POLITICS: U.S. VIEWED AS TURKEY’S "GREATEST THREAT"
By Jonathan Bell
IPS, Italy
Sept 7 2007
WASHINGTON, Sep 7 (IPS) – Nearly two-thirds of the Turkish public
named the United States as their country’s greatest future threat,
a recent Pew Global Attitudes Project survey has revealed — the
highest percentage of any Middle Eastern or Islamic country polled.
The survey, which was also conducted in Palestine, Egypt, Lebanon,
Kuwait, Jordan, Morocco and Israel, asked an open ended question:
"What country or groups pose the greatest threat to (survey country)
in the future?" Turkey was the only country in which a majority
of respondents pointed to the U.S. Turkey, a U.S. NATO ally and
recipient of U.S. and NATO security guarantees, also harbours the
second most negative attitudes towards the U.S., with 83 percent
holding an "unfavourable" opinion of it — up 29 percent since 2002,
the biggest drop in public opinion of the U.S. in recent years.
Eighty-six percent of Palestinians express an unfavourable opinion
of the U.S., the most negative response from a Middle Eastern country.
Dr. Emre Erdogan, a political scientist and founding partner of
Infakto Research Workshop, says that this is "a result of intensifying
terrorist activities of the PKK" — an armed militant group founded
in the 1970s also known as the Kurdistan Workers Party — which has
found increasing support since the Iraq war began.
The Turkish people "perceive the U.S. as responsible for the worsening
situation," said Erdogan in a World Public Opinion (WPO)/Programme
on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) analysis of the Pew results.
The "increasing terrorist and political activity of the PKK" is seen
to be "under direct supervision of the Northern Iraq Administration
and the U.S.", and the Turkish media "continuously present evidence
for this [U.S.-PKK] collaboration," said Erdogan.
According to a 2005 Infakto poll, 71 percent of Turks think that
"the West has helped separatist groups in Turkey gain strength",
and a Pew 2007 survey found that 79 percent of Turks oppose "U.S.-led
efforts to fight terrorism".
"[T]his intolerance and antipathy towards the PKK became converted
to the perception of the U.S. as the major enemy of the country,"
Erdogan said. "Before the invasion of Iraq, the worst enemy of the
country was stated as Greece or Armenia… rather than the U.S."
The 2005 Infakto poll also found that 66 percent think that "Western
countries want to divide and break Turkey like they divided and broke
the Ottoman Empire in the past," an idea that Steven Kull, director
of PIPA and editor for WPO, found "surprising".
"[The] Turks are very concerned that the Kurds are going to leave and
want to gain independence," Kull told IPS, but the suggestion that
"the U.S. is intentionally seeking to divide [Turkey] surprised
me…the U.S. has a commitment to protect Turkey from aggression,
and has never threatened to [directly] attack Turkey, unlike Greece,
which is why I find this particularly striking."
Dissatisfaction with U.S. foreign policy is not only prevalent in
Turkey. A January 2007 Gallup poll of U.S. citizens found that 56
percent of respondents were dissatisfied with the current role of the
U.S. in the world — up from the 51 percent who shared that view in
2006 — and not only do majorities of U.S. citizens see the world
as more dangerous, but large numbers attribute that to the George
W. Bush administration’s foreign policy.
A Chicago Council on Global Affairs poll found that 69 percent of
U.S. citizens support Washington’s involvement in world affairs,
reflecting the trend of greater support for U.S. involvement since
the attacks of 9/11, but a February 2007 Gallup poll showed that
only 15 percent of U.S. citizens believe the U.S. should take "the
leading role" in solving international problems — 58 percent said
the U.S. should "take a major role but not the leading role."
The Pew survey found that 81 percent of Turks dislike "American ideas
about democracy", 83 percent dislike "American ways of doing business",
and 68 percent dislike "American music, movies and television",
statistics that have all increased by at least 22 percent in the last
five years.
Erdogan commented that, before, Turks might dislike the U.S. government
but they still appreciated its culture, whereas now there is an
"emerging antipathy" towards U.S. citizens and their life style,
with 77 percent saying they held unfavourable views of U.S. citizens.