Over the past couple of years, Turkish foreign policy has encountered unprecedented challenges. Just like most regional and international actors, who have vested interests in the Middle East, Turkish foreign policy planners have been caught off-guard by the breakout of the Arab Spring.
For almost a decade, since the ascendance of the AKP (Justice and Development Party) to power in November 2002 and until late 2010, Islamically-oriented Turkish officials thought they can navigate a turbulent Middle East with minimum risk and maximum gain. That equation proved to be mere illusion.
Another painful reality encountered by Ankara was that it cannot play a key regional role without paying the right price. Indeed, Turkey does not lack the potential to assume a hegemonic position in the region, but may have not yet decided to take the risk.
In many ways, Turkey is both the most prosperous and the most powerful Muslim country in the Middle East. It has the second-largest army within Nato, its economy grows at approximately 8 per cent annually and it occupies one of the most vital strategic locations in the world.
Turkey sits astride one of the most important waterways in the world, the Bosphorus, connecting the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. Given that it is part of the Caucasus, shares a border with Iran, borders the Arab world and is part of Europe, Turkey is by far the most important country in the region.
Beyond its strategic importance and military and economic power, Turkey is becoming the most stable Islamic democracy in the world. In fact, ever since the ascendance of the ruling AKP to power in November 2002, Turkey has been consolidating its democratic credentials, presenting itself as a unique model of a Muslim nation ruled by democratic means. It has shown that liberal values and Islam are not only compatible, but complementary.
The audience for this message includes Europe, which for historical reasons has been too sceptical about accepting a Muslim nation in its rank. There is a more important audience, however: the Muslim world. The rising global Islamist movement is embroiled in its own epochal debate about whether an authentically Islamic government can and must respect individual freedoms and the equality of all citizens. The best possible refutation of the claim that Islam and democracy are incompatible would be to point to an existing government where liberal and Islamic values work together.
Three additional factors increase Turkey’s political importance. First, the Islamic world changed its shape. From being overwhelmingly secular in political outlook, not incidentally influenced by Mustafa Kamal Ataturk, founder of the modern Turkish Republic, the Islamic world began to move in a more religious direction until the main tendency was no longer secular, but Islamic to varying degrees.
Second, Turkey is taking advantage of the dwindling US influence in the region. The two major wars in the Muslim world being fought by the US were not proceeding satisfactorily, and while the main goal had been reached — there were no further attacks on the US — the effort to maintain or create non-Islamic regimes in the region was not succeeding. Now the US is withdrawing from the region, leaving behind instability and an increasingly powerful and self-confident Turkey.
Third, following the breakout of the Syrian revolution in March 2011, Iran started to lose influence in the region. For almost a decade, since the US invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, Ankara has been watching with great concern Iran’s rising regional power. To an extent, Iran has almost succeeded in building an arc of influence that stretches from Afghanistan to the Mediterranean. That seems also to have come to an end with the breakout of the Syrian revolution.
These factors will indeed serve Ankara’s ambitions, but Turkey is also discovering that guaranteeing a key regional role is not as easy as it has initially thought. On the contrary, it will be an awkward and rocky business. Over the past decade, the regional and international environment may have allowed Turkey to proceed towards achieving its objectives with minimum cost.
Soft power tools accompanied with phrases like ‘zero problems with neighbours’ did serve Turkey pretty well. But as the region becomes far more volatile, Ankara is no longer in a position to distance itself from the thorny issues. Furthermore, it is true that Iran is losing influence, but it is also putting stiff resistance to protect its dividends in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.
Russia too, a historic foe, is showing more aggressiveness in seeking a prominent global role. Having said that, Turkey will be forced into action regardless of whether it likes to take on the responsibility or not.
Dr Marwan Kabalan is the Dean of the Faculty of International Relations and Diplomacy at the University of Kalamoon, Damascus.
