Turkey According to the National Pact Turkey after the Treaty of Lausanne
This is important because despite voluntarily conceding these territories, a psychological phenomenon called Sevres syndrome, dubbed after the never-executed 1920 Carthaginian Treaty of Sevres signed between the last Ottoman Sultan and allied powers dividing up the remaining territories of the empire, kept dominating the subconscious of the Turkish elite. It is so because, as noted by Lewis, had it been implementedthe Sevres Treaty would leave Turkey ―helpless and mutilated, a shadow state‖,275 which is exactly what penetrated the
Turkish alter ego. Consequently, the West as the ultimate model of modernity and civilization was much admired, yet equally feared for harbouring conspiracies against Turkey. ―Sevres
103
syndrome‖ in this context basically referred to a constant fear and anxiety that external and internal enemies of the young republic were after its ultimate partition and disintegration. As remarked by Jung, it refers to ―the perception of being encircled by enemies attempting the destruction of the Turkish state‖276
which lingers among nationalist circles, in the left and right alike, in Turkey. A feeling of mistrust and isolation from outsiders culminates in Sevres- phobia. Mustafa Kemal is quoted substantiating these anxieties by saying that ―if we are perceived too suspicious with regards to the activities of foreigners, it is due to the fear of losing our very hard earned independence.‖277 In particular, the military seemed to strongly
embrace such an increased sense of insecurity.
This was supplemented by another worry which stemmed from perceiving Turkey‘s geography exceptional. In the sense,Turkey‘s south and east was perceivably doomed with instability, turmoil, and secessionist, irredentist and fundamentalist ideologies.278Such a bleak perception served as the backbone of a lingering geopolitical anxiety about impeding Turkey‘s territorial integrity and national unity. As a result, a fear of abandonment and fear of loss of territory279 loomed large in Turkish geopolitical culture. It was believed that ―Turkey was besieged by a veritable ring of evil‖.280The expression signifying such deep-seated
anxiety in popular culture was ―Turkey is surrounded by seas in three, by enemies in four corners‖. Another expression claimed that ―there is no friend of Turk but a fellow Turk!‖
276 JUNG, D. The Sevres Syndrome: Turkish Foreign Policy and its Historical Legacies in MØLLER, B. (2001). Oil and
Water: Cooperative Security in the Persian Gulf. London, I.B. Tauris. p.131.
277 DÜNDAR, C. (2009). Atatürk, 29 Ekim 1923’te Türkiye’nin Rotasını Böyle Anlattı: Geleneklerimiz Bizi Avrupa’ya
Yöneltiyor (Atatürk Explained Turkey’s Route in October 23, 1923 This Way: Our Traditions are Directing us to Europe),Milliyet (Turkish daily) October 29, available at http://gundem.milliyet.com.tr/-geleneklerimiz-bizi-avrupa-ya- yoneltiyor-/can-dundar/guncel/gundemyazardetay/29.10.2009/1155767/default.htm (consulted on November 26, 2012)
278YESILTAS, M. (2013). The Transformation of the Geopolitical Vision in Turkish Foreign Policy. Turkish Studies. 14, p.
664.
279CRİSS & KARAOSMANOĞLU cited in BİLGİN, P. (2005), Turkey’s Changing Security Discourses: The Challenge
of Globalization,” European Journal of Political Research, Vol. 44 (2005), p.183.
