It is hard to predict what will come out of this effort, but even if it doesn’t achieve much, I think it is important in order to understand what the “new Turkey” is trying to do in the Middle East.

From Özal to AKP

By the term “new Turkey,” I mean the one which is governed by the new paradigm that the AKP (Justice and Development Party) has introduced since 2002. Actually it is not totally new; former Prime Minister and President Turgut Özal had followed a similar course during his golden years – and those of Turkey’s, from my perspective – from 1983 to 1993. The AKP has continued with the same paradigm, and, more importantly, has found a better environment to implement it.

What is that paradigm? Well, it is basically a post-Kemalist one, if that is not too strong a word. The previous (i.e., the Kemalist) foreign policy paradigm was based on a strict detachment from the matters of the Middle East. By Atatürk’s reforms, Turkey had turned its face to the West, and pretended as if it had nothing in common with its Muslim neighbors. This was not just a matter of policy; it was also a cultural reorientation. The Republican narrative defined Arabs as an inherently backward and treacherous people that Turks should have no business with. Just try to talk to the firm believers of that narrative, and you will soon listen to a lecture about why we wonderful Turks have nothing to do with “those dirty Arabs.” It is, actually, a form of anti-Semitism – the Semites, in this case, being the Arabs.

This Republican narrative is not just Arab-hating, it is also Kurdophobic. The Kurds, according to this story, are simply not supposed to exist. They can only be called Iraqis, Syrians, Iranians, or, of course, Turks. They are, actually, described as a tiny branch of the glorious Turkish race whose origins go back to a highly advanced but totally mythical civilization in pre-historic Central Asia.

So the gist of Turkey’s old paradigm was something like this: “We don’t care about the Arabs, and we don’t know any Kurds.” But life is hard. These people, although they might be unpopular in Ankara, do exist. And for strategic, political, economic and cultural reasons, they matter for Turkey.

Davutoğlu’s Vision

Özal saw this during his time and tried to establish closer relations both with Arab countries and the Iraqi Kurds. (No wonder that he was, like today’s AKP, accused by the Kemalists as a conspirator for a “counter-revolution.”) When the AKP came to power in 2002, Erdoğan also saw the necessity of change. Thus he brought in Dr. Davutoğlu who had written extensively on Turkey’s need to give up its “strategic blindness,” and open up to the Middle East – and the Balkans and the Caucasus, for that matter.

According to this erudite political science professor, Turkey had made a mistake for decades by denying its ties with the neighboring countries. Perhaps that was understandable during the Cold War, but the brave new world was presenting Ankara the chance to be an effective power that could promote peace and stability throughout the region. It had to be used, both for Turkey and for the world.

Dr. Davutoğlu’s vision soon created some alarmism among secularist Turks – both in Ankara and Washington. He, and the AKP government in general, was accused of “turning Turkey’s face from the West to the East.” Soner Çağaptay, director of the Turkish Research Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, has made that argument insistently by adding the claim that the AKP’s incumbency made the Turkish people more anti-American. (He, unfortunately, often forgot to mention the little detail called the Iraqi War, and to add the fact that the real anti-Americans in Turkey are the AKP’s political rivals.)

What the AKP has actually tried to do was to give Turkey a power and prestige that would make it a peacemaker between the West and the East – and Israel and the Arabs. In 2006, Dr. Davutoğlu tried to achieve that through a controversial meeting with Hamas leader Khalid Meshal. He tried to persuade the Hamas hawk to recognize Israel, but failed. Yet he was also working on the idea of talks between the Israelis and the Syrians. Turkey, as the only power which is trusted both in Jerusalem and Damascus, was tailor-made for that role.

On another front, Dr. Davutoğlu also orchestrated the rapprochement between Turkey and Iraqi Kurds. While the hawks in Ankara – who are all Kemalists – have been willing to crush the only stable region of Iraq since 2003, the AKP government wisely differentiated the terrorist PKK (the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party) from the legitimate government of Iraqi Kurdistan. Recently, following a trip to Iraq by Dr. Davutoğlu and special envoy Murat Özçelik, Ankara and Arbil started to talk.

Old Turkey’s Backlash

All such political steps testify to a fundamental truth: If Turkey wants to be a nation that contributes to the world, it really needs to outgrow the Kemalist isolationism of the old days. A post-Kemalism paradigm is a must. This won’t be treason to Kemalism, let alone to the persona of Mustafa Kemal, as some believe. It will be just the realization of the fact that we live in different times than that of the founding father, and thus we need different mental tools and strategies.

The AKP government, despite all its shortcoming and mistakes, gets that. That’s why it has been trying to open Turkey up toward both the East and the West. Its major opponents, conversely, want to isolate Turkey from both sides. (They are, if you haven’t already noticed, strongly anti-EU, anti-Arab, and anti-Kurd.)

The sad thing is that these guardians of the Old Turkey are still powerful and are using all their “institutions” in order to crush the New Turkey. And while it is not clear whether the Israelis and the Syrians will really cut a deal over the fate of the Golan, it is very likely that the conflict over the fate of Turkey will continue for quite some time.