In an Attempt to Ditch the Dollar, Turkey Will Take Back All Its Gold From the US

(ZHE) After Venezuela, Germany, Austria and the Netherlands prudently repatriated a substantial portion (if not all) of their physical gold held at the NY Fed or other western central banks in recent years, this morning Turkey also announced that it has decided to repatriate all its gold stored in the US Federal Reserve and deliver it to the Istanbul Stock Exchange, according to reports […]

Nato Air Force is Moving from Turkey to Jordan

People in the Middle East are joking, cynically:

“From Incirlik, Turkey to Al-Azraq, Jordan with love.”

That is, if they pay any attention to the movement of NATO troops in this part of the world.

They should.

At least one substantial part of an incredibly deadly and aggressive force has been gradually relocated, from an ‘uncertain’ and according to the West suddenly ‘unreliable’ country (Turkey), to the impoverished but obedient Kingdom of Jordan.

It is now clear that NATO is not sure, metaphorically speaking, which direction is Turkey going to fly in, and where it may eventually land. It is panicking and searching, ‘just in case’, for an exit strategy; almost for an escape plan from the most important regional power.

Is the West really losing Turkey? Nobody knows. Most likely, nobody in Ankara is sure, either, including Mr. Erdogan.

But what if … What if Erdogan moves closer to Russia, even to China? What if Turkey’s relationship with Iran improves? What if Ankara has finally gotten tired of being humiliated, for years and decades, by the European Union? And what if it does not want to follow Washington’s diktat, anymore?

These ‘nightmarish’ scenarios are most likely turning many apparatchiks in Brussels, Washington and London, into insomniacs.

NATO does not want to leave anything to chance. If not Turkey, then where? Where should all those nukes, fighter jets, bombers and ‘Western military advisors’ go?

Incerlik, a giant air base located right on the outskirts of the Turkish city of Adana used to just be the perfect place. Incerlik has been, for many years, the most important and lethal air force base in the Middle East, from which the West has been intimidating and directly attacking various targets in the region, and where, as many Turkish experts believe, numerous extremist jihadi cadres operating in Syria and elsewhere, have been receiving their training.

Anything the West wants to bomb, be it in Syria, Iraq, or potentially Iran, Lebanon, Yemen or even Afghanistan, Incerlik is there, with perfect infrastructure and a ‘fantastic’ geographical location. For NATO, a dream-come-true place, really! But only until recently; until Mr. Erdogan’s era, until the 2016 failed coup, and the consequent, incomprehensible, but real ‘Turkish rebellion’.

Suddenly, Turkey is ‘not trusted anymore’; at least not in the Western capitals.

That is perhaps very good for Turkey and its future, but definitely not for NATO.

*

So where to move Incerlik, really?

The Kingdom of Jordan seems to be the best candidate. Conveniently, it is greatly impoverished, and it has been historically submissive to its Western handlers. It is essentially dependent on foreign, mainly Western, aid and would do just about anything to please the rulers in Washington, London or Berlin.

Most importantly for the West, Amman is sufficiently oppressive, lacking any substantial opposition. If dissent gets too vocal, its members get kidnapped and tortured.

Therefore, it is natural that both Europeans and North Americans feel safe and at home here. In 2017, the German Wermacht moved its soldiers, pilots and Tornados, more than 200 people and dozens of airplanes in total, to Al-Azraq base, which is located only some 30 kilometers from the border with Saudi Arabia, and a similar distance from Syria. Iraq is just 200 kilometers away.

It is obvious that Angela Merkel and Recep Erdogan feel a certain (some would say ‘great’) distaste for each other. It is also a well-known fact that NATO countries like to work closely with oppressive, market-oriented and obedient countries.

But Jordan?

Even the official German television network, Deutsche Welle (DW), displayed clear cynicism towards the move, although it expressed, simultaneously, true understanding of the situation:

“King Abdullah II is a leader very much to the West’s liking. In contrast to the princes in the Arabian Peninsula, he is usually dressed in a dark suit. He received a military education in Britain and studied in Oxford and Washington. Under his leadership, Jordan has reliably positioned itself in line with Western politics in all major Middle East conflicts.

And this won’t change, according to Udo Steinbach, who was in charge of the Hamburg-based German Orient Institute for many years.

“He was a man of the West, he is a man of the West, and he has no alternative whatsoever to being a man of the West,” Steinbach said. “Jordan is a poor country, and without Western aid, it wouldn’t be able to survive at all.””

*

NATO has been already using Muwaffaq Salti airbase near Al-Azraq, for years, mainly to illegally bomb numerous targets located on the Syrian soil.

In Brussels, Al-Azraq is truly a ‘household name’, as it has been used by both NATO and the EU air forces, concretely by the Belgians (2014-2015), and now both Dutch and Germans. The US air forces were operating from here already for several years.

The base is situated in yet another gloomy part of the Middle East; economically depressed, with countless small businesses and factories that have been closing down and now rusting and rotting, and with the almost totally drained-out Azraq Wetlands Reserve – an oasis once renowned as a ‘migratory birds’ sanctuary’.

The oasis used to extend almost all the way to the border with Saudi Arabia. Now most of the territory of the ‘reserve’ is dry. Not many birds would fly here, anyway, as they’d be confronted with the deafening roar of airplane engines and the engine-testing facilities, not unlike those that I witnessed in Okinawa.