104
As highlighted by Bilgin, such non-material, non-military and non-specific insecurities (in the sense that there was not an easily identifiable specific counterpart/other/enemy against which such anxieties were directed at) were partly presented as justification to devise a western oriented foreign policy as early as the 1920s.281 As Foucault outlines, the construction of cultural spaces is essential to how any society conceptualizes its existence.282In this perspective, geopolitical identity formation in Turkey was partially an attempt to get accepted and recognized as part of the western world in order to address these stumbling insecurities. Turkey sought westernization as a means of avoiding probable western intervention while also hoping to benefit from the privileges of membership in the western (European) family of nations.283
Secondly, Lausanne provided a central theme, i.e. Turkey‘s territorial limits. Turkey largely identified the province of Anatolia and Eastern Thrace as its natural territorial homeland and willingly dropped all claims on Ottoman Arab provinces and the lands in the Balkans. Turkey was content with the arrangements in Lausanne except for Alexandretta (reunited to Turkey by a referendum in 1939), the status of Mosul and Kirkuk (left permanently under British rule in 1925 in accordance with the decision of the League of Nations) and the international regime on the Turkish Straits (reregulated by the Treaty of Monteux in 1936). It was so content that the remaining territories in Anatolia and Eastern Thrace served as the territorial basis for Turkey‘s westernist vision. These two reflected the natural boundaries of Turkey. To forge territorial attachment, Atatürk himself pioneered the development of a Turkish history thesis, by which ancient Sumerians and Hittites, as locals of Anatolia, were deemed Turkish in essence.284 In defending the naturalness of the new state‘s territorial core, Kemal Atatürk emphasized the principle of ―remaining within national boundaries‖ for guiding Turkey‘s
281 BİLGİN, P. (2009). Securing Turkey through Western Oriented Foreign Policy. New Perspectives on Turkey Vol
40. p. 113-116.
282FOUCAULT, M. (1986). Of Other Spaces. Diacritics 16, p.22-27. 283Ibid. p. 117.
284GEORGEON, F., & BERKTAY, A. (2006). Osmanlı-Türk Modernleşmesi , 1900-1930 (Ottoman-Turkish
105
foreign policy. Encapsulated in his following words, this has gradually transformed Turkey into a survivalist status quo power which aimed to jealously guard its national sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity.
“Many continents were home to Turks throughout history. Today Turks live in a vast homeland lying to the west of Asia and to the east of Europe which is recognized by the whole world within its delimited land and sea borders. Therefore, Turkish people today are satisfied with (the boundaries of) their homeland for their existence. This is because Turks are confident that their rich ancestral heritage will be preserved and further developed in this homeland.”285 (emphasis added)
“It is our goal, within our national frontiers, to work for the real happiness and development of our nation and our country, relying above all our own strength for the preservation of our existence, to refrain from inducing our people to pursue deleterious aims and to expect from the civilised world human treatment and friendship based on reciprocity.”286
The sanctity and inviolability of borders was a central theme in the Kemalist mantra. The non-irredentist motto, ―peace at home, peace in the world‖, by Mustafa Kemal envisioned indivisible and inviolable national borders. Such perception of borders and secluded territoriality were strongly linked to a rigid conception of homeland, national unity/homogeneity and sovereignty. Borders therefore marked not only the territorial demarcation of Turkey but also the limits of Ankara‘s external action. A rather strictly legalistic understanding about the rigidity of borders led to a sense of self-encapsulation and enclosure even to the brink of ―locked-in syndrome‖. This was later taken as a central point of
285AKÇAKAYALIOĞLU, C. (1980). Atatürk : Komutan, Devrimci ve Devlet Adami Yönleriyle (Atatürk: The
Commander, Revolutionary and Statesman). Ankara, Genelkurmay Askeri Tarih ve Stratejik Etüt Başkanlığı Yayınları, p.537-538.
106
contention by conservatives as it was claimed that ―taken to the extreme, Turkey‘s sacrosanct borders built mental walls around Turkey‖287
making it virtually impossible to steer contact, interaction and cooperation beyond legal frontiers.
d) Kemalist Geopolitical Code
In an attempt to create a new monolithic polity, differences such as Islamic and Kurdish identities, and other minorities were perceived as threats to national unity and security.288 Hence, the major internal enemies of the Turkish state were identified as Kurdish nationalists and movements with Islamic motivation. Christian minorities were also seen as a source of unease, one of the reasons for exchanging populations with Greece in accordance with the Treaty of Lausanne. These domestic challenges kept haunting Turkey‘s external relations as they had cross-border ramifications, and hampered its influence over regional affairs significantly in the years to come.
