Russia after October 1, aiming to support the Assad regime, is carrying out military operations on ISIS and the other opposition forces. Such a development has created a serious concerning the Middle East from the view point of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Turkey.
This situation is contrary to Turkey’s Syrian policy based on Assad’s leaving power that it has been carrying on continually for almost four years. The existing circumstance in the area brings Turkey closer to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates as it does Moscow, Tehran, Bagdad, Damascus and the Kurdish movements. Such a balance of power complicates the solution of the Syrian problem and had adverse impact on Moscow-Ankara relations especially on October 4-5-6 due to border violations of Russian military planes.
The strategic affiliation Turkey has established since 2012 with Muslim Brothers and Qatar and the policies to design the region accordingly have been altered in 2014 with the new king in Saudi Arabia. The fact that Muslim Brothers lost Egypt and its failure to be effective in Syria have forced Erdogan to seek new cooperation possibilities in the Arab World. Especially following the agreement on nuclear issues between US and Iran, Turkey was forced to ally with the Sunni countries. His several visits to Saudi Arabia prior to Russian interference in Syria and improvement in relations with the Gulf countries, helped Turkey’s convergence policies on the Syrian issue. It is important to perceive Russia’s latest military interference in this context. Namely, Russia was recently uncomfortable about the opposition forces, backed by Saudi Arabia, Arab Emirates and Turkey, progressing toward areas under Assad regime’s control. As a result of dialogues between Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf countries, the opposition groups in Syria could merge and gain strength. These developments threatening Russian military presence in Syria have forced Moscow to openly defend Assad. A military move in Syria was essential to counter these proceedings as well as to save Russia from international isolation. Lack of direct intervention from the USA, despite all these developments in the region, helped Moscow take advantage of the gap formed.
It is possible that Russia may be alienated by siding with the Arab countries or with Turkey. In order to prevent being pulled into the regional anti-Sunni equation, Russia is continuing its dialogue with Egypt and is trying hard to get Egypt on his side. But this is not expected to be successful. It could be a very dangerous game for the Egyptian President Sisi, who came to power with a coup. It was Saudi Arabia that provided the greatest support in bringing Sisi to power. Both the US and the EU allowed this to happen. If Sisi gets into this game with Putin, it is a great possibility that he will be toppled by Muslim Brothers and Salafis again.
The Russian military operation seems to proceed in two directions. First is air strikes on the South-Western parts of opposition group in Syria and operations against ISIS to ensure the existence of Assad’s regime. Here we should take into consideration the feeling that there has been an exchange of information between Russia and Turkey prior to these operations. Before the start of operations Erdogan visited Moscow to open a Mosque. According to information infiltrated from these meetings, Russia has informed Turkey on the joint military quarters they had established with Iran, Iraq and the Assad regime against ISIS and proposed Turkey to take part in it. Second is that they have agreed on a transition period under the leadership of Assad. Third is I think that Turkey has been given an important guarantee regarding the Kurdish Issue? This was that there will no Kurdish corridor formed from North to South in Western Syria.
After his visit to Russia, Erdogan stated that a transition period may be possible with Assad. Also the diplomatic sources rendered the fact that a proposal was made by Russia to Turkey to join the military quarters. For this reason, on the first days of the operations Turkey has expressed its discomfort only by diplomatic language. Later when Russia has directed its air attacks against the opposition forces, it became hysterical. It is evident that the Turkish side was not expecting this.
Turkey’s continued presence in Syria depends on the existence of the opposition forces it supports. With Russia’s elimination of these forces, Turkey will be out of the battlefield. A development like this will weaken Turkey’s hand at the table on its cooperation with Saudi Arabia and the Gulf countries related to Syrian issues.
Russian Interference in Syria and Turkey
Turkey’s discomfort on the matter is felt clearly. Such a development would mean a total failure of the Turkish Syrian policy. For Turkey to save its position in the Middle East equation, it has to continue dialogues with the Gulf Emirates and Saudi Arabia as well as maintain its strength on the battlefield. This is also a strong instrument in its negotiations with US and EU on Syrian issues.
