Despite the harsh rhetoric of the president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey will probably “give the green light” for the accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO, reports Politico. Just the military alliance will have to pay a price first.
Ankara has raised objections to the two Nordic countries’ efforts to join NATO, preventing the organization from proceeding with the accession process. Turkish officials have accused both Finland and Sweden of supporting Kurdish “terrorists” (PKK) and have expressed skepticism about arms export restrictions.
“NATO is a security alliance and Turkey will not agree to jeopardize that security,” the Turkish president said earlier this week. However, current and former officials and diplomats note that Turkey’s motives go beyond simply seeking to change its policies in Stockholm and Helsinki. Erdogan is in the midst of protracted negotiations with the United States over the purchase of fighter jets. He also likely sees an opportunity to gain political points at home with his international aggression against “terrorism”.
Now diplomats are working feverishly to find what will make Erdogan back down, not wanting to delay Finland and Sweden’s bid, which would give Russia more time to intervene before the countries fully join the alliance.
“The price is unknown at the moment, but it is clear that there will be a price,” Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, a former NATO leader, told Politico.
Turkey’s attitude is a pattern
Although Turkey has a history of supporting NATO enlargement, Erdogan… has experience in exploiting major alliance decisions to extract concessions.
In 2009, Turkey opposed his appointment Anders Fogh Rasmussen as NATO’s top official, stepping down only after high-level talks. Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, who was the outgoing secretary general at the time, recalled the overnight talks involving then-US President Barack Obama.
Finally, the former leader of the alliance told Politico that Turkey had withdrawn from Rasmussen’s appointment and “received as a ‘prize’ an assistant secretary general in NATO”.
Finland and Sweden’s membership bids now give Erdogan another chance to build on NATO’s consensus-based model, as well as consolidate its base ahead of next year’s elections.
De Hoop Scheffer commented that a combination of factors could be behind Turkey’s maneuvers.
The first, he said, is domestic policy. Erdogan has always liked to speak out against terrorism, and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has been a long-time enemy in this campaign. Turkey, the US and the EU have branded the group a terrorist organization, although the designation is considered obsolete by some circles in the US and the EU. Erdogan, on the other hand, often uses the PKK to rally.
“You can always rally large sections of the population by linking terrorism to the PKK,” said the former secretary general.
The second, according to de Hoop Scheffer, is that the accession of Finland and Sweden would “change the internal political balance within NATO, because there will be two fully developed and heavily equipped” democracies that are part of the alliance.
Finland and Sweden are expected to significantly strengthen NATO’s defense capabilities. Finland can offer naval power in the Baltic Sea and a presence in the Arctic North, where Russia has shown interest in expanding its reach. Sweden has advanced aviation.
Turkey’s stance has to do with armaments
Another crucial element is the continuing tensions between Turkey and the US over the fighter jet markets.
For years, Ankara has been a trusted customer for US defense companies, buying dozens of F-16 fighter jets. Turkey later turned to the more advanced F-35s as they began to be launched.
But relations between the two sides deteriorated in 2019, when Turkey bought the Russian-made S-400 anti-aircraft system – a move the United States said would endanger NATO aircraft flying over Turkey. In response, the United States expelled Ankara from the F-35 program and imposed sanctions on the Turkish defense industry.
Following this dispute, Turkey began to “play with the idea” of buying Russian fighter jets and even developing its own program. However, it is also seeking to upgrade its F-16 fleet and purchase new F-16 aircraft. The request has been pending for months by the Biden administration and the US Congress.
“This price could very well be that the Americans will lift their blockade on the F-16,” de Hoop Scheffer said.
The US seems willing to pay that price. The US State Department has temporarily backed Turkey’s request, which is currently being considered by the White House and Congress.
The issue was one of the open questions regarding the meeting in New York on Wednesday between US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Tsavousoglu.
Tsavousoglou hinted that NATO members could be part of the solution to the impasse. Speaking with Blinken, Cavusoglu said he understood Finland and Sweden’s security concerns, “but that Turkey’s security concerns should also be met. And that’s also one of the issues that we need to keep talking about with friends and allies, including the United States. “
This issue may involve F-16s. In separate comments published in the Turkish media that day, the Turkish Foreign Minister stressed that talks on a possible sale “continue positively”.
In Helsinki, there is also a sense that the Turkish blockade may be linked to its current dispute with the United States.
“Finland has good relations with Turkey and we share the goal of fighting terrorism,” said a senior Finnish official, speaking on condition of anonymity. “I do not think our bilateral relations are a problem. “This is probably about Turkey’s issues with the United States.”
. Turkey’s attitude has to do with the Kurdish
Some analysts, however, insist that the Finnish and Swedish approach to the PKK remains a vital issue for the Turkish government.
“We can not solve this problem” simply by normalizing the Washington-Ankara relationship, said Sinan Ulgen, a former Turkish diplomat who is now a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Europe think tank.
It can help speed up the process, he said, but “there is no way out” of tackling Swedish and Finnish policies on Kurdish groups.
Negotiations with Sweden are expected to be tougher than with Finland, according to Ulgen.
“There are higher expectations from Sweden,” he said, referring to what he described as Stockholm’s “more lenient approach” to the activities of what Turkey considers a terrorist organization, the PKK and its offshoots.
The Swedish government “must prove that it has changed its view on this,” he said.
Swedish and Finnish officials have said they are open to dialogue with Turkey. And senior officials from across the alliance have insisted that a consensus be reached on the inclusion of Helsinki and Stockholm.
“I am confident that we will reach a speedy decision to welcome both Sweden and Finland into the NATO family,” said the NATO Secretary General. Jens Stoltenberg at a press conference on Thursday.
“When an ally, an important ally like Turkey, raises security concerns,” he observed, “the only way to deal with this is to sit down and find ways to find common ground.”
The same message was sent from The Hague, where the German chancellor Olaf Solz met with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.
“I am very convinced” that Turkey’s opposition can be overcome, “Solz said.
“I believe that it will eventually be possible to find a common position on the accession of Finland and Sweden,” Rutte agreed.
politico.eu
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