One of the first acts of the 45th President of the United States Donald Trump who took over the presidency from Barack Obama on January 20th was to bring visa restrictions to seven Muslim countries. While many countries, especially the ones that have been prohibited getting visas, made statements condemning the new decision, Turkey was more tolerant about the decision. Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus criticized the visa restrictions decision in his statement and said, “I hope that this decision will be corrected.” In the other hand Deputy Prime Minister Veysi Kaynak preferred to make a “more soft” statement regarding the decision and said: “The visa prohibition is a denial of the US’s own history.”
Comment:
How much longer the low prestigious and arrogant images of Trump from the White House will continue to be served to the world is unknown. But the established American order will surely put him on the colonial road, which is the road of the American interest. In this analysis we will evaluate what the Turkish American relations will look like and how they will go on during the Trump era.
Firstly, I find it useful to say that Turkey is confronted with a surprise in the results of the Presidential elections in the United States. Because the expectation in Turkey was that the candidate of the Democrats Clinton would be the president who would continue in the same style and method as Obama. But “shockingly” Trump came. Despite this surprise, AK Party Government and President Erdogan have never considered the election of Trump to be unusual because we can easily understand this from the initial reactions to the results of the elections. During the campaign, Trump spoke very harshly against Islam and the Muslims and said that he would apply separatist policies against the Muslims if he were elected as President. It wouldn’t be wrong if we said that the AK party would give a typical strong and loud Erdogan style response according to their political tradition. But that was not the case, on the contrary, because Obama had a few days left for his term he was the one that was pointed out and Trump was the one who was welcomed.
So how did Trump respond to this act of Turkey? For example immediately after Trump won the elections, Turkey requested to return over Fethullah Gulen by saying; “Obama didn’t give him at least you hand him over”. Neither positively or negatively, Trump didn’t even respond to this request. He utterly ignored this subject. Again, Turkey asked from Trump not to support YPG. The US, on the other hand, it didn’t stop supporting YPG but also showed that it will defend him by sending armored vehicles. There is also an initiative taken by Trump about security issue in Syria which shows that Turkey isn’t been taken into consideration in regional affairs. Trump met with Saudi King Selman and spoke about the establishment of a safe zone in Syria. However, it was Turkey, not the Saudi government, who expressed more the safe zone project in Syria. It seems that, what Turkey understands in the safe zone is not the same as the US understands it. The US is trying to guarantee the safety of YPG and PYD with the safe zone project and Turkey on the other hand is advocating the construction of new metropolitan cities that it wants to be built by itself in North Syria.
Why doesn’t he respond to Trump who has put visa restrictions for the people of the Muslim countries and the immigrant? Why doesn’t he respond to Trump who supports YPG and stays ignorant against the attempted coup and the request for the return of Fethullah Gulen? In the classical sense, why is Erdogan not immediately warned due to his political sayings? While everyone in the world is reacting to Trump’s decision about the visa restriction why has Turkey given such a poor reaction days after everyone which doesn’t have any value?
Here is the answer to the questions above: Erdogan will be more dependent to the USA on the way to the presidency, and will make more compromises.
With the presidential system, the US wants to take over Turkey completely and put it under its full control. Erdogan, as a privileged leader who has neither a partner nor an opponent, wants to maintain his political life with the presidency. These two issues are clear. Both the USA and President Erdogan’s future in Turkey is directly related to the Presidency. However, it is important how Trump’s USA and the first awaited President Erdogan will manage this process. In other words, Turkish American relations are much more important in that new period. Trump’s presidency will not change the fundamentals of America’s colonial foreign policy, but it is expected that their way of implementing to be harsher. In other words, it is understood that Trump’s team will use a harder and more confrontational style of struggle with the Islamic world. Mike Flynn, who Trump appointed as national adviser, has given signs to this. According to Flynn, Islam is not a religion but a fierce ideology that threatens the United States. This form of perception of the USA seeing Islam as a threat is real. However, it is another fact that the threat that is threatening USA isn’t ISIS is known by the former and the new government. Then the important question here is the following; what does the USA want from Erdogan which is going to give Turkey the assurance of the presidency?
What will Erdogan promise the Muslims for the freedom of Iraq, Syria, Palestine and Egypt from now on?
How will Erdogan, who claims to be the leader of the Islamic world, and who claims that the rights of the Muslims will be protected, and who claims that the Syrian, Egyptian and the Palestinian cases will not be abandoned, agree on a partnership with an arrogant defiant infidel who openly declared war on the Islamic world like his predecessor Bush. How will he hide this partnership from the Ummah? If the people in Turkey are not seeing the compromises of Erdogan for the Presidency, will the Muslims in the Islamic world also not see this?
In conclusion, both America’s and Erdogan’s work is difficult.
Mahmut Kar
Head of the Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir in Wilayah Turkey