The people who come to this corner of Jordan are mostly ‘adventurous’ Western tourists, ready to ‘explore’ the nearby castle which was once used as a base by the glorified sinister British intelligence agent, Thomas Edward Lawrence, otherwise known as “Lawrence of Arabia”. They also come to visit ‘wildlife reserves’ and several smaller archeological sites.

Ms. Alia, who works at the artisan center of Al-Azraq Lodge, confessed:

“Sometimes we are very scared here… It is because our place is sitting right next to perimeter of the air force base, while it is also serving as a hotel for foreign tourists. There are many reasons why someone could consider attacking this place…”

But is this really a ‘tourist’ inn, I ask, after observing numerous hangars and military planes from the parking lot, at the back of the structure. She hesitates for a few moments, but then replies:

“Originally this used to be an eco-lodge, but now the bookings are mainly from the base. Both Americans and Germans are staying here; while couple of years ago it was Belgians. Officers sometimes live here for one entire month – you know: training, meetings… They work inside the base, but sleep at our place.”

There is a “US Aid” sign screwed into the wall near the entrance to the inn. And there are countless black and white historical photos of the area, decorating the walls, as well as a figurine of a soldier wearing an old British colonial uniform.

Azraq town is dusty and half-empty. It is surrounded by the brutally dry desert. There are countless ruins of houses and services lining up along the main road. Some people live in misery, in torn up tents.

I stopped near a cluster of humble dwellings. An old woman wearing a black dress waved a cane at me, threateningly.

An old-looking man approached the car. He extended his hand towards me. It was wrinkled and hard. I shook it. I had no idea how old he was; most likely not too old, but he looked tired and dejected.

“Is this base,” I waved my hand, abstractly, towards the walls: “Is it helping the town, at least a little bit?”

The man stared at me for several seconds. Then he mumbled:

“Helping? Yes, perhaps… Perhaps not… I don’t really know.”

My driver and interpreter, who used to be a salesman only several years ago, before hitting hard times, commented, as we were slowly departing from Al-Azraq:

“It is very bad here! The situation is tragic. West Amman and this – as if two different universes would exist on a territory of one single country. Such a contrast! Well, you can see it yourself.”

I asked him, whether Jordanian people would mind having this deadly air force base expanding into their area, in their country? After all, the only purpose of it is to brutalize fellow Arab nations, while killing countless innocent human beings.

He shrugged his shoulders:

“They don’t care. Most of the people here don’t think about such things. They want to be able to eat, to get by. Government convinced them, that collaborating with the West could improve their standard of living. It’s all they think about. Our leaders, in the Gulf and here, are corrupt, and people are humiliated; they don’t see any bright future here, or any way out from the present situation…”

Around 70 kilometers towards the capital, Amman, we slow down, as we are passing several checkpoints and a concrete fence, which looks similar to those built by the West in Afghanistan. The driver wants me to know:

“Look, this is where they have been training the so-called Syrian opposition, for years.”

Back in Amman, I met several friends, mainly foreigners, who have been working here.

“There are already numerous Western air force bases operating in Jordan,” one of them said. “This topic is not discussed here, openly. Right or wrong, it does not matter. Nobody cares. The spine of this part of the world has been already broken.”

*

Al-Azraq is not only a large air force base. It is also a place synonymous with one of the major refugee camps in the Middle East. It is a new camp, built in the middle of the desert, designed to accommodate mainly Syrian people fleeing the war.

In 2016 and 2017 I worked here, or more precisely, I tried to work, before being chased away by aggressive local security forces.

Refugee crises, the Western military bases, foreign aid and tourism, these are the main sources of income for the Kingdom of Jordan.

In a sinister, surreal way, everything here comes around in a big circle, ‘makes perverse sense’: ‘Entire countries are being flattened from the military bases, which Jordan is willing to host on its territory; of course, for a hefty fee. Consequently, hundreds of thousands of desperate refugees would continue to flood to this ‘island of stability in the Middle East’, bringing further tens, even hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign aid into the coffers of Amman.’ No industry, production, or hard work is really needed.

Could this arrangement be defined as ‘immoral’? ‘And does it really matter?’ I was told on several occasions, during this as well as during my previous visits to the Kingdom of Jordan, that ‘nobody cares’. Almost all ideology, together with the spirit of solidarity and internationalism, has already been destroyed by the Western-sponsored education and media indoctrination programs and campaigns, camouflaged as ‘help’ and ‘aid’.

I say ‘almost’, because now, a flicker of hope is once again emerging. Not everything is lost, yet. A neighboring country – Syria – is still standing. It has fought and lost hundreds of thousands of its people, but it has almost managed to defeat the brutal Western intervention. This could be the most important moment in modern Arab history.

The people of the Middle East are watching. The people of Jordan are watching. Turkish people are watching. Apparently, the imperialists can be defeated. Apparently, collaboration is not the only way how to survive.

The huge NATO air force base is slowly moving from Turkey to Jordan.

The West has already lost Syria. It may be also losing Turkey. Who knows: one day even Jordan might wake up. Some say: the ‘Domino effect has begun.’

