.
But in the aftermath of the election, figures showed that out of 11 provinces affected by the earthquakes, Erdogan and his AK Party were ahead in eight provinces in both the presidential and parliamentary elections, while Kilicdaroglu of the Nation Alliance and the leftist main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader were well ahead only in two earthquake provinces.
Without this meddling from the US and Western media, Erdogan would have easily won the election without the necessity of a runoff on May 28. It is indeed very strange that the US and its allies are hell-bent in plotting the downfall of even its own ally, Erdogan.
In fact, according to Alexander Mercouris of the Duran, an independent news channel, this meddling especially the Economist cover story and its pictures had the opposite effect of galvanising the Turkish population to come out in droves as shown by the more than good voters turn out to vote for Erdogan, which gave him a slight lead in winning the first round of the election on May 14.
Now most analysts including the US and Western ones are predicting an easy victory for Erdogan in the runoff on May 28.
But can we really believe and underestimate the neo-cons in the Biden administration and their allies in Europe to just surrender without trying their best to unseat Erdogan?
Only time will tell. Jamari Mohtar is the Editor of Let’s Talk!, an e-newsletter on current affair.
