John Bolton on : Turkey should be excluded from NATO – Watch video

A few days ago, the former head of the White House National Security Council launched “bombs” about Erdogan, on Swedish television, calling him a new Mussolini and calling for his expulsion from NATO.

John Bolton spoke exclusively to SKAI and insists that Turkey should be pulled out of the alliance while talking about the possibility of fraud in the Turkish elections.

As he specifically said, he believes that Turkey under President Erdogan is definitely destabilizing the alliance.

The interview in detail

Mr. Ambassador, President Erdogan has made it clear that he will block Sweden from joining NATO. In one of your articles it is argued that “the alliance should have to remove its membership from Ankara squarely, considering its expulsion. Do you think Turkey is destabilizing the Alliance?”

I believe that Turkey under President Erdogan is definitely destabilizing the alliance. And there is a long list of moves that the Erdogan government has made, starting, in my view, with the purchase of the Russian S-400 air defense system.

The S-400s neutralize NATO’s other air defense systems. They disable the F-35’s stealth capability, part of which we actually agreed Turkey would build.

Now this is not the case. But when you add to these situations the unacceptable blocking of Sweden’s application for membership and the blocking of Finland’s application, and you combine that with Erdogan’s efforts to prevent the popular vote in Turkey from taking place in a free and fair way, I think that all this demonstrates behavior inconsistent with being a NATO ally.

If Erdogan tries to rig the election, then I think we should consider removing Turkey or at least suspending membership.

Simply, a NATO member cannot behave like this.

Is there such an article in the Founding Treaty of NATO, which provides for the removal of a member? Are such voices heard among the member states? Who should take the initiative to activate such an article?

I think the United States could take the initiative. There is no specific provision in the statute. But under the existing doctrine of international law, it is possible to expel or suspend Turkey’s membership. There is another way to do it, which is to disband the Alliance and then re-create it a second later, with all members except Turkey.

Challenging the national sovereignty of Greece is a fundamental goal of Ankara, even threatening to invade the Aegean islands. Are the reactions of NATO members commensurate with these threats?

This is unfortunately a behavior we have seen in the past from Turkey. It is much worse, I believe, under Erdogan than it was in previous years.

There is no doubt that NATO members have disagreements with each other on some issues, but it is inconsistent with being a proper member of the Alliance to threaten other NATO member states.

Should the Biden administration approve the sale of F-16 fighter jets to Turkey if Ankara gives the green light for Sweden to join NATO?

I think what we need to do right now is to postpone any major decisions on things like the sale of F-16s until after the Turkish elections in May.

I believe that in part Erdogan is playing political games with the fundamentalist element in Turkey by pitting Sweden against each other.

I appreciate that it is part of his general anti-Kurdish campaign.

So I see that what we need to do is to avoid giving Erdogan or any of the Turkish candidates the opportunity to use the NATO issue to their own political advantage.

Turkey, as you said earlier, is blackmailing Sweden and Finland, threatening to invade Greece, buying Russian military equipment and refusing to impose sanctions on Russia. Is there a red line in all these challenges?

When we add all of this together, we realize that there are many reasons to expel Turkey right now.

But since in my judgment the real problem is not the people of Turkey, the real problem is Erdogan and his neo-Ottoman ambitions.

He wants to revive Turkey, as it was before the end of the First World War and the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.

Turkey is an important part of the NATO alliance and I hoped we could return to that. But I don’t see it possible if Erdogan rigs the elections and wins again.

Minister Soylu said a while ago that “all American ambassadors serving in Turkey are helping to organize a military coup against Erdogan”, how do you comment on that?

This is ridiculous. And it shows, I think, how desperate Erdogan is.

He is very worried, given what happened in the 2019 municipal elections and in Istanbul and Ankara and Izmir and other cities in Turkey, where his party was defeated. I think he’s worried that it might happen again, so I’m worried he’ll try to hijack the election and that has to be prevented.

I believe that Turkey under President Erdogan is definitely destabilizing the alliance.

There is a long list of moves that the Erdogan government has made, starting, in my view, with the purchase of the Russian S-400 air defense system.

The S-400s neutralize NATO’s other air defense systems. They disable the F-35’s stealth capability, part of which we actually agreed Turkey would build. Now this is not the case.

But when you add to these situations the unacceptable blocking of Sweden’s application for membership and the blocking of Finland’s application, and you combine that with Erdogan’s efforts to prevent the popular vote in Turkey from taking place in a free and fair way, I think that all this demonstrates behavior inconsistent with being a NATO ally.

If Erdogan tries to rig the election, then I think we should consider removing Turkey or at least suspending membership. Simply, a NATO member cannot behave like this.

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