Andre Vltchek is philosopher, novelist, filmmaker and investigative journalist. He’s a creator of Vltchek’s World in Word and Images, a writer of revolutionary novel Aurora and several other books. He writes especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”

On the American Inability to Turn Turkey Around

While last two weeks have seen the erstwhile—and current—NATO allies, the US and Turkey, exchanging serious words of warning over Turkey’s ground and air operations against the US-backed Kurdish militias, Turkey doesn’t seem to be deterred, nor does it appear that it will abandon its strategic goals. While such a situation is nothing short of a serious embarrassment for the US, as we pointed out in one of our recent pieces, past two weeks have only proved that the crisis is not going to just die down. On the contrary, with every step that Turkey takes towards eliminating its ‘Kurdish threat’, the US ability to manipulate the ground situation in Syria becomes weaker, thus speedifying the near permanent departure of the US from the Middle East and a potential end of Pax Americana. They many changes the Syrian war has brought to the region has triggered a wave of geo-political upheavals, particularly the ascendance of Iran and then Russia, which have made the US concede the Middle East, a region that has been at the receiving end of occidental manipulations since the end of World War One; hence, the US’ inability to turn Turkey around the Kurdish question and prevent it from forcing them out of the territories under their control in Syria.

Despite the US warnings to the contrary, Turkey isn’t stopping short of clearing Manbij, after Afrin, of Kurdish elements. Speaking to the members of his party in the Turkish Parliament, Turkey’s Erdogan said, pointing his words sharply at the US, “They tell us, ‘Don’t come to Manbij.’ We will come to hand over these territories to their rightful owners.” Who are the rightful owners? Of course, it is the Syrians. But where does this emphasis on ‘handing over Manbij to the rightful owners’ place Turkey in the regional geo-political matrix?

To locate Turkey in the regional matrix, we first have to understand what other major regional actors are striving to achieve in and through Syria. In other words, let’s see what the matrix is.

The Regional Matrix

First of all, Turkey’s operation Oliver Branch could not have been possible without direct and indirect support from the Russians, who are currently controlling the entire Syrian end-game, and taking it to a direction that ensures Syria’s territorial integrity and restoration of the Syrian regime’s sovereignty over the whole of Syria. Given the Russian objectives, Turkey’s Oliver Branch doesn’t diverge but converge with the Russian objectives as this operation is aimed at clearing the Syrian land of the Kurds and push them back to the pre-war positions. But the question is: why is Turkey doing it? Why not the Russians or the Syrian forces?

Of course, they could have done the same, but it would have equally made the Russians a target of criticism and propaganda for its ‘hegemonic’ ambitions. Turkey, on the other hand, has its long standing security concerns vis-à-vis Kurds—and the fact that the US had pledged and not fulfilled its promise that the Kurdish forces would withdraw from Manbij after clearing the territory of ISIS. This hasn’t happened, leaving Turkey with no option but to intervene.

And while Turkey is clearing a strategic territory of the Kurds, it seems to be making things a lot easier for the Russian and Syrians as far their objective of restoring Syria’s pre-war territories is concerned. Before the beginning of Oliver Branch, the Russians had asked the Kurds to leave the region, but the Kurds didn’t live up to it and neither did the US, giving the Russians a genuine excuse to vacate the area and let the Turks do their thing.

And with everyday passing, western speculative whispers of Turkey-Russia clash in Syria are dying out. After initially indirectly supporting Turkey’s Afrin operation, the Turkish resumed its airstrikes in Afrin, which had been halted following the downing of a Russian jet in Idlib, only after a telephonic conversation between Erdogan and Putin, thus indicating the extent of caution Turkey was following to avoid any possibility of conflict with Russian interests.

Turkish steps are therefore in line with Russian objectives of strengthening Syrian regime. And with Iran, too, maintaining a sort of ‘silent consent’ over Turkish incursions in Syria, we can only expect more co-operation among these key players in Syria.

Unsurprisingly, therefore, Russia’s Vladimir Putin has already accepted Erdogan’s invitation to attend a Turkey-Iran-Russia summit in Istanbul on Syria. Therefore, as we analyzed in one of our previous pieces for NEO, Oliver Branch is not going to damage Turkey-Russia alliance, instead it is opening a new chapter of co-operation between the three countries. The holding of trilateral summit in Istanbul also symbolically places Turley firmly in the Russian-Iranian camp, and the fact that both Russian and Iranian leaders will attend it signifies the importance these two countries attach to the otherwise NATO’ second biggest military power after the US.

And even though it is far from clear that the US will pull out of Manbij, the fact that without taking Manbij, Turkey’s strategic objectives will remain unfulfilled hints the possibility of further deterioration in Turkey-US bi-lateral relations—something that would directly add to Moscow’s ability in Syria as the chief power-broker. And even if the US refuses to pull out, it will push Turkey with more force to the Russian camp.

Besides it, the fact that Turkey will continue to target Kurdish militias in Syria highlights how the US would continue to lose its main ground force in Syria, consequently sequestering the US influence in the broader Syrian conflict.

And if the US agrees to pull out of Manbij, it will automatically lose its entire ability to influence ground realities—something that will be akin to signing its own death warrants. Syria for the US is, therefore, becoming a deep quagmire, leaving which only mark a permanent end to its dominance in the Middle East—and the end is nonetheless near even if it stays in Manjib, for is too small a territory for the US to manipulate the entire Syrian end-game.

Salman Rafi Sheikh, research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

Oliver Branch: Turkey’s Bid to Modify the ‘Syrian End-game’

Whereas Turkey’s operation Oliver Branch is nothing short of an attack on the forces allied undoubtedly with the US, and thereby an attack on the US, this operation is as much a result of Turkey-US conflict of interests as it is aimed at modifying the US ‘end-game’ for Syria. The US ‘end-game’ for Syria envisages a Syria clearly portioned between the Syrian regime and the Kurds. This ‘end-game’ is, however, nothing short of a nightmare for the Turks who have moved, in the last 5 years or so, from initially supporting the Jihadi elements such as ISIS to creating their own militias and to allying with Russia to strangulate the growing power of Kurdish militias and thus prevent the emergence of an independent Kurdistan on Turkish borders. In other words—and contrary to what is being hoped in the West—neither Russia nor Syria will have any major objection to Turkish intervention because this intervention is directly thwarting the US objectives.

