FIXING ANTI-AMERICANISM IN TURKEY
Soner Cagaptay
Washington Institute for Near East Policy
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April 16 2009
Bitter Lemons International
President Barack Obama’s visit to Turkey could not have gone better
in terms of winning Turkish hearts and minds. Obama did all the right
things, visiting Ataturk’s mausoleum, the Blue Mosque and the Turkish
parliament, capturing the complexity of a country that is Turkish by
birth, Muslim in culture and western in its political identity.
Yet Washington still faces a challenge among the Turks: after a
debilitating downturn in recent years, America’s favorability rating
is at rock bottom. Obama should be concerned about this phenomenon
that, if ignored, will eat into the foundations of the new US-Turkish
relationship he wants to promote on key issues, including Iraq,
Iran and Pakistan. As serious as the problem is, though, Turkish
anti-Americanism can be fixed.
Obama cannot and should not ignore anti-Americanism in Turkey,
because as a democracy, Turkish politics are ultimately accountable
to public opinion. Washington can sustain cooperation with all sorts
of authoritarian Muslim states, such as Egypt, despite pervasive
anti-Americanism in those countries, because these authoritarian
regimes do not care for public opinion. In Turkey, though, these
sentiments will sooner or later erode, reshape and then cripple
governmental cooperation with the United States. Anti-Americanism in
Turkey presents a larger, more immediate challenge to Obama than it
does in other Muslim majority societies.
Obamania will help face this challenge. According to a recent poll
by Infacto, whereas only 9 percent of Turks thought favorably of the
US president four years ago, today 39 percent have a positive view of
Obama. However, this jolt has not lifted America’s standing in Turkey
to match political ambitions for long-term and grand cooperation
with Ankara as laid out by Obama’s speech to the Turkish parliament
on April 6. The Infacto poll also shows that 44 percent of the Turks
view the United States as the biggest threat to Turkey.
Lately, the United States has done the right things to win Turkish
hearts and minds. First, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, during
her March visit to Turkey, and then President Obama gave the Turks a
needed bear hug, emphasizing that the United States likes the Turks,
respects their faith and supports their western vocation. Washington is
assisting Turkey in its struggle against Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK)
terror attacks, a key security concern for many Turks. Obama has even
shied away from his campaign promise to support the "Armenian Genocide"
bill in the US Congress, which many Turks find extremely offensive.
At this stage, there is little more Washington can do to charm the
Turks. As I learned during a recent sabbatical in Turkey, the Turks
form their views of the world based upon what they hear from their
leadership. Turkey is a rare fence-sitting country between East and
West, in which pro-American and western statements have the same
weight in shaping public views as do views that oppose the United
States and the West.
Since the Justice and Development Party (AKP) assumed power in 2002,
the Turks have not heard anything positive about the West from their
leadership. In fact, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has
often lambasted the West, suggesting, for instance, that "the West uses
terrorism to sell Turkey weapons" or that "Turkey has borrowed only
immoral stuff from the West." Anti-Americanism has become pervasive
in Turkey as not just the AKP but even secular and nationalist leaders
now vehemently voice such views.
The United States cannot stop entrenched anti-Americanism altogether;
only the Turkish leadership can do that. Hence, the first step toward
combating anti-Americanism would be zero anti-American and anti-western
rhetoric from opinion makers in Turkey, government and opposition
alike. By avoiding anti-American rhetoric, the Turkish leadership could
demonstrate that it is ready to receive Obama’s extended olive branch.
The next step is targeting existing anti-Americanism, which can be
alleviated precisely because the Turks are a fence-sitting people. What
the Turks hear about the United States and the West shapes their
views. In battling anti-Americanism, the Turkish leadership needs to
highlight for the Turks the common interests of Turkey and the US, such
as a stable Iraq; shared institutions, such as NATO; and shared values,
such as democracy. Ankara should also give Washington major credit
for intelligence assistance to Turkey in its attempt to stop terror
attacks launched by the PKK. Many Turks are not only unaware of this
fact, but also think that the United States supports the PKK, as many
news reports and government allegations insinuate. The situation on the
PKK shows best how Turkish views of the United States can be distorted.
President Obama should not despair when faced with evidence of
anti-Americanism in Turkey. This is indeed an immediate and big
problem, but it can be fixed, for there is a Turkish solution to
anti-Americanism in Turkey.
Soner Cagaptay is a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for
Near East Policy and the author of Islam, Secularism and Nationalism
in Modern Turkey: Who Is a Turk?