As we have observed on Geneva I. and II. told, Russia always by-passes Turkey, as much as it can, when negotiating Syrian issues with USA. This time because it has no direct relation with US and EU, Russia is by-passing Turkey on the battlefield in order to strongly pressure Ankara into accepting his own conditions.
Turkey, in order to by-pass Russia and actually prevent Russia’s emergence from international isolation on Syrian issues, has to change its attitude toward Moscow this time. This means that Turkey ends the cooperation among the two countries regarding the Turkish Stream Project and the power plants and must join the policies followed by US and EU on Crimean issues. Actually Turkey didn’t take part in the economic sanctions of the western countries against Russia. As a matter of fact its wish was to penetrate the Russian markets more deeply. It is known that the Turkish companies’ investment in Russia is over 10 billion US dollars. We can say that in the first 7 months of 2015, the total trading volume between the two countries has decreased by 21,5% and dropped to 14,4 billion US dollars.
According to some, the reason why the Turkish Stream treaty has not been signed yet is the failure of Russia’s signing the promised %10.25 price reduction agreement. Since reaching an agreement on gas prices transmitted by the South Stream Project, Turkey wishes the Turkish Stream treaty to be evaluated separately. Russia, however, favors discussing the 10.25 percent reduction in gas prices to be paired with the Turkish Stream Project. The aim of Turkey, in this case, is to bring different terms to the negotiation table concerning the new line. Turkey wants guarantees not to relive the stress of “buy or pay” articles of previous gas agreements with this new pipeline project. However, the Turkish side has already reached an agreement within the scope of the Turkish Stream Project, with Russia, upon two of the total of four pipelines crossing underneath the Black Sea. The four pipelines together have a total export capacity of 63 billion cubic meters of gas. The capacity of the permitted two pipelines is 15.75 billion cubic meters. The aim is to utilize the gas from these lines mainly in the Turkish domestic market.
After all these developments, on October 6, the yearly capacity of the Turkish Stream gas line has been diminished from 63 billion cubic meters to 32 billion cubic meters by the decision of Russian energy company, Gazprom. It has been noted that with this decision the Russian-Turkish relations have declined even more. Actually Turkey is not in a position to risk its economic relations with Russia and both energy and economic relations with Moscow are of great importance for Turkey.
Therefore it is not possible for Turkey to take any harsh measures against Russia at present, since any such action can also seriously affect the November 1st general elections. The vulnerability of the Turkish Lira against the US dollar can increase. Due to all this, the prediction is that without support from USA, Turkey’s hand will grow weaker in Syrian policies and it will be left out of the field.
It is expected that Erdogan will continue his convergence policy with Saudi Arabia and the Gulf countries as before the Russian operations in Syria. As the leader of the Sunni bloke in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia together with Turkey wants them to stop soon. Keeping in mind the fact that the decisions on Turkish foreign policy are taken not by Erdogan but the National Security Council, after November 1 elections, in case of a CHP (Republican People’s Party)-AKP (Justice and Development Party) coalition there is a possibility of improvement in Turkish-Egyptian relations. That is why we can say this is one of the greatest expectations after November 1. elections. A CHP-AKP coalition is also expected to smooth out relations with Israel. Turkey, not getting the full support of US regarding Middle East policies, wants to adjust the political balance on his side by taking part in building the Sunni bloke and concurrently improving relations with Israel. So as a result, we can witness Russia’s super activity in the area together with Turkey settling relations with Israel and Egypt. Actually, my opinion is that Israel will have the priority.
In case of AKP getting enough votes to come to power alone, the expectation is a Middle East policy based on close relations with the Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. The unfavorable relations between Turkey and Israel is expected to continue as it is. The relations with Egypt might be established again if the most important issue Morsi, the leader of Muslim Brothers, is freed.
