The homepage of the (newly, and poorly, redesigned) Hurriyet Daily News features a fairly provocative headline today: "Turkey given possession of nuclear warheads, report says." So has Turkey just become the Middle East's newest nuclear power? The real story is a lot less sensational, yet also much more interesting, than that.
Turkey, as a member of NATO, has in fact hosted tactical nuclear weapons since the 1950's. Today, NATO keeps an estimated stockpile of 60-70 nuclear bombs at the Incirlik air base in southern Turkey, down from 90 in 2001. Most of these (some 50) are designed to be delivered by United States aircraft (which are not housed at Incirlik and would have to be flown in and armed for any mission). The rest are earmarked for Turkish fighter jets, although it appears that Turkish pilots are currently not being trained for nuclear missions. (Hurriyet's sloppy story follows up on a more carefully written one that appeared the day before in the Vatan newspaper, written by Washington correspondent Ilhan Tanir.)
From an interesting report published at the end of last year by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which looked at the status of the the US's tactical nuclear weapons in Europe, especially in light of NATO's newly-developed "Strategic Concept," which places less importance on these weapons:
Up until the Arab Spring spilled over so violently into Syria, the rapprochement with Damascus could have been considered one of the great successes of Ankara's outreach to its neighbors. But Turkey-Syria relations have deteriorated as rapidly as the situation inside Syria has, leaving Ankara with some very difficult policy choices, among the most prominent ones being how to deal with the issue of sanctions against the Assad regime. Ankara has suggested for weeks now that it will roll out a host of sanctions aimed at the Damascus regime, but has yet to make the details public. (Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu today said sanctions would soon be announced, after he holds consultations with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is recovering from a recent operation. More details here.) (UPDATE- Ankara Wednesday unveiled its new sanctions program, which includes a freeze on certain Syrian assets in Turkey and a hold on dealing with Syria's Central Bank, among other measures. Details here.)
The issue is, of course, a political one. But for Turkey, which uses Syria as an important trade route and whose imports to the country have boomed in recent years, the sanctions issue is also very much an economic one. In a recent piece in The National, analyst Henri Barkey, says Ankara's hesitation regarding Syria sanctions is strongly influenced by economic concerns:
As reported in this previous post, Greek Cyprus's efforts to explore for gas off the divided island's shores has led to a serious ramping up of tension in the Eastern Mediterranean, with Turkey retaliating by signing exploration deals of its own with the Turkish Cypriots and even hinting at the possibility of military action regarding the issue.
While the rhetoric has been lowered in recent weeks, new developments could bring the resource-related tension in the region back up to the surface. From an Associated Press report published yesterday:
A top official with United States firm Noble Energy said on Tuesday that a field it is conducting undersea exploratory drilling in off the coast of Cyprus may yield between 3 to 9 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
Noble Senior Vice President Susan Cunningham says there is a 60 percent chance it will successfully reach the deposit.
Cunningham told an analyst conference at Noble’s Houston headquarters — broadcast live through the company’s Website — that firm results from the ‘Cyprus A prospect’ would impact other possible exploratory drilling in the area.
It is the first time Noble has given an estimate on the size of the deposit which lies inside the Mediterranean island’s exclusive economic zone about 115 miles (185 kilometers) off its south coast.
By comparison, Noble said an Israeli field discovered nearby in 2010 had an estimated 16 trillion cubic feet of gas — the world’s largest offshore gas discovery that year.
The fall of the Soviet Union presented what should have been a golden opportunity for Turkey to develop a sphere of influence in the Turkic republics of Central Asia. For various reasons, though, things didn't quite work out that way. In many ways, Ankara now finds itself having better relations and more influence in the Middle East -- a region whose countries it traditionally kept at an arm's length -- than in Central Asia.
What went wrong? Nadir Devlet, a professor in the International Relations department of Istanbul Commerce University, tries to answer that question in a new paper for the German Marshall Fund that takes a look at the last 20 years of Turkey-Central Asia relations and that suggests that a new outreach effort from Ankara may be on the horizon. From his paper:
Turkey’s efforts to penetrate the Turkic regions of the former Soviet Union with its own influence have had a number of successes and failures. President Gül has been a particular advocate for a more assertive Turkish approach in this regard. Yet to date, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Turk- menistan are not important business partners for Turkey, despite their geographic proximity, energy riches, and other resources. Turkey’s relations with Turkmenistan are in fact deteriorating, and its relations with Uzbekistan — which with a population of nearly 30 million is Central Asia’s most important actor — are at their lowest level in many years. Turkish-Turkic integration clearly has a long way to go. Yet we should not be surprised to see Ankara assigning height- ened importance to the larger Turkic world in its emerging foreign policy as Turkey gives up its former commitment to the status quo for a more visible strategic activism.