Oliver Branch will not damage Turkey-Russia alliance

Turkey, by invading Syria, is therefore not running the risk of breaking or significantly damaging the Turkey, Russia, Syria, Iran alliance. While Turkey may end up controlling a part of Syria, Turkey is neither interested in assimilating Afrin as its own territory nor is going to establish its direct military control.

While reports in the western media have tended to project this operation as an “assault on Russia” because Afrin is west of the Euphrates, where Russia, not the US, has been controlling the air space ever since it sent its air force to Syria in 2015 to salvage the Assad regime. However, instead of this operation being an ‘evidence’ of a crack in Turkey-Russia alliance, it largely underscores the fact that this operation is a result of broader understanding reached between Ankara and Moscow.

There remains little doubt in that this operation will directly work to the US’ rather than Russian or Syrian disadvantage. To begin with, Afrin is a place which has been the gateway to the Amanos Mountains, where Kurdish guerillas and Turkish army have clashed numerous times. And, according to various media reports, Kurdish militias present in Afrin have amassed a big stockpile of weapons, thanks to American supplies since 2016, including multiple rocket launchers, missile launchers, 80- and 120-mm mortars, MK19 grenade launchers, US-made BGM-71 TOW anti-tank missiles, reconnaissance vehicles, FGM-148 Javelin anti-tank missiles, and so on.

One of the many purposes behind the provision of such weapons was clearly to enable these militias to establish their own control and governments. And, while the establishment of such government would have directly worked to Turkey’s disadvantage, even Russia had to warn against the consequences of such steps. It was, as such, only days before the commencement of Oliver Branch that Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that, “It’s a fact that US forces are seriously involved in creating alternative government bodies on vast part of the Syrian territory.”

Therefore, as far as the question of preventing Syria’s de facto break up is concerned, Turkey and Russia, and by default Syria as well, are on the same page. But Russian and Syrian acquiescence has not come without having Turkey to pay for it elsewhere.

Besides Turkey’s sustained co-operation with Russia in successfully holding Syrian National Dialogue Congress in Sochi on January 29-30, which is a necessary step toward national reconciliation and settlement, the fact cannot be overlooked that just as Turkish forces are moving in Afrin, Syrian forces are moving in Idlib, lying to the west of Afrin and bordering the coastal province of Latakia, where Russia’s air and naval bases are located. It is worth remembering here that Idlib is where Turkey and Russia have previously collaborated and freed it from terrorists. It was in October 2017 when Turkish reconnaissance forces had moved into Idlib and established lines of control.

And, if all things go according to the plan, that is if Turkey comes to control Afrin and Syrian forces come to control Idlib, Washington’s dream of establishing a territorially contiguous Kurdish region will become almost impossible to realize. This brings, notwithstanding the otherwise condemnation for Turkish incursions, Russia, Turkey, Syria and even Iran on the same page.

How will the US work out of this ‘invasion’?

And while a discreet arrangement seems to be working between Moscow and Ankara, at least at this stage, there still remains the American factor to be taken into account. This arrangement is clearly working to the US’ disadvantage as it will not only prevent the establishment of a contagious Kurdish zone but also thwart the creation of a 30,000-strong “border defense force” comprised of US-armed and funded Kurdish militias. This is likely to leave the US with little to no leverage on the ground in Syria. Part of this can be explained with reference to the lackadaisical response of the US Secretary of Defense James Mattis, who confined himself to saying that “we will work this out” with the Turks, clearly implying that the US will have to work something out and that they will have to wait.

Therefore, if things work out well for Turkey, it will not hesitate putting more pressure on the US for ending its support for Kurds, or the US might end up facing a drastic failure of its plans to keep an indefinite direct and indirect military presence in northern Syria. The only silver lining for the US is that Turkey remains a NATO member and that NATO supports Turkey’s deep concerns for self-defence, a support that comes out of NATO’s understanding of the ‘new cold war’ revving up with Russia and China in the coming years. Both the US and NATO understand how crucial Ankara will be in that war, and having Ankara in their camp will require nothing but a major compromise on the US’ traditional support for Kurds.

However, for now, the irony of the US-Turkey relations is that Turkish jets, pounding Kurdish militias, take off from the same military base in Incirlik that the US uses to support its Syria operations. And, if Turkey to force the US out of Incirlik a well, the US will lose another territory. As is increasingly evident, there are only bad options left for the US; and the question now is that of choosing the best bad one.

Salman Rafi Sheikh, research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

What Will Turkey’s Future Be Like?

Turkey marked its 94th anniversary in October, celebrating that anniversary with serious problems related to its latest strategic choice in foreign affairs.

For an extended period in its history, Turkey’s politics were connected with its main geostrategic asset, the Bosphorus and Dardanelles Straits between the Mediterranean and Black Seas, which were the object of numerous military conflicts over several centuries. The main reason for these conflicts was that both straits were, on the one hand the key to Russia’s access to southern seas, and on the other, a wonderful opportunity for the West’s naval aspirations on Russia’s south. This is where Turkey’s constant balancing between territorial ambitions toward Russia’s south, and the desire to use the military potential of its northern neighbor for opposition to the West is originated.