In transition from the empire to the nation state, Turkey dropped ambitions for a global foreign policy agenda. Facing near disappearance after World War I, the national mission of Turkey in this vision was identified as survival within internationally recognized borders as an independent and sovereign state. Mustafa Kemal‘s goal was to reinforce and preserve the territorial integrity of Turkey, which was put under jeopardy during World War I in pursuing high hopes. One could add a strong dimension of modernization, equated with European westernization, to Turkey‘s new national mission. Consequently, Turkey, rather than pursuing
287 Turgut Özal, Turkish PM from 1983 to 1991 and President from 1991 to 1993, was among the first to air the
harshest criticism on perceptions of Turkey’s borders. For a brief see ÖZAL, T. (1992). Türkiye'nin Önünde Hâcet Kapıları Açılmıştır (Doors of Wishing is Opened Before Turkey). Interview with Mustafa Çalık. Türkiye Günlüğü. No. 19. p. 5-23.
107
a revisionist foreign policy agenda, embarked on a path of territorial consolidation to pursue its national interests. All of this was part of a geopolitical project aspiring to make Turkey part of the ―Western world‖ based on civilizational geopolitics. Apart from that, the particularities were largely shaped subscription to Western style international and regional organizations such as the League of Nations, the UN, NATO and the Western European Union. Embracing the role of a peripheral country during the Cold War, just as its European partners kept imagining Turkey since the late 19th century, as the southern flank of the Alliance boded perfectly well with this national mission. In this vein, Turkey did not seek any territorial claim against any of its neighbours in the following decades if the case of Alexandretta is put aside which was a last attempt to strengthen territorial consolidation. In defining this mission, Atatürk stated that;
“We are not a people running after big dreams, like those fraudulents who chase things they cannot achieve. We drew the enmity, grudge and ill will of the whole world since we were perceived as pursuing big and imaginary dreams. We never pursued Pan-Islamism but said “we are and we will”. Likewise, we did not pursue Pan-Turkism while declaring to have been doing so. In response, our enemies said “we will kill (if necessary) not to let you”. This is the gist of the matter. This is how we increased the number of our enemies and their pressure upon us. Instead we shall be looking at the natural situation, what is at hand. We should know our limits.”289
“Neither the Islamic Union nor Pan-Turkism is a feasible policy for us. It is from now on the state policy of Turkey to live independently within our national borders as a sovereign state.”290
289ATATÜRK, M. K. (1961). Atatürk'ün Söylev ve Demeçleri (Atatürk’s Speeches and Statements). Ankara, Türk Tarih
Kurumu Basımevi. p.195-196.
290SOYDAN, M. (1929). Gazi ve İnkılap (Ghazi and Revolution), Turkish daily Milliyet quoted in KOCATÜRK, O.
Atatürk'ün Fikir ve Düşünceleri (Ideas of Ataturk), available at http://atam.gov.tr/?Page=FikirDusunceler&IcerikNo=67 (consulted on April 15, 2012).
108
The experience of coming to the brink of total extinction while pursuing high hopes of territorial recovery during World War I led the new Turkish elite to have a lower level of ambition in foreign policy. The official discourse was shaped by Mustafa Kemal‘s dictum, ―peace at home, peace in the world‖. Having introduced a dramatic transformation in the political, social, economic and cultural make up at home, all Turkey needed was a state of peace, stability and tranquillity in its external relations. Pursing overarching foreign policy agendas could put already fragile republican reforms in jeopardy. Mufti acknowledges that Kemal‘s dictum was domestically interpreted as ―unity and order‖ (hence ―peace at home‖), and externally as ―to be left alone and leave others alone‖ i.e. ―peace in the world‖.291 This
called for realism, insularism and caution in foreign policy. In other words, Turkey had to pursue goals aware of its limits, i.e. it no longer held an empire and a robust economic and military capacity. The new state instead had a rather mediocre image of itself about what it can or cannot achieve regionally and globally. Therefore Turkey had to have its feet based firmly on realpolitik.292 Pursuing any substantial modification in Turkish foreign policy was equated with adventurism and hence without good reason.293
Conservative Geopolitical Tradition
Conservatism, the anti-thesis of Kemalism, developed over time in conservative intellectual circles. This tradition was with Turkey all along, just like Kemalism, having a historical trajectory stretching well to the Ottoman era.294 As it is usually understood in analysing
291 MUFTI, M. (2009). Daring and Caution in Turkish Strategic Culture: Republic at Sea. Basingstoke [England],
Palgrave Macmillan. p.50.
