Statesmen and diplomats are quick to claim success, but few acknowledge their role in failures. To date, the State Department has not issued any report on how the United States lost Turkey, once among its most trusted NATO partners.
There is plenty of blame to go around when it comes to Turkey’s transition from ally to adversary. Both Republican and Democratic administrations allowed wishful thinking to trump reality in their assessment of Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Speaking alongside Erdogan in Ankara, then-President George W. Bush told the then-prime minister, “I appreciate so very much the example your country has set on how to be a Muslim country and, at the same time, a country which embraces democracy and rule of law and freedom.”
Former President Barack Obama listed Erdogan among his top foreign friends and said he trusted the Turkish leader so much that he even sought his advice on how to raise daughters. Obama omitted, however, the 1,400% increase in murders of women under Erdogan’s regime. Not to be outdone, during his first term in office, President Donald Trump told Erdogan during a White House visit, “You’re doing a fantastic job for the people of Turkey.” The Turkish people might disagree: Inflation was out of control, the Turkish currency in freefall, and Turkish political prisons busting at the seams.
While successive administrations treated Erdogan with kid gloves, no one bears as much responsibility for Turkey’s descent into a terrorist-sponsoring dictatorship than Erdogan himself. The real mistake in Washington was both its blindness to Erdogan’s anti-Western, pro-Muslim Brotherhood agenda and the tendency of some U.S. ambassadors to ingratiate themselves with Turkey’s dictator by gratuitously undermining the opposition.
In 2006, as secular opposition parties and Turkey’s military began to raise alarms over Erdogan’s growing Islamism and the “threat of religious reactionaries,” U.S. Ambassador Ross Wilson dismissed the opposition’s warnings as part of the opposition’s “cacophony.” Wilson’s tone-deaf remarks raised outrage at the time, as Erdogan interpreted them as a green light to continue his drive to undermine Turkey’s already weak democratic norms.
It is now déjà vu all over again. Just under six months ago, Turkish police arrested Ekrem Imamoglu, the mayor of Istanbul and Erdogan’s chief opponent. Turks understand that Erdogan views demonstrations as an opportunity to make further arrests as opponents concentrate in a single location. Rather than march, then, demonstrators began to boycott stores and brands associated with Erdogan and his top supporters. As the boycotts continue, Erdogan complains but is powerless to stop them. They are important as they signal that the Turkish people do not consent to Erdogan’s repression or the conspiracy theories that consume the president.
Alas, U.S. Ambassador Tom Barrack, Trump’s longtime business associate and friend, repeats the mistakes of his predecessors, confusing ingratiation with U.S. national security. On Monday, he visited a coffee shop boycotted by Turks and posed with its owner, whom Turks believe is a cheerleader for Erdogan and his Islamist rule.
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Gratuitously undermining Turkey’s opposition is unwise in both the short and long term. Trump sees himself as a deal-maker, and his doctrine is transactional. Signaling that he gets U.S.-buy without offering concessions is not the way to maximize U.S. gain.
In the long term, a more liberal, pro-Western Turkey should be the clear U.S. interest. The eastern Mediterranean will not be stable until Turkey is at peace with itself and its neighbors. That can never happen so long as Erdogan cracks down on secular opposition and instead sponsors Hamas and incites violence against Israel, Jews, and Americans. It is time to bring Barrack home before he causes more damage with his blind spot, if not enthusiasm, for the region’s most radical Islamist movements.
Michael Rubin is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential. He is the director of analysis at the Middle East Forum and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.