Turkey’s Careful and Risky Fence-Sitting between Ukraine and Russia

Foreign Policy Research Institute


By Aaron Stein
Feb. 8, 2022

On February 3, 2022, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan traveled
to Kyiv, where he met with his Ukrainian counterpart, President
Volodymyr Zelensky, for a pre-planned meeting to co-chair the tenth
High-Level Strategic Council between the two countries. The two sides
signed a series of bilateral agreements, including a deal on the
co-production of drones and a free trade agreement. The
Turkish-Ukrainian defense relationship is mutually beneficial and
serves as the core component of a rapidly expanding bilateral
relationship.

The relationship took on new importance in 2019, following Turkey’s
downturn in relations with the United States and the imposition of
sanctions for Turkey’s purchase of the Russian S-400 air and missile
defense system. Ankara is keen to explore non-American suppliers for
export-controlled items or American-origin technologies that are
subject to U.S. end-user agreements, while Ukraine’s Motor Sich hopes
to alleviate funding shortages. This relationship is slated to be the
lynchpin of current and future Turkish aerospace efforts, beginning
with cooperation on drones and helicopters and, potentially, on
jet-powered drones and fighter jets. However, all of this progress may
be upended by a Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the outcome of a
large-scale conflict could threaten the regime in Kyiv and upend the
security situation in the Black Sea.

The Russian military has positioned enough forces and equipment on
Ukraine’s borders to topple the regime in Kyiv. Moscow has significant
military overmatch and could choose any number of military options
ranging from punitive air and artillery strikes, a limited military
incursion in the Donbas, to the toppling of the Zelensky government.
The Turkish position has been to balance its relations with Kyiv and
Moscow. This policy is grounded in Turkish affirmation of Ukrainian
sovereignty, balanced against Ankara’s ongoing effort to retain
cordial and functional ties with Moscow. As Erdogan explained to
pro-government media on his plane ride home, Ankara’s ideal outcome in
this crisis is for Russia to de-escalate and to agree to direct,
bilateral talks with Kyiv with a Turkish mediator. Erdogan has been
explicit and has repeatedly offered to mediate leader-to-leader talks.
He has also cast blame on the United States for mishandling the crisis
and the West, more broadly, for making it worse. Erdogan’s opinion on
the topic fits with the Zelensky government’s handling of the crisis
and Kyiv’s criticism of the West for overhyping the threat of invasion
and exacerbating Ukrainian economic woes.

The Kremlin has managed to shroud its ultimate ambitions in secrecy,
leaving outside observers to guess about the ultimate intent of a
potential military operation. Ankara has attached considerable
significance to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s potential visit to
Turkey after the Winter Olympics in Beijing and views the invitation
as part of the government’s broader effort to mediate the crisis by
engaging with both sides. This visit—should it happen—may coincide
with Russian offensive operations in Ukraine, so the trip could be
delayed or cancelled outright. In any case, one potential outcome is
that Ankara hosts a victorious war leader who would use the
leader-to-leader visit to lend credibility to the military campaign
and position Turkey to affirm a military victory, rather than find an
off-ramp to current tensions.

The broader challenge that Ankara now faces is that a large-scale
Russian operation in Ukraine will upset the fragile balance in the
Black Sea region. Turkish elites have made a series of political
decisions over the past decade that suggests Erdogan’s circle believes
that great power war is unlikely in Europe and Turkey’s near abroad.
In December 2017, Ankara has made the decision to purchase the Russian
S-400 air and missile defense system, despite being told that such
action would lead to the country’s removal from the F-35 co-production
consortium. The F-35 serves as the backbone of Western tactical air
power and was slated to serve as Turkey’s front-line fighter. Ankara
was removed from the consortium in 2019 and has since invested heavily
in comparatively low-tech (and low cost) unmanned platforms, some of
which are now partly produced in Ukraine.

A Russian invasion of Ukraine would upend Ankara’s assumption about
regional, large-scale conflict and could have a series of cascading
consequences for Turkey, ranging from negative economic effects to
increased tensions in the Black Sea. Ankara’s agreements with Kyiv
could also be at risk. If Moscow opts for regime change, it is unclear
what a pro-Russian government in Ukraine would do vis-à-vis the
aerospace agreements with Turkey. The suspension of any agreement
could have secondary effects on Turkey’s future drone development and
could even extend to its design efforts for an indigenous jet fighter.

In the past, Ankara has sought to decouple from the United States on
the purchase of aerospace products. This decision stems from Turkey’s
removal from the F-35 consortium and broader Western discomfort about
how Western-origin technological products are used in the Turkish TB2
drone in regional wars, ranging from Nagorno-Karabakh to Ethiopia.
Turkish elites have adopted an autarkic vision for the future of the
country’s defense products in order to insulate the country from
Western pressure. The relationship with Ukraine is a pillar of this
policy precisely because the country manufactures the engines that
Ankara is interested in using to power its next generation of drones.
In short, Ankara has a vested interest in retaining cordial ties with
the current government in Ukraine. If these agreements were suspended,
then Ankara would have to consider a different approach. Its
leadership could continue to invest in indigenous products, or it
could once again turn to the United States or suppliers in the West.
The Turkish government has also flirted with Russia although the
United States has promised to impose sanctions on Moscow in the event
of war, which could complicate any further Turkish-Russian
cooperation.

The Turkish-Russian relationship is multi-faceted, so Ankara faces an
equally difficult challenge in severing ties with Moscow. Ankara,
therefore, may not join the United States and Brussels in sanctioning
Russia and, instead, continue to position itself as a potential
arbiter between the two sides, even after a Russian invasion. The
tensions between Ukraine and Russia have obvious implications for
Turkish security. Ankara has ample incentives to “fence-sit” in the
near term. This policy does not preclude defense cooperation with
Ukraine, or even supporting broader NATO responses to reassure member
states and to punish Moscow for an invasion. However, it does not mean
that the United States should expect Erdogan to second U.S. actions
and seek to engage with Russia continuously, even in the event of a
conflict. The broader challenges that Ankara will face, though, are
going to be outside of its control. The scope and size of a Russian
military response depends on thinking in the Kremlin. For now, the
signs point to a large-scale offensive. The Turkish relationship with
Ukraine may, in fact, be at risk in such a scenario, and, beyond this,
the security environment in the Black Sea could degrade and negatively
impact Turkish interests. The Ukrainian-Turkish relationship is
nuanced and complicated, but it also impacts Ankara’s thinking about
its place in the world, as well as its defense relationship with the
United States.

The security situation in Turkey’s near-abroad can change rapidly and
at any moment. Ankara has few good options to manage Russian actions,
but it appears committed to trying to meet with Putin and to mediate a
solution. The Russian government, at this time, appears to have no
interest in any Turkish role. A large-scale war would test recent
Turkish elite assumptions about the future of great power conflict and
could have broader implications for the defense industry. Only time
will tell, but, at some point, Ankara may have to make broader
decisions about its future foreign policy that either risk its
relations with Moscow or strain its ties with the West.

*

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and
do not necessarily reflect the position of the Foreign Policy Research
Institute, a non-partisan organization that seeks to publish
well-argued, policy-oriented articles on American foreign policy and
national security priorities.