INONU-DAVUTOGLU, HISTORY AND REPETITION

Radikal website
March 21 2010
Turkey

Is there a shift of axis taking place in Turkey’s foreign policy? Is
having zero problems and being impartial an AKP [Justice and
Development Party] invention? What would Davutoglu have done in
Ottoman times had he lived then as one of Inonu’s peers?

Davutoglu is seen with Nalbantyan: His efforts are being compared
to US super-diplomat Henry Kissinger. Might he be able to get the
results he seeks?

It is not just in foreign policy, but particularly so in foreign
policy, that every move is measured not by how impressive it was when
being made, but by whether or not it yields results.

If the outcome is successful then just how impressive it was when
being made and the degree of proficiency shown become important. If
it fails, then none of that means anything.

Time Magazine on 19 May 1941 made the then Prime Minister Ismet Inonu
its cover.

The Second World War had begun in May 1941. However, neither the United
States nor the Soviet Union had gone to war with Nazi Germany just yet.

Who would have thought that by attacking the American Naval Base in
Pearl Harbour on 7 Dec 1941 the Japanese would "wake up the sleeping
dragon"?

In Moscow Joseph Stalin paid no attention to intelligence provided
by his two best spies Leopold Trepper in Brussels and Richard Sorge
in Tokyo, at the cost of their lives, that Adolf Hitler was going to
break the 1939 Non-Aggression Pact. Just one month later and Operation
Barbarossa, the largest military operation in history with 4.5 million
troops), was to begin on 22 June.

But the Balkans had fallen entirely into Nazi hands.

The reason why Time Magazine made Inonu (and Turkey) its front cover
was the proposal that Germany had made to Turkey and pressure it was
under because of this.

Germany’s Ambassador to Ankara Franz von Papen had returned to Berlin
in order to discuss this proposal. Back in Ankara it was not just
President Ismet Inonu who was waiting for Von Paper, Iraq’s Defence
Minister Naci Sevket was waiting for him as well.

The topic was Iraq: The Soviets were making a play for Iraq’s oil
fields from the north while the British were making a play from the
south. In order to balance this out Germany calculated on staging a
landing in Syria then moving by road into Iraq. However, the Royal
Navy in the Mediterranean was obstructing this operation. That left
only one path. Germany wanted to send its forces through Bulgaria
then into Iraq via Turkey. In order to do this, promises were made of
all kinds of military and economic aid for poor and weak Turkey. The
promise was that the German soldiers would just be passing through.

It needs to be repeated that there was as yet no American or Soviet
obstacle in the path of the Nazi war machine, and the young Turkish
Republic did not have a powerful army like it has today; it did not
have enough rifles, tanks, wheat or uniforms even.

Time Magazine lauded Turkey for giving a definitive "No" in response
to the proposal. Time quotes one anonymous source (most likely Chief
of Staff Marshal Fevzi Cakmak) saying: "We fought long and hard for
our independence. We cannot take lightly the supposedly harmless
transit of these units. You should understand that the people who
won Turkey’s independence are still governing Turkey."

Back in 2003 when the United States asked to send its forces across
Turkish soil without touching a thing in order to fight in Iraq the
people who had won Turkey’s independence were not in charge. But
they too did not take this matter lightly. All the same, the
government did not say, "No" but instead left it up to Parliament
to say, "Yes." The people who had won Turkey’s independence were
not in Parliament either. All the same, Turkey’s Parliament denied
passage. This is an example of continuity. Just like the policy of
"zero problems with the neighbours" was not first invented during
the AKP’s rule, so it is the continuation in today’s world of such
agreements as the Balkan Pact and the Sadabad Pact, which Mustafa
Kemal Ataturk signed in the nascent years of the Republic wishing,
"Peace at home, peace in the world."

This may not exist in Washington’s collective memory but in Ankara’s
collective memory there is the concern that the United States, which
when failing to heed the example of 1941 Germany applied pressure and
caused relations to hit rock bottom in order to have its forces cross
Turkey into Iraq, might try to apply similar unnecessary pressure in
the Iran business.

The way that the tension following the passing of the Armenian
genocide bill by the House of Representatives Foreign Relations
Committee is being linked in some way to the United States wish for
sanctions to be applied to Iran because of its nuclear programme
(another energy-related topic) is increasing this concern.

I wonder if President Gul or Prime Minister Erdogan take offence at
the current foreign policy being called the Davutoglu era given his
influence in the government’s foreign policy when Abdullah Gul was
prime minister and later foreign minister?

If we can say it like this, one characteristic of the Davutoglu era
has been the way Turkey has resurrected its relations with the Arab
world and Muslim populated countries as a whole, relations that had
been suspended for 20-30 years because of the Cold War and ideological
dogma in domestic politics. The Palestinian problem and in particular
the problems with Israel because of its attacks on Gaza where Hamas
is influential, plus the way Turkey had Davutoglu running as the lead
actor in the Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran and Syria topics all caught
attention. That is how the debates over axis-shift and neo-Ottomanism
all began.

The phrase shift in axis may have a nice ring to it but that ringing
is because it is a hollow concept. There are no axes in the world that
have not shifted, when you look at things from a different perspective.

I think that the concept of neo-Ottomanism is being used as a
psychological tactic mainly out of ideological prejudice and partly
to emphasize Davutoglu’s Muslim identity.

You only need to cite its relations with Russia to show that this
government does not fit the neo-Ottoman mould. The Ottomans’ greatest
fear was Russia, with which it had fought 30 conflicts. Putting aside
our generals who see Russia as an alternative to the European Union,
one of Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s most important foreign policy
partners today is Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Just as
Turkey is not afraid to be dependent on Russia for its energy needs,
so Russia is Turkey’s largest bilateral trading partner. (The United
States for its part does not even appear to be aware that Russia’s
influence is growing in the region because of its policy over Iran,
a policy shaped by Israel.

One more note: as shown by the tension surrounding the latest Armenian
Protocol and the Armenian genocide [bill], Davutoglu’s nationalist
identity is not being masked by his Islamic identity.

So, if Davutoglu had lived back in Ottoman times and occupied a
position of influence what might he have done?

If Davutoglu had been born in Ottoman times as one of Inonu’s peers he
would probably have joined the Committee of Union and Progress like
that young officer Ismet. In fact, given his intellectual capacity
he may well have taken a place at the centre of that Committee. The
ranks that the Davutoglu we know today would have joined back then,
and I am inferring no negativity here, would most likely have been
the Committee for Union and Progress.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress