French President Francois Hollande has spent the two weeks since the murderous events in Paris, trying to build an informal international coalition to fight Daesh (the self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant). He has had talks with United States President Barack Obama, consulted with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, tried to persuade British Prime Minister David Cameron to let Britain’s military join the fight, and, on Thursday, met Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Regardless of Hollande’s own mission to force a coalition, Putin was still reeling from the downing of a Russian jet fighter by Turkish missiles, an act that he described as a “stab in the back”. Relations between the Kremlin and Ankara are at a low, not seen since the height of the Cold War, and Putin’s government on Thursday began slapping sanctions on sectors of the Turkish economy. Food and agricultural are initially targeted by the measures that could be expanded to aviation, trade and investment. Turkey is a key member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and Ankara was quick to place a call to the Nato headquarters in Brussels, seeking an emergency meeting of the alliance. Yes, the meeting sent out a message of unity, affirming its principles of mutual self-defence, but it did nothing else to provoke Kremlin. Undoubtedly, since Russia’s annexation of Ukraine, the Kremlin has been emboldened, sending more long-range patrols by bombers to breach European airspace, sending its ships on more naval exercises close to those of Nato navies and actively using its submarines on missions along Europe’s coastline. The reality though is that these actions make for better television footage than foreign policy.
An even truer reality is that Russia, since becoming involved on the aground and in the sky above Syria, is a very useful partner in the fight against Daesh, who downed a Russian Airbus over the Sinai last month. In this fight against Daesh, and as in the case of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad, Nato has to keep the friend of its enemy close — despite Turkey’s actions.