Though Turkey had been, on multiple occasions, a military and political ally of the West, however temporarily, as history witnessed throughout the last centuries – until such “alliance” served the West’s main goals and interests.

After the end of the World War I, British, French, and Greek armed forces occupied the Bosphorus and Dardanelles Straits, as well as Istanbul, which was the capital of the defeated Turkish Empire under the rule of Ottoman dynasty. In 1921, in Moscow, the Soviet-Turkish “Treaty of Brotherhood” was signed, which became the first official recognition by Russia of Turkey’s independence and equality, and its struggle against the Anglo-Greek intervention.

Although Turkey fought for independence against Western occupation forces, and received support from Soviet Russia’s government, as soon as the World War I ended, the Turkish leader Mustafa Kemal Atatürk tried to establish good relations with France, Great Britain, Greece, Italy, and with rising power of that times, the United States of America.

In 1947, after the end of the World War II (during which Turkey remained neutral), the American President, Harry S. Truman, announced a “new policy,” in which Turkey and Greece were considered to “belong to the Western system.” Then, in 1950, Turkey sent troops to the Korean War and in 1952 became a member of the NATO. In addition, Ankara also joined the Council of Europe and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, the OECD, enthusiastically engaging in integration with the European Economic Community, which over time transformed into the European Union. From the above-mentioned 50’s of the previous century, which marked the height of the Cold War and the intensification of confrontation between NATO countries and Soviet Russia, the strategic value of Turkey for the West acquired special importance in connection of which the United States and European powers tried mightily to draw Turkey into the “Western system,” to maintain strong ties with Ankara at any cost despite serious differences.

Recently, while confronting serious problems in relations with its main political ally, the United States of America, and its main economic partner, the European Union, the ruling Justice and Development Party, headed by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has strived for closer cooperation with Turkey’s traditional rivals in the region, Russia and Iran. At the same time, the Party continues to have problems with a number of Arab countries, though in domestic policy it relies on the votes of conservative Islamists.

Lately, Ankara persistently reproaching Washington for not extraditing F. Gülen, whom Turkish President Erdoğan accuses of involvement in the Fetullahist terror organization – FETO and in the 2016 military coup attempt in the country. And, yes, Turkey also suspects the United States’ own involvement in the preparation of this overthrow attempt. Ankara’s serious dissatisfaction with Washington is also related to US actions in Syria by supporting the Syrian Kurds under the pretext of fighting Daesh terrorists.  With regard to his personal attitude towards the US, the Turkish president recently expressed plainly his discontent with the duplicity of the United States, stating that “the U.S. is lying to the whole world.”

Washington, in turn, is dissatisfied that the Turks are pursuing their own line in Syria, agreeing on a number of issues with Russia and Iran. And recently the US took an openly anti-Turkish step by suspending the issuance of nonimmigrant visas, having decided to “minimize the number of visitors to the Embassy.”  Previously, the United States expressed dissatisfaction with Ankara’s purchase of an S-400 anti-aircraft missile system from Russia, saying that this will create problems for NATO.

Recent serious anxiety of the Turkish president is also correlating with decreased trust in NATO. He reminded that during the period of the maximum growth of the terrorist threats from Syrian territory, the North Atlantic Alliance withdrew Patriot anti-aircraft missile systems from Turkey making clear that it would not support Ankara in case of an attack on Turkish territory.

An additional round of chilling relations between Turkey and NATO occurred during NATO’s maneuvers in Norway from November 1 to the 18th, when President Recep Tayyipa Erdoğan, and the founder of modern Turkey Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, were depicted on a display as “accomplices of enemies of NATO and its hypothetical enemy.” It was apparent that this scandal had not erupted over a mere oversight. Apparently, it is a clear example of the growth of anti-Turkish attitudes, which Western governments have endorsed for a long time, as in the issue of Turkey’s accession to the EU, and in critical perception of the personality of the country’s leader, Tayyip Erdoğana.

Yes, we can assert that today Europeans are creating independent states with a Muslim population (Bosnia and Herzegovina) for the sake of the Turks. However, this will not impede Europe from delicately carving up Turkey itself. Kurds and Armenians will rise, and Europeans will demand from Ankara recognition of the independence and right of these peoples to self-determination. It is entirely possible that they will tell Turkey that, in exchange for previous concessions, she herself must now grant independence to the Kurds and Armenians, in so doing “magnanimously” dividing Turkey into parts.

It is under such difficult conditions that Turkey today has been forced to make an alliance with Iran and Russia, which encounters further displeasure from the United States and Western Europe, but which Ankara uses to build “a current balance of power favorable to it.” That is why, against this background, relations between Russia and Turkey cannot be considered a stable factor in Ankara’s future political orientation. Everyone remembers the “stab in the back” with the downed Russian plane, and also the recent promise of Erdoğan to Poroshenko, that Ankara will not recognize Crimea as Russian territory. And, as they pertain to the Syrian question, Ankara’s relations with Moscow and Tehran in no way look rosy, which provides periodically a reminder of the number of disagreements in views on the matter. So one can say that Turkey is not such a far cry from the United States in duplicity, and Ankara can be called a present-day partner of Russia and Iran, without any guarantees for the future.

Vladimir Platov, Middle East expert, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook“.