Today's edition of the Turkish daily Sabah has a very provocative scoop. According to the paper, an Armenian group in the United States is working to revive the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA), a terrorist organization that was active in the 1970's and 80's and which was responsible for several fatal attacks on Turkish diplomats during that period.
ASALA has been dormant since the early 1990's, but the Sabah article claims to have exclusive information that shows that a neo-ASALA is being created in rural California by an organization called the American Armenian Militia. According to the Sabah, the group has some 1,000 members that it is training to be assassins and commandos. The article also hints that this "neo-ASALA" may be supported by Israel, in order to punish Turkey for their recent falling out, and that Turkish Prime Minister will be raising the topic of the group's activities during his upcoming trip to the United Nations' General Assembly. All sensational stuff, to be sure. But is it true?
To find out a bit more, I did something the author of the Sabah article didn't do, which is call the American Armenian Militia (AAM) for comment. By dialing a toll-free phone number given on the "Contact Us" page of the group's website, I was able to reach the group's founder, a 43-year-old electronics engineer in southern California who, for fear of any more negative publicity, said he only wants to be referred to as John S.
The Militia, he said, was founded in 2007 and currently has about 20 members, ranging in age from 17 (the youngest age allowed) to retirement age.
With its relations in Israel in freefall, following the release of a United Nations report about last year's Gaza flotilla, Turkey has increasingly been turning up the heat on its former ally. In particular, Ankara has promised that it will be increasing its naval patrols in the Eastern Mediterranean to show Israel its displeasure with the ongoing naval blockade of Gaza. But could these beefed up patrols (if they materialize) actually be aimed at flexing some muscle towards Cyprus? From Reuters:
Some Turkish and Israeli commentators have suggested Turkey might use the feud with Israel to build up naval patrols in seas between the Jewish state and the divided island of Cyprus.
Turkey has bitterly complained about recent Cypriot-Israeli energy deals. The presence of Turkish ships would have a menacing effect and could be seen as a provocation by neighboring Greece, also a NATO member.
Noble Energy, a U.S. firm, is due to start exploratory drilling for natural gas off Cyprus in October despite warnings from Turkey against such concessions.
Turkey and Cyprus have been at odds for decades over the ethnically split island, whose internationally recognized Greek Cypriot government is an EU member. Turkish Cypriots live in a breakaway state in northern Cyprus recognized only by Turkey.
Asked about exploratory drilling for natural gas by Greek Cypriots, Egemen Bagis, Turkey's European Union minister, told Turkish media last week: "It is for this (reason) that countries have warships. It is for this (reason) that we have equipment and we train our navies."
It may not be as famous as the Elgin marbles, which were taken from Greece by an Ottoman-era British diplomat, but a marble head sitting in storage in a London museum could create friction between England and Turkey. From the Independent:
Turkey is demanding the return of an ancient marble head, now languishing in the stores of a London museum, which was taken from Anatolia more than a century ago.
The Turkish culture ministry has asked the Victoria and Albert Museum to return a 1,700-year-old life-sized marble carving of a child's head, described as bearing a likeness to Eros, the Greek god of love.
Tolga Tuyluoglu, the director of Turkey's culture and tourism office in London, said: "The Turkish ministry of culture thinks this item belongs to Turkey. We believe if an item has been removed from a country then it should be returned to the original place."
In 1882, the archaeologist Sir Charles Wilson, then Britain's consul-general in Anatolia, removed the head from the Sidamara Sarcophagus, a huge tomb dating from the third century, which he had excavated. The sarcophagus, which now sits in Istanbul's Museum of Archaeology, is one of the finest and most widely known of its type and period.
Sir Charles, who served in the Royal Engineers, conducted archaeological surveys in Palestine and Lebanon before moving to Anatolia, which corresponds to most of present-day Turkey, in 1879. He removed the head from the Sidamara Sarcophagus, which he then re-covered in the hope of acquiring the whole object. The head is that of a child with curly hair looking over his shoulder. Sir Charles's family later donated the head to the V&A, where it is held in the museum's stores.