292BARLAS, D. (2010). Turkey in the Mediterranean during the Interwar Era: The Paradox of Middle Power Diplomacy
and Minor Power Naval Policy. Bloomington. Indiana University Press.p.200.
293BAYÜLKEN, Ü. H. (1994). Türk Dış Politikası ve Kuvvay-ı Milliye Ruhu (Turkish Foreign Policy and the Spirit of
National Forces). Mülkiyeliler Birliği Dergisi, Vol. XVIII: 163, p.72-78.
294 MUFTI, M. (2002). From Swamp to Backyard: The Middle East in Turkish Foreign Policy in FREEDMAN, R. O.
109
Turkey and its politics, Turkish conservatism for the purposes of this research is not only a moral imperative to preserve religious and spiritual values or an attempt to reshape society in accordance with traditionalist principles. It is at the same time an integrated approach to portray, with resort to ―civilizational geopolitics‖, a distinct picture of world affairs and give meaning to Turkey‘s geopolitical position.
Historically speaking, Aral notes that ―…conservatism rejects Western-oriented foreign policy and xenophobic nationalism that mistrusts most of Turkey‘s immediate neighbours.‖295 To the
contrary, conservatism is an out loud cry to keep the links between Turkey and its former (Ottoman) geopolitical space intact. Therefore conservatism, as much as a moral and political project, is an attempt to re-interpret world affairs and a call to retain contact with former geographies. In terms of academic probing, it deserves closer scrutiny as a separate school of thought since most of the permanent articulations of alternative modes of representation and discourses in Turkey are initially brewed in this tradition. Equally crucially, a distinct geopolitical mentality is developed by which later politicians took up the challenge of operationalizing its central premises in the realm of foreign policy.
Just like Kemalists, conservatives too did not make an explicit claim to having engaged in geopolitical entrepreneurship. Therefore, the geopolitical reasoning and discourses evolving around the writings of prominent conservative intellectuals296 have gone largely unnoticed in terms of geopolitical inquiry. These were geopolitical texts, as much as literary pieces, in imagining the world differently and defending an alternative place for Turkey in the international arena. Through the ideas disseminated in their writings, these intellectuals served the ideological backbone of an alternative tradition. Most of them were attendants of
295ARAL, B. (2001). Dispensing with Tradition? Turkish Politics and International Society during the Ozal Decade, 1983-
93. Middle Eastern Studies. 37, p. 73.
296 The most prominent are but not limited to Mehmet Akif Ersoy, Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, Yahya Kemal Beyatlı, Cemil
110
western-style schools abroad (mostly France) or at home. Many visited territories both to the east and the west outside Turkey, thus were well exposed to the Western space, ideas and its geo-cultural traits. But conclusions they drew as to where Turkey is and how it should behave in foreign affairs differed fundamentally.
From the early days of Turkey, the conservative counter elite grew in size and intellectual activity challenging many of the prerogatives of the Kemalist establishment, first and foremost locating Turkey firmly in the West and the stereotypical inscription of the Middle East. They were the harshest critiques of the Kemalist project of state and nation building as the top-down revolutionary project did not bring any material gain for them and also seemed to have undermined their values and traditions. Westernist policies, domestic and foreign alike, were scripted as what made Turkey despicable in the eyes of the West.297 Conservatives dubbed the westernization effort blind mimicking (a cheap act of travesty) while naming Kemalist reformists copycat monkeys298 as it ran against where they saw Turkey‘s belonging at.
