There is a lively debate centered on whether Turkey is undergoing an axis shift, meaning Turkey is drifting away from the Transatlantic system and heading towards the Middle East in the most acclaimed dailies and journals of the Western world.
One may witness a flurry of commentaries, appraisals and op-ed articles published in these media outlets. Taking notice of the vibrant debate on Turkey’s orientation in the international sphere, Turkey’s leaders underlined Turkey’s position with varying degrees of emphasis. Despite the statements of Turkey’s policymakers, which argue against the idea of shift of axis, the debates over Turkey’s identity and foreign policy orientation has not lost steam. The shift should not be attributed to Turkey’s departure from its Western ties to be replaced by those with the East but rather, a shift of power as the inevitable outcome of the end of the Cold War and a fact of the new millennium. ***
A Shift of Axis? The third quarter of the year 2009 witnessed a flurry of commentaries, appraisals and op-ed articles published in the most acclaimed dailies and journals of the Western world on whether Turkey is undergoing an axis shift, meaning Turkey is drifting away from the Transatlantic system and heading towards its turbulent South and East. Here,South is meant to be the Middle East and East is Asia. In the post-9/11 world where the postulate of late Samuel Huntington, the “clash of civilizations” had become one of the major topics of global intellectual discourse, Turkey’s turn towards the East would be a significant tectonic shift over the civilizational fault lines given its indispensable geopolitics. Thus, Turkey’s direction becomes a concern for everybody, from West to East, from South to North. Since the beginning of Fall 2009, not a single day goes by without reading titles and headings like “How the West Lost Turkey,” “What Happens If Turkey Leaves the West,” “Turkey: An Ally No More,” “Turks’ Eastern Turn,” “The Turkish Temptation,” “Turkey’s Worrisome Approach to Iran and Israel,” “The New Turkish Lexicon,” “A NATO Without Turkey,” “Is Turkey Iran’s Friend?” “An Islamist Pivot to the East,” “Disillusioned with Europe, Turkey Looks East,” “Turkey and the Middle East – Looking East and South.” These are a few examples of titles of think-tank reports and the headings of oped pieces and articles appearing in periodicals and dailies in the West ranging fromthe United States to the United Kingdom, France, and Germany. They underscore the prevailing sentiment on both sides of the Atlantic on Turkey’s current foreign policy direction. Implicit in all these analyses is a foregone conclusion that Turkey has reoriented itself and is making a historically significant detour away from the West towards its South and East, primarily the Muslim world. With it comes the perception –mainly among the Europeans- that “Neo-Ottomanism” is replacing some of the basic tenets of Republican Turkey. The Western-oriented secular Republican Turkey, which has remained loyal for decades to the principles laid out by its founder Kemal Atatürk, is seen to markedly contrast with the Ottoman Empire that reigned over the Middle East and parts of Eastern Europe for 400 years. Turkey’s current foreign policy initiatives are considered to be a revival of the Ottoman vision. Turkey’s foreign policy direction equally and simultaneously raised interest in the region’s opinion circles
