Turkey: Iraq Situation Seen Creating Conditions for Turkey-Syria-Iran Alliance Istanbul Ortadogu (Ankara edition) in Turkish 26 Jul 04 p 6
[Column by Kamuran Ozbir: "Turkey-Iran-Syria Alliance"]
The thought is very attractive and dates back a long way. Should it be actualized then it could have major and strategic effects both regionally and internationally. In fact, it could have repercussions similar to the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, the Islamic Revolution in Iran, the Arab nationalist movement of the 1950s and Ataturk's revolution at the start of the last century.
If objective conditions are set and a tripartite alliance actualized then an important turning point will materialize, and just as the three historical nations (Turks, Farsi and Arabs) toyed with the region in previous eras (Emevids, Abbasids, Ayyubids and the Ottomans) so a new role no less dangerous than that being readily quoted will be given. There is a fact known by everybody in the account and laws of history: When the will of these three nations unify then the region and the world progress! This is how it was in the first days of Christianity. It was repeated in the great empires that followed later and was again repeated with the Ayyubids and the Ottomans.
Recent Changes
As can be seen from the experiences of the Pharaohs, the Pharisees, the British and the Romans it is no empty or coincidental fact that the region where these three civilizations and three nations live is an area for the demise of civilizations, for victory or destruction. Recent changes too bear witness to this. The sun of the British Empire set when it fell into this region. The Soviet Union too collapsed midway between the Afghanistan and Desert Storm wars.
Today's American empire wants to establish grandeur aiming to rule these three. Everybody knows that the reason for the attack on Iraq was that the American administration sees this place as the start point for changing the region and the world. There are countless documents on the region's value and characteristics. Its cultural wealth, dynamism, human resources, the hidden riches due to its location at the center of the world, its investment areas and capital, and the material at the head of every tense and delicate development: oil! However, the question being asked persistently is this: When and how? Is it possible to say that the conditions have been formed to say that an alliance between Turkey, Syria and Iran is on the horizon? These three countries and their people have in addition to their human qualities other means that they possess, common borders, an historical-cultural-social integrity, economic maturity and an influential position within the process of international change.
Conditions Conducive To Alliance
With its integrity, its details, its current situation and its future the Iraq affair is a key element for bringing the three countries and their people into dialogue, bringing them together and then through joint effort laying a sound foundation for an alliance or alliances. Turkish-Syrian relations developed with the Iraq affair and are continuing to develop. The coordination or harmony between the three countries is present at all platforms. Conditions are changing rapidly. International, regional and national economic and cultural needs, and direct interests are already lying in this direction.
There has been an acute increase I the awareness of the importance of such an alliance.
It is possible to interpret the visits of Syria's head of State Asad and Iran's Head of State Otri to Turkey in connection with this.
These visits are taking place with a level of coordination and cooperation that tie these three countries to one another.
As far as we understand a unique basic formation is being forged in the Iraq affair so as to stave off chaos and prevent domestic conflict.
Turkey: Candar Decries Erdogan's Effort at Cooperation With Iran, Syria Istanbul Dunden Bugune Tercuman (Internet Version-WWW) in Turkish 27 Jul 04
[Column by Cengiz Candar: "Where To With Iran? And How Far?"]
Prime Minister [Recep] Tayyip Erdogan goes to Tehran today. Both the substance and the timing of the visit are interesting. Its timing is interesting because it is taking place just at a time when Turkey's relations with Israel are cooling, particularly as a result of harsh criticisms by Tayyip Erdogan himself, and when the animosity between Israel and Iran has become more intense.
The fact that, on the very same day that he declined to receive Israel's number-two, Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who was visiting Turkey at such a time, on the grounds that "I have no time, and am going on vacation", he received Prime Minister [Muhammad] Naji al-Utri of Syria, which is in a "legal state of war" with Israel, certainly entailed a special diplomatic significance, and conveyed a "message" in and of itself.
Furthermore, Israel's concerns regarding Iran's nuclear program have also been growing over the past two weeks. Just after Erdogan "rubbed Olmert's nose in it" but did set aside time for the Syrian Prime Minister, the Jerusalem Post newspaper, which is close to the Israeli government, published in its news pages a report that the British Sunday Times, attributing it to Israeli officials, had first broken.