The only exception is Turkey‘s decision to remain in the Western camp of democracies during the Cold War, which was considered not a calculated policy choice but an act of divine intervention.299 This preference is nonetheless tacitly approved not merely due to strategic or security considerations but on the perception that with its atheist prerogatives, the communist ideology of Soviets posed a direct threat against the Muslim character of Turks and their distinct culture. 300 From the vantage point of Turkish conservatives, Soviets and
297KISAKÜREK, N. F. (1998). İdeolocya Örgüsü (Ideological Texture). Cağ., 10th edition. [ i.e. Cağaloğlu, İstanbul],
B.D. Yayınları. p.50.
298ERSOY, M. A., & GÖKÇEK, F. (2007). Süleymaniye Kürsüsünde (At Süleymaniye Mosque’s Rostrum). İstanbul,
Dergâh Yayınları , p.158, 218. The same call is reiterated in SAFA, P. (1963).Doğu-Batı Sentezi (East-West Synthesis), Yağmur Yayınları.
299KISAKÜREK, N. F. (1998). p.443-459.
300 Kısakürek provides the harshest critiques of the communist system and thereby significantly contributing to the
111
communismare represented as a godless and atheist ideology and regime. Hence it constitutes a distinct ―other‖ that Turks should avoid at any cost. Turkey therefore had every reason to refrain from interacting with such a dangerously evil regime.
As Mufti notes, frontrunners of this tradition differed significantly from Kemalists in embracing many of the post-imperial impulses and reflexes.301 These stemmed from a different conception of Turkey, as a post-imperial state. That is its geographical situatedness, perceptions about its borders, territorial outreach, zones of influence, identity, sense of belonging and cultural attachment were formulated in clear contrast to Kemalists. In this understanding, rejecting the Eastern and Muslim credentials of Turkey would contradict its past, culture and prospects for a better future. Conservatives outright challenged the Kemalist inclination to render anything reminding Turks of their Ottoman geopolitical heritage and Muslim identity as a backward baggage to drop. To the contrary, they rather strongly embraced it. As one observer put it, if the Kemalist predicament was based on a firm denial of the Ottoman past, the conservatives reconstruct that legacy as a paradise lost.302 This was believed what would re-give Turkey a distinct character as a great state and nation.
Therefore, this school of thought took pride in the Muslim character of Turks, glorified Islam, praised Ottoman accomplishments, embraced former geopolitical space (epitomized as the ―Glorious East‖), and eschewed narratives degrading Turks‘ links to Muslims. The common storyline scripted Turkey as the natural leader of the Muslim and Turkish speaking worlds as the natural heir to the Ottoman Empire.303 Therefore, a common theme in the conservative tradition was ―to make Turkey great again‖ or to ―bring about a resurgent Turkey‖. Assertive Cephesiyle Komünizma (Communism Through Every Abgle). Istanbul, Doğan Guneş Yayınları and KISAKÜREK , N. F. (1985). Dünya Bir Inkılap Bekliyor (The World is Expecting A Restoration). İst. [İstanbul], Büyük Doğu.
301 MUFTI, M. (2009). Daring and Caution in Turkish Strategic Culture: Republic at Sea. Basingstoke [England],
Palgrave Macmillan.
302 ONAR, N. F: (2009). Echoes of a Universalism Lost: Rival Representations of the Ottomans in Today’s Turkey.
Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 45, No. 2. p. 234.
112
pursuit of national greatness with a somewhat romanticized notion of post-imperial legacy was how this concept was translated into the field of foreign policy.
a) The Never Ending Controversy: The West vs. the East
A monthly review called the Great East304 offers the most succinct and systematic account of the geopolitical argumentation in this tradition. The Great East (and the following compilation