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January 8, 2019<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n by <\/b>Michael Rubin<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n President Donald Trump\u2019s about-face toward his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan is enough to give whiplash. Just five months ago, Trump was criticizing<\/a> Turkey and undercutting<\/a> its economy to bring Erdo\u011fan to his knees over the imprisonment of Pastor Andrew Brunson. Behind-the-scenes, American officials and U.S. intelligence had grown exacerbated with Erdo\u011fan for his enabling<\/a> of the Islamic State <\/a>as well as terrorist groups <\/a>ranging from Hamas <\/a>to Boko Haram <\/a>. Now, of course, Erdo\u011fan is Trump\u2019s confidant<\/a> and friend<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n The irony of this about-face is the prickly Trump has absolutely no idea the disdain with which Erdo\u011fan and the Turkish press view him. Erdo\u011fan may be an enigma to many diplomats and analysts who do not want to believe the worst about him, but certain Turkish newspapers that are allowed to publish and have grown more prominent during Erdo\u011fan\u2019s reign provide a window into his mind. The reason is simple: any journalist who dares contradict what Erdo\u011fan says or thinks is fired, imprisoned or worse. As columnist Zeynep Gurcanli observed<\/a> in one of Turkey\u2019s last secular newspapers, \u201cThe journalists who said that \u2018the AKP\u2019s Syrian policy is wrong\u2019 have been externalized, marginalized, and fired.\u201d In contrast, Erdo\u011fan cheerleaders like \u0130brahim Karag\u00fcl at Yeni \u015eafak <\/i>, however, have only grown more prominent and, indeed, have found the doors to wealth and the highly-restricted Turkish airwaves open to them.<\/span><\/p>\n So what do these journalists say about the United States and Trump? While Washington may navel-gaze and assume all anti-American animus has to do with Trump, it\u2019s important to recognize that Trump is not the cause of anti-Americanism in Turkey; it long predates him. According to the Pew Research Center\u2019s annual surveys <\/a>of anti-Americanism, Turks\u2019 favorability toward the United States declined from around 50 percent in 1999 to just 30 percent in the wake of the 9\/11 attacks, and that was before the U.S. war in Iraq. Those numbers have since plummeted.<\/span><\/p>\n When President Barack Obama ordered a drone strike in Yemen that killed Al Qaeda preacher Anwar al-Awlaki, preacher to three 9\/11 hijackers and mentor to Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hassan, Yeni \u015eafak <\/i>compared<\/a> the U.S. president to Hitler. When Obama subsequently declared that the United States was not at war with Islam, Yeni \u015eafak <\/i>called<\/a> his statement an outright lie, and suggested that the United States sought to wage war against Islam since it had plotted the September 11, 2001, attacks and subsequently created the Islamic State. In 2017, Karag\u00fcl, whose conspiracies won him promotion to editor of Yeni \u015eafak <\/i>, spun one to suggest<\/a> that every development in the Middle East since the 1991 Gulf War was actually a plot by the United States to destroy Islam.<\/span><\/p>\n But what about Erdo\u011fan\u2019s views toward Trump? Just a year ago, Karag\u00fcl declared<\/a> that \u201cThe United States is no longer a trustworthy country for Turkey. It is no partner, nor ally\u2014it cannot be and will not be.\u201d Because Erdo\u011fan promises to defeat the Islamic State, it is essential to understand that he sees the Islamic State as a puppet of the United States or, as Yeni \u015eafak <\/i>calls<\/a> it, America\u2019s \u201cillegitimate child.\u201d Such rhetoric isn\u2019t<\/a> just a one-time occasion, nor is it just the creation of Turkish newspapers; rather, it is a reflection of Erdo\u011fan himself. At the height of the battle against the Islamic State, for example, it was Erdo\u011fan himself who speculated<\/a> to his political followers that the United States created the Islamic State in order to have an excuse both to intervene in the region and to further Islamophobia.<\/span><\/p>\n To defeat the Islamic State, in Erdo\u011fan\u2019s fevered mind, therefore, means defeating the United States. Even if Erdo\u011fan\u2019s believes that Trump\u2019s about-face on Syria is a dream come true, those reflecting Erdo\u011fan\u2019s vision pity Trump because of his weakness. \u201cErdo\u011fan has a stronger hand\u2026 because, Trump does not yet have control over the established system,\u201d Karag\u00fcl wrote<\/a> in the wake of the 2017 summit between the two leaders. Hence, for the current Turkish regime, the United States cannot be trusted because it is a democracy. Nor should Erdo\u011fan pay heed to a country which, contrary to Trump\u2019s statements, Erdo\u011fan\u2019s followers see in decline. \u201cThe U.S. and the West are in a period of regress. The economic order they control is in a deadlock and can no longer move,\u201d Yeni \u015eafak <\/i>declared<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n Trump may make concessions, and Erdo\u011fan may pocket them, but none of that changes the fact that, in the worldview<\/a> of Erdo\u011fan and his team, the United States is \u201cthe primary threat for Turkey.\u201d As Karag\u00fcl explained<\/a>, the clash between United States and Turkish interests is part of \u201ca century-old showdown.\u201d That Turkey is still shy of its one-hundred-year mark underscores how Erdo\u011fan sees himself as representing global Islamism in a battle against Western liberalism. Trump himself can\u2019t hope to change Turkish minds: when he spoke before the UN General Assembly, the pro-Erdo\u011fan press called<\/a> his ideas the epitome of \u201cintroversion\u201d and \u201cpeevishness.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Trump would not be the first leader to put all his eggs in Erdo\u011fan\u2019s basket. In 2012, Obama declared<\/a> Erdo\u011fan to be among the five international leaders to whom he felt closest, even talking about <\/a>the advice he solicited about raising daughters from Turkey\u2019s leader. By Obama\u2019s second term, however, he learned what folly it was to trust Erdo\u011fan. He recognized Erdo\u011fan for what he was: a deeply corrupt<\/a> ideologue dedicated to the destruction<\/a> of the post-World War II liberal order, an enabler of terrorism<\/a> and anti<\/a>–Semitism<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n Trump may feel leadership means defying conventional wisdom in Washington. Certainly, he is right to challenge much of that. But, with his embrace of Erdo\u011fan, he not only wields power to a man complicit in the Islamic State\u2019s rise and survival, but also a man whose closest circle ridicules Trump if not to his face than behind-his-back to his own people. In Washington, Trump may see it as creative disruption. In Ankara, however, they will call it the humiliation of America and its president.<\/span><\/p>\n source:https:\/\/nationalinterest.org\/feature\/erdogans-turkey-no-american-ally-40987<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" January 8, 2019 by Michael Rubin President Donald Trump\u2019s about-face toward his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan is enough to give whiplash. Just five months ago, Trump was criticizing Turkey … <\/p>\n