The Moment of Turkey’s ‘NATO Ex-communication’

While still a NATO member, Turkey has drifted away from the alliance to a great extent, indicating the way conflict in Syria has changed the Middle East’s geo-political landscape, and largely continues to. It is particularly the end-game in Syria that has now greatly crystalized which country stands where in the regional geo-political spectrum, and Turkey is certainly not in the US-led Western camp, which means that Turkey is an ally of Russia and will directly or indirectly counter-act any NATO manoeuver against Russia. In simple words, Turkey’s strengthening relations with Russia mean a full NATO member working in a very close tandem with a country that happens to be the reason for NATO’s very existence in the post-cold war era. That certainly sounds counter-intuitive in terms of what NATO seems to stand for, thanks to Russia’s active and truly anti-terror policy in the Middle East where the organization has not only failed to eradicate terror, but its biggest military power, the US, also stands accused of plotting a coup against Turkey, the second biggest NATO power; hence, the crisis within NATO.

The US and the NATO have clearly sensed that their current position is not comparable to the pre-conflict scenario, which means that they need to re-define their relationships with a number of countries. Ironically, the first on the list happens to be Turkey. And, its first emphatic glimpse game on last Monday when HR McMaster, Donal Trump’s National Security Adviser, described Turkey along with Qatar as two countries responsible for the spread of extremist and radical Islamist ideology.

While he did make a passing reference to Saudia’s past involvement in the spread of radical ideology, he emphasised that Qatar and Turkey were more involved into it, adding further that the core reason for Turkey’s growing problems with the West was largely the rise of the Justice and Development Party, to which president Erdogan belongs, in Turkey and presumably its connection with extremism.

While McMaster didn’t make any reference to Turkey’s growing relations with Russia, he did not hesitate to describe Russia and China, just a few days before his Monday statement, as two “revisionist powers”, encroaching on US allies (read: Turkey) and thus bent upon undermining the (US dominated) international order. When the two statements are read together, McMaster seems to clearly mean that the “revisionist powers” are not only undermining the US dominated order, but also bent upon undoing the gains the US claims to have made in its 17 years of ‘war on terror’ by allying with powers, such as Turkey, which are spreading ‘terror’ in the Middle East.

There is as such a little more than a coincidence that McMaster’s verbal attack on Turkey came just within hours of Erdogan’s meeting Russia’s Putin. This meeting not only greatly underscored the fast growing alliance between the two states but also indicated the potential lift both leaders are in the middle of giving to their relations.

“We see significant prospects for expansion of cooperation in the military-technical sphere. We finalized the credit agreement during today’s work and I hope it will be signed in the soonest possible time,” Putin said after talks with his Turkish counterpart, Erdogan.

Erdogan added that “the relevant agencies of our two countries are expected to complete what needs to be done this week” with regard to Turkey’s purchase of Russia’s S-400 missile system. The purchase of Russian defence system in no small thing within NATO’s strategic culture; for, as it stands and as hinted above, what it potentially means is integration of Russian systems within the ‘NATO territory’, which further means that Russia is now setting its own foot in response to NATO’s own advances towards Russia through Ukraine. Erdogan’s this particualr statement came only few days after he had criticized NATO for interfering in Turkey’s defence deals. The deal, besides it, is also a clear rebuff to the US & NATO’s withdrawal of Patriot air defence batteries from Turkey.

Besides the co-operation in military and technical fields, it is particualr the Syrian end-game that has brought Turkey and Russia as much closer as it has driven a wedge between the Turkey and NATO, whose officials were reported to have said that “No NATO ally currently operates the S-400″, implying that Turkey was perhaps no longer an ally.

Thanks to Russia’s ability and capacity to use its leverage over the Kurds, Turkey is no longer even objecting to a Kurdish participation in the Russia led Syrian National Dialogue. Not only does this badly isolate the US in the region—one again—but also leaves with potentially no effective allies on the ground to influence the Syrian end-game and manage a loose ended military presence in Syria even.

“We have handed the list of those who represent the Kurds to Russia,” said recently Turkey’s foreign minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu. He sounded fairly positive when asked if Kurdish groups other than the YPG could join a conference on Syria’s future to be organized by Russia. There is, as other reports have indicated, more to it than meets the eye.

Russia and Turkey are already in the middle of negotiating the ways and means of clearing Afrin of the Kurdish militia, YPG. Were this to happen, this will be a major paradigm shift not only in Russia-Turkey bi-lateral relations but also in terms of striking at the heart of American interests in the region. While a new flashpoint may arise out of a possible Russia-Turkish operation in Afrin, what is clearly on the horizon is that this flashpoint may very well turn out to be the last nail in the coffin for Turkey’s status as a full NATO member.

While NATO so far has no precedent of ousting a member, and any such decision on Turkey will require unanimity in the organisation, what is becoming evident is that Turkey might just become the first country to face an ‘ex-communication’ from NATO, which might just be necessary to complete its embrace with Russia and re-define its regional and global position.

Salman Rafi Sheikh, research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

President Putin’s Visit to Turkey

On 11 – 12 December the Russian president Vladimir Putin, as part of his lightning tour of the Middle East also visited Turkey, where he had a private meeting with Recep Erdoğan, and also had important and wide-ranging discussions at the delegation level with the most important representative of economic departments and business circles, and the heads of the Foreign Ministry and Ministry of Defense.