"It's a complicated issue," said Mr Tuyluoglu. "There are many agreements between the two countries. We are discussing the matter."
Relations between former allies Turkey and Israel have been on the skids since last year, when Israeli commandos killed nine Turks in an attempt to take over a ship that was part of an aid convoy heading to Gaza. Turkey demanded Israel apologize and pay compensation for the deaths (and later added a third condition, that Israel lift is blockade of the Gaza Strip), but -- despite negotiations and efforts by Washington to bridge the divide -- Jerusalem refused to meet Turkey's demands.
After the flotilla incident, both countries joined a United Nations panel created to take a look at the event and perhaps assign some responsibility for what transpired. After months and months of delays, the report (here) was leaked yesterday to the New York Times. While strongly criticizing the conduct of Israel's military in both taking the ship over and in how it treated the passengers afterwards, the report deems Israel's naval blockade of Gaza and the interception of the ships heading there legal. It also has some harsh words about the motives of the flotilla's organizers, saying the convoy was more of a publicity stunt than a humanitarian effort.
The release of the report, as expected by many, has resulted in a futher -- and quite severe -- downgrading in Turkey's relations with Israel. From Hurriyet:
Turkey expelled Israel's ambassador and senior Israeli diplomats and suspended military agreements on Friday, the day after it emerged a U.N. report said Israel had used unreasonable force in a raid on a Gaza-bound ship that killed nine Turks, Reuters reported.
Greece has long been concerned about the flow of irregular migrants who cross its borders from Turkey, but a Greek plan to build a water-filled ditch along the two countries' shared border is causing concern in Ankara that the plan is not just about stopping migrants from crossing the frontier. From a very interesting article in The National:
"We are following the recent developments in Greece about digging a ditch at the Turkish border with concern," Egemen Bagis, Turkey's minister for EU affairs, said earlier this month. "I hope our Greek friends are not after a foreign crisis to divert the attention from their domestic crisis," Mr Bagis added in reference to the financial turmoil in Greece, which is close to bankruptcy and has to rely on help from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.
It was "surprising to see Greece spending funds in such a project at a time when it is muddling through a financial crisis", Mr Bagis said. "For a more effective solution, Greece should have chosen to increase its cooperation with Turkey against irregular migration rather than coming up with palliative solutions."
Greece is digging a 120-kilometre trench along its north-eastern border river Evros, or Meric in Turkish, to hold back recurring river floods but also to stem illegal immigration, the Athens daily Ta Nea reported. The ditch, which is being built by the military, is reported to be seven metres deep and 30 metres wide. About 14.5km had been dug as of early August. The online edition of the Greek newspaper Ekathimerini reported the trench was to be filled with water, adding that the project was treated as a "military operation".
In the wake of Israel's recent find of massive amount of offshore natural gas in its little patch of eastern Mediterranean, Cyprus (the Greek side, that is) is hoping that it too is sitting on top of large energy reserves. The Cypriot government has given the green light to an American energy company to start exploring for gas in the island's waters later this year, but there is one major problem that stands in the way of Cyprus's plans: Turkey. From a report by the energy analysis firm Platt's:
There is still one stumbling block to Cyprus becoming a gas power though--namely its uneasy relations with Turkey. Israel and Cyprus have reached agreement on their maritime borders and each has accepted the other's exclusive economic zone. But Turkey, which occupies the northern part of Cyprus, has said it does not accept the agreement.
The Turkish government claims any agreements concluded by Cyprus are void unless and until the island is reunited and both the Greek and Turkish communities are represented.
Turkey has termed the offshore gas exploration activities "unlawful and in violation of international law" and as the planned date of drilling approaches, Ankara has stepped up its campaign. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu warned that Ankara would "take appropriate measures" if Greek Cypriots went ahead with drilling plans.
The Turkish newspaper Hurriyet reported that the country's embassy in Washington is planning to convey Ankara's reservations regarding Noble's plans to begin drilling to the US government.
And the Turkish foreign ministry warned that agreements and exploration activities in the southern Mediterranean "would negatively affect the settlement of the Cyprus question and lead to new conflicts among the countries in the region."
