2008_10_SRP_CornellKaraveli_Turkey

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Svante E. Cornell and Halil Magnus Karaveli
Central Asia is visible in the AKP’s foreign policy. The 2008 war in Georgia,
which elicited only a half-hearted Turkish reaction, is a case in point.
Turkey has great potential for economic and political influence in the areas
of the South Caucasus and Central Asia. Nevertheless, this remains an
unfulfilled potential largely due to a relative lack of interest on the part of the
current government, perhaps understandable given the multitude of more
prioritized issues such as Europe, Iraq and Cyprus. To that, recent experience
has shown that Turkish policy in the Caspian region is likely to be effective
and influential only if coordinated with the West, primarily but not only in
the energy sphere. By contrast, flirtations with the idea of dealing with
Russia in the region are bound to failure. This is the case simply because
there is little room for Turkey in Russia’s plans for the region – which
overtly seek Russian dominance over the South Caucasus – while Turkey
could play a considerable role in Western strategies.
This reality notwithstanding, the war in Georgia in 2008 showed that
Turkish leaders by no means felt an instinctive reaction to coordinate
policies with the West. In fact, when Prime Minister Erdoğan revived the
moribund idea of a Caucasus Stability Pact (swiftly renamed into a
somewhat less compelling Initiative) in the middle of the war, the proposed
structure would include the three states of the South Caucasus, Turkey, and
Russia. Neither Iran nor the EU or the U.S. featured in Turkey’s
calculations, in spite of them all being included in earlier proposals for a
stability mechanism for the region; and western spokesmen made it clear that
the initiative had not been discussed with them. Naturally, this raised
eyebrows in western capitals, as it seemed to indicate a submissive reaction
to blatantly aggressive Russian policies, salvaging Turkish interests by
accommodating Moscow. It prompted worries across the South Caucasus
that the AKP government had defected from playing a leading role in
Western policies toward the Caucasus, instead beginning to play second
fiddle to Russia, a role hitherto reserved for Iran.
Russia – Rival and Partner
Turkish-Russian relations have developed greatly since the collapse of the
USSR, becoming a vector in its own right not least because of the huge trade
relationship: Turkey’s economic ties with Russia by far outweigh Turkish