The main subject was the transit of gas between Russia and the EU through Turkey, in the light of recent events: in particular the end of the war against DAESH in Syria, and the decision by Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, together with Azerbaijan and Iran, to create their own gas corridor to the EU under the Caspian Sea and through Turkey- bypassing Russia. This route is clearly intended to compete with Russia’s plan to create a Turkish Stream which would deliver gas to Turkish consumers and which would involve the construction of two branches, each with a capacity of 15.75 billion cubic meters, along the bed of the Black Sea and then through Turkey to the E.U. (Greece and Bulgaria). The goal is clear: to avoid the unreliable Ukrainian transit route. This is essential from a political point of view, bearing in mind that Kiev uses its role as a transit country to create tension in the already complicated relationship between Russia and the European Union.

It must be admitted that the Syrian war has not turned out very well for Gazprom. Now that Syria has been split up into de-escalation zones and the Kurds and America have obtained control over the eastern part of the country, it is impossible to continue with the main gas pipeline from Iran, through Iraq, in order to transport Russian, and, later, Qatari gas. Considering the fate of the South Stream project, which was not long ago being discussed by the Baltic States, the CIS and Iran, the prospects of the Turkish Stream do not seem very hopeful. The three pipelines to Europe announced in January 2015, which were to have a combined capacity of 45 billion cubic meters, have now been reduced to a single one with a capacity of 15 billion cubic meters, and even that has not yet been finally approved and thus remains under question. The Turkish Stream, assuming it is completed and has the proposed capacity, will play a dominant role in the E.U.’s southern gas route and may become the main channel for pumping gas from the region- a region in which we must now include Iran and Qatar. In that case the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline would of necessity be subordinate to the Turkish Stream as it would have less access to resources. Turkmen and Kazakh gas would then have no access to Western markets and could only be transported south, through the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline.

The Syrian war, in addition to the fight against DAESH and the protection of Damascus against foreign aggression, also had the result of encouraging Turkey to agree in full to the Turkish Stream, and this was the only thing that gave Gazprom an advantage. This also provided the bases in Syria with special significance, as they were needed to protect the Turkish Stream. However, not everything has worked out yet. The parameters of the Turkish Stream are an indicator of what has occurred here. Even one transit pipe would almost be a failure, especially concerning avoiding Ukrainian transit.

That is why Vladimir Putin’s visit to Ankara is very important. The future of Russia’s energy policy largely depends on this visit, in particular Russia’s ability to earn income from gas exports to the E.U without being dependent on transit through Ukraine. It is no coincidence that, according to various media reports, the Iranian president Hassan Rouhani is likely to join the meeting between Vladimir Putin and Recep Erdoğan. It is clear that this is likely to become a successor to the recent three-party summit in Sochi. And it is also clear that the three parties, in addition to discussing Syria, will also now have to discuss the territorial division of the gas corridor in the light of the new situation. Turkey and Iran, in addition to their own interests, will also represent Qatar’s interests. It is also clear that Doha is now very much in need of allies and supporters, in view of its dispute with its fellow members of the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf, in particular Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E. And Ankara and Teheran have agreed to take on this role, supporting Qatar in the above dispute. It is true that Russia’s participation in joint projects with Iran, and also now with Qatar- which Riyadh and Abu Dhabi have been unable to wear down in 6 months of confrontation and economic blockade- may be highly irritating to Saudi Arabia. And, behind the scenes, the U.S.A. and Israel are standing behind Saudi Arabia. As things are currently developing, Qatar will be given the chance to be included in the Iranian gas pipeline project and start delivering gas to Europe using the Iranian pipeline, which is now definitely going to be incorporated into the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline. The Trans-Anatolian Pipeline, with gas from Azerbaijan, Iran and Qatar (and possibly, in the future, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan) will become the dominant system in the region.

Vladimir Putin now as a result of the Syrian war needs to protect at least one Russian thread and get agreement to its participation in the South Stream project. The gas talks between Rouhani, Putin and Erdoğan, if theyhappen, of course, will be the most interesting part of his trip to Turkey, although it is unlikely that the media will have much to say about them. However, it will not be possible to hide the details of the new division, either. Once they are made public it will be clear who the winners – and who the losers – are in this war. The fight for pieces of the European gas market, which started at the beginning of the 2010s, is continuing. Just one round has finished. As of the evening of 12 December there were still no media reports of Rouhani’s arrival in Ankara. It looks as if the meeting has been postponed, or maybe Iran is angling for a better negotiating position.

But as far as Syria is concerned the situation is clear. Here Moscow, Ankara and Teheran have common interests. Moscow can also now find those Syrian Kurds who Ankara is prepared to sit down and negotiate with concerning the regulation of the situation inside Syria. This became clear on December 12. At least, the Turkish Foreign Minister, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, announced that Ankara was “not against the Kurds having a role in the regulation of the situation inside Syria, and it has given Russia a list of the Kurdish groups who it is ready to work with.” He also said, in an interview with the NTV television channel, that Turkey no longer sees any threat from the “Syrian regime”. He added that several Kurdish organizations did pose a danger, namely the Democratic Union Party (PYD)- a Syrian Kurdish terrorist organization-, the People’s Protection Units (YPG), and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). “If we do carry out any operations, we will first agree its scope with our allies, including Russia”, Mr. Çavuşoğlu added. “There are a number of Kurdish groups in Syria. We are in contact with them. We are not against the Kurds, on the contrary, we stand together with them. But this has nothing to do with terrorism. Iran is also against the YPG, as it knows that they are the same as the PKK. Russia respects our position, even if it does not support it entirely.”

