RIGHTEOUSNESS BEFORE REALISM
The Guardian, UK
Oct 11 2007
The decision on Capitol Hill to accuse Turkey of genocide a century
ago could have disastrous repercussions in the present.
Simon Tisdall
About Webfeeds October 11, 2007 12:30 PM | Printable version
Imperial delusions die hard – and once again the US Congress is
trying to legislate for the world. As most Turks see it, this week’s
committee vote in the House of Representatives accusing Turkey of
genocide against the Armenians in 1915-17 is an insulting, gratuitous
interference in their sovereign affairs. As the 27 Democrats and
Republicans who backed the bill see it, it is a matter of putting
the world to rights, according to America’s lights.
Congress has a long history of extraterritorial meddling. It regularly
slaps unilateral sanctions on "rogue" governments, and orders foreign
businesses and individuals to obey its strictures, regardless of
nationality. Its attempts to direct US foreign policy are resisted
by the executive branch to varying degrees. On Cuba, Venezuela,
Iran and Israel, White House and legislature mostly agree.
On Turkey, like Iraq, they are at noisy loggerheads.
"We oppose the bill. We think it is a bad idea that will do nothing
to improve Turkish-Armenian relations. It will not do anything to
advance American interests," Daniel Fried, assistant secretary for
Eurasian affairs, told Turkish television this week. President Bush,
the secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, and defence secretary,
Robert Gates, all chimed in. They even mobilised all former living
US secretaries of state in joint opposition, but to no avail. It was
a measure of the lame-duck president’s chronic weakness.
Sentimentality and righteousness are never far from the surface of
American politics. "Despite President Bush twisting arms and making
deals, justice prevailed," said Democrat Brad Sherman of California,
playing to a gallery of elderly ethnic Armenians who attended the vote
and the wider Armenian diaspora. "If we hope to stop future genocides,
we need to admit to those horrific acts of the past."
One problem for Mr Sherman and his fellow Californian Democrat, the
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, is that for the most part Turks admit
nothing of the kind – and deeply resent such vicarious apologising.
"Twenty-seven foolish Americans" said a headline in the Vatan
newspaper. "It is blatantly obvious that [Congress] does not have a
task or function to rewrite history," snarled the Ankara government.
Another problem is that the Democrats’ motives are up for scrutiny.
Turkish media suggest the struggle is less about justice and more about
votes and campaign contributions from the powerful Armenian-American
lobby, concentrated in the key 2008 election battlefields of
California, New Jersey and Michigan.
More pertinently perhaps, Turkish officials ask why, when the US
officially believes genocide is occurring right now in Sudan, it
is digging up disputed events nearly a century ago. This week saw
escalating killings in Darfur and warnings that a beefed-up UN force
will not deploy for many months yet. Campaigners say that is partly
because Congress has failed to honour US funding pledges.
Having lost the committee vote, and conscious that the full House
is expected to approve the bill before Thanksgiving, the Bush
administration is now pursuing damage-limitation. Turkey is being
reassured the Senate will not pass the bill into law and that in any
case, nothing is really changed by such posturing. The hope is that
Ankara will not "overreact".
Hope is the correct word, for Mr Bush is now reduced to a
fingers-crossed policy. In the next few days, an alienated Turkish
parliament will almost certainly vote to authorise punitive military
incursions into northern Iraq in pursuit of Kurdish separatists who
find sanctuary there. Such action, going directly against US wishes,
has great potential to destabilise the region further.
And that may be just a beginning. As Mr Gates noted this week, Turkey
could cut off US military supply lines to Iraq and disrupt air force
operations. It could strengthen its de facto anti-Kurdish alliance
with Iran and withdraw support for Washington’s attempts to isolate
Tehran. In the worst case, congressional grandstanding could cost
the US its most powerful Muslim ally in the Middle East.
Such catastrophic rupture is unlikely – the two sides need each
other too much. But as the Turkish Daily News columnist Mehmet Ali
Birand noted today: "In spite of the non-binding nature [of the bill],
Turkey will still lose considerable prestige. Armenian allegations will
gain credibility. It will make it easier for Armenians to pressurise
European parliaments. Turkey will be hurt."
The hurt is deep, born of a sense of a friend’s betrayal. And
given that a poll earlier this year found that 81% of Turks already
disapproved of US policies, the multiplying, ramifying cost to American
prestige and leverage is set to rise. Even after Iraq and uncounted
"war on terror" disasters, imperial Washington still seems blind to
the difference between power and wisdom.