According to this, Israel has reportedly prepared "all the necessary plans" to strike the Bushahr nuclear reactor in the event of Iran's receiving enriched uranium from Russia for its nuclear reactor at Bushahr, in other words, in the event of its beginning to attain the capability to produce a nuclear weapon. Judging by the information that has been leaked to the press, one of the most vital of the Israeli plans depends on F-15I fighter planes passing over Turkey to strike their target in Iran.
It would be very difficult for any relationship that Turkey might enter into with Iran at any level in the current period to remain within "bilateral" limits; like it or not, it will have to be included within regional, and even international, equations. And it does not appear very easy, from the existing "indications", to be able to discern to what degree the government is aware of this, and what sort of Middle East policy it is designing -- if it is indeed designing one at all.
This traffic has to be noted: First, Syrian Head of State Bashar al-Asad visited Tehran. Thereafter, the Syrian Prime Minister came to Ankara (and benefited from "special treatment" that was not accorded to Ehud Olmert). Following these developments, the Prime Minister of Turkey travels to Tehran.
It is plain that, while there is a known Tehran-Damascus axis in the Middle East, for Turkey to place itself in a position close to both of them would present a very strange international profile.
Particularly when headlines like "Alliance between Tehran and Iraq" are appearing in the Turkish press, and when frequent lines are appearing about Tayyip Erdogan's preparing to bring up "the danger of Iraq's being divided", and that he is going to make the proposal that "We could wage war together, with a force in which Syria would also participate, against the efforts to establish an independent Kurdish state in our region", how can the image of Turkey's being "regionally off-side" be prevented? This merits attention.
Because it appears that it will be impossible for Turkey to avoid being in a "regionally off-side" position in its "cooperation initiatives", which bring to mind the anti-Kurdish "Saadabad Alliance" of the 1930s [referring to the tri-partite Treaty of Saadabad signed in 1937 by Iran, Iraq, and Turkey]. For the real security threat that produces the danger of Iraq's division comes, essentially, from Syria and Iran. Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, in the meeting of the Countries Neighboring Iraq held last week in Cairo, said that "Instability in Iraq will not remain in Iraq, but will spread into the surrounding areas", and, without providing names, pointed to Syria and Iran as being responsible for the instability in Iraq. Hoshyar Zebari, referring only obliquely to these countries, stated that "armed resistance fighters" have been infiltrated into Iraq from both countries, and he issued a call for both these countries to close their borders to such "terrorist activities".
Fine, then; let us remember that Hoshyar Zebari is himself a "Kurd", and simply shrug our shoulders. But then what are we to say to the statement made yesterday by Iraq's "Arab" Defense Minister, Hazim Shalan? Hazim Shalan, saying that "Iran is Iraq's number-one enemy", accused Iran of "supporting terrorism and sending enemies to Iraq." He also alleged that Iran wants to take over control of the police posts along its borders with Iraq, and that it "has dispatched spies and saboteurs into Iraq." The Iraqi Defense Minister also added that "A good many people who had fought in Afghanistan have been captured in Iraq, and these individuals have confessed that they received assistance from the Iranian security forces."
Against this "regional background", what is Tayyip Erdogan going to discuss, and with which Iran? Do you think that President Mohammed Khatami governs Iran? It is former President [Ali Akbar] Hashemi Rafsanjani who really runs Iran. Is Erdogan also going to meet with the "Imam" [Supreme Religious Leader Ali] Khamenei? Affairs of this type are in fact in the hands of "that wing" of the administration in Iran.
The danger of Iraq's being divided is indeed a matter of concern. But how accurate is it to point only to the Kurds as the source of the possibility of division? There is a situation of the south of the country, from Baghdad all the way to Basra, turning into a "Shi-istan". The effort by the Shi'ites to establish domination by the majority, and the actions in the "Sunni triangle" west and northwest of Baghdad by Sunni militants who infiltrate in from the Syrian border, are developments that could trigger the division of Iraq much more strongly than the intentions of the Kurds. Is the "interactive" nature of the relationship between Iran and the Shi'ites known?
If, when all of these things are known, a regional "anti-Kurdish axis", consisting of Turkey, Syria, and Iran, is indeed going to be established, then the "logic" of this has to be questioned. On the other hand, however, if there is in fact a movement toward a foreign policy with the same "profile", but with these things not being known, then it is even more important to question the "illogic" of this.
[Unrelated passage omitted]
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