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On Defense, France Bites the Bullet, But Avoids Strategic Insolvency May 7, 2013
Iceland’s Recovery Saga Presents Opportunities for Brussels, Washington—and Beijing May 6, 2013
Which Way Forward for Europe’s Hybrid Regimes? May 2, 2013
The Arab Revolts and the Liberal Order May 2, 2013
Events
GMF celebrates its 40 year history and Founder and Chairman, Dr. Guido Goldman at Gala Dinner May 09, 2013 / Washington, DCGMF held a celebratory gala dinner at the United States Institute of Peace in Washington, Wednesday May 8.
In this podcast, GMF Vice President of Programs Ivan Vejvoda discusses last month's historic agreement to normalize relations between Kosovo and Serbia.
Anchor Elaine Reyes speaks with Andrew Small, Transatlantic Fellow of the Asia Program for the German Marshall Fund, about Beijing's potential role in brokering peace between Israel and Palestine
The United States and Turkey: Can They Agree to Disagree?
November 16, 2010 / Joshua W. Walker
Belfer Center
Given the headline-grabbing actions of Turkey this summer with regard to both Israel and Iran, a powerful narrative has emerged in which the West has "lost" Turkey. In this Brief, Dr. Joshua W. Walker argues that this narrative ignores the process of democratization in Turkey and the domestic pressures facing a populist Justice and Development Party (AKP) government. To this end, this Brief evaluates US-Turkish relations by placing the recent tensions in a larger historical context and assesses various points of convergence and divergence in this relationship today.
"...When Turkey's governing AKP directly challenged the military in 2007 by selecting a conservative Muslim presidential candidate with a headscarf-wearing wife and the party was not closed or swept out of power by the military, it was a first in Turkish politics. The Turkish military had always positioned itself as a guardian of Turkey's secular character and had promoted itself as the protector of American interests in Turkey. But when the Cold War ended, the logic of politics in Turkey began to change from leftist/Communist versus rightist/ultranationalist to a secular versus Muslim identity polarization. And with greater democratization within the country and a newly emerging conservative ruling elite represented by the AKP, many formerly pro-American secularists began to reveal an ultranationalist tilt that made them instinctively xenophobic, including anti-American. Washington's old Cold War calculus of trying to maintain strong relations with the Turkish military while remaining silent with respect to various domestic issues was no longer viable: The argument floated by the secularist bloc's allies in Washington, that speaking out would cause the U.S. to "lose" the military, no longer carried weight, because in one sense the military had already been lost as a result of Turkish domestic political realities, including a resurgent civilian administration...."
Read the enitre policy brief here.