It remains to be seen how the U.S.A, Saudi Arabia and Israel will react to this. The decision of the Syrian opposition depends on them, and thus also whether the planned Peace Congress will take place in Sochi next February, or whether it will be postponed again. In any event, time is needed before we can get answers to all these questions.

Peter Lvov, Ph.D in political science, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”

Behind Turkish Arrest Warrant for Ex CIA Graham Fuller

The Office of the Istanbul Prosecutor has issued arrest warrants for two “former” CIA agents, accusing them of involvement in the failed July 2016 coup attempt against the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. US media and various Washington think-tanks have dismissed the charges as “implausible” and a “likely tit-for-tat” response of Erdogan for the arrest by US authorities of Reza Zarrab, a Turkish-Iranian gold trader accused of violating US sanctions against Iran. Clearly is there is far more behind the accusations than is being said so far.

On December 1, Turkish prosecutors issued an arrest warrant for Graham E. Fuller, former head of the CIA’s National Intelligence Council and former CIA head of Middle East and East Asia operations. The warrant claims Fuller was in the vicinity of Istanbul the night of the coup attempt at a meeting with another top “former” CIA person, Henri Barkey. It claims both CIA veterans were meeting at the five-star Splendid Hotel on the island of Büyükada some 20 minutes boat ride from Istanbul.

What’s notable about the charge is the degree of involvement of Fuller with the reclusive Turkish cult leader, Fetullah Gülen, now in exile at an estate in Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania since he was forced to flee Turkey in 1998 to escape trial for treason against the state.

“One of the Most Encouraging Faces of Islam…”

In July, 2016, less than a week after Erdogan accused the vast Turkish network of Gülen for being behind the coup, of using a network of senior military officers who had been recruited into the Gülen organization, Fuller wrote for Huffington Post a fulsome praise of Gülen titled, “The Gulen Movement Is Not a Cult; It’s One of the Most Encouraging Faces of Islam Today.” In it Fuller wrote, “I believe it is unlikely that Gulen was the mastermind behind the dramatic failed coup attempt against Erdogan last week…” Fuller goes on to admit he formally backed granting Gülen special US visa status in 2006: “Full disclosure: It is on public record that I wrote a letter as a private citizen in connection with Gülen’s US green card application in 2006 stating that I did not believe that Gülen constituted a security threat to the US…”

Fuller’s “full disclosure” then however omits the fact that it was not merely a casual letter of recommendation to a man Fuller claimed he had met only once. Fuller’s endorsement of Gülen’s Green Card application was so influential that he managed to override the no votes of the FBI, of attorneys for the US State Department and Homeland Security. In the Gülen hearings, State Department attorneys stated, “Because of the large amount of money that Gülen’s movement uses to finance his projects, there are claims that he has secret agreements with Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Turkic governments. There are suspicions that the CIA is a co-payer in financing these projects.”

Gülen in NATO’s Gladio

The ties between Fetullah Gülen and the CIA go way back to the 1980’s when Gülen was recruited to be active in a Turkish right-wing NATO “Gladio” network codenamed Counter-Guerrilla. Gülen broadcast over the CIA’s Radio Free Europe into the Islamic regions of the Soviet Union.

Counter-Guerilla members were responsible for a series of far-right terrorist attacks in Turkey and facilitated a bloody US-backed 1980 military coup. Indeed, in a little slip, in his July 2016 defense of Gülen, Fuller writes in praise about Gülen that, “He even felt compelled to support the military takeover of the state in 1980 in order to preserve the state…”

That US-instigated 1980 coup, as Fuller well knows, established a military dictatorship under General Kenan Evren in which 650,000 people were detained, 230,000 people trialed, all political parties, unions and foundations were closed, 171 were killed under custody, hundreds of thousands people were tortured, and thousands are still missing. A former senior US intelligence official later reported that as the 1980 coup was underway, then President Jimmy Carter was informed by an aide who said, “Our boys have done it.” And Gülen, the peaceful Muslim, endorsed that brutal CIA coup.

Gülen and CIA English Teachers

In the post-Soviet chaos of the 1990’s in Central Asia the CIA used Gülen and his moderate Islam image to build one of their most extensive networks of subversion reaching across the entire so-called Turkic region of former Soviet Central Asia including Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and even into the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the People’s Republic of China, where ethnic Uyghurs have been recruited via Turkey to wage terror in Syria in recent years.

In 2011, Osman Nuri Gündeş, former head of Foreign Intelligence for the Turkish MIT (the “Turkish CIA”) and chief intelligence adviser in the mid-1990s to Prime Minister Tansu Çiller, published a book that was only released in Turkish. In the book, Gündeş, then 85 and retired, revealed that, during the 1990s, the Gülen schools then growing up across Eurasia were providing a base for hundreds of CIA agents under cover of being “native-speaking English teachers.” According to Gündeş, the Gülen movement “sheltered 130 CIA agents” at its schools in Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan alone. The CIA “teachers,” he added, submitted reports to an arm of the Pentagon.

Gülen’s organization had been active in destabilizing newly-independent Muslim republics of the former Soviet Union from the moment the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, when the nominally Muslim Central Asian former Soviet republics declared their independence from Moscow. Gülen was named by one former FBI authoritative source as “one of the main CIA operation figures in Central Asia and the Caucasus.”

Who is G. Fuller?

Even Fuller himself admits that the Gülen organization had some two million members in Turkey on the eve of the July 2016 coup. They had systematically infiltrated and largely controlled national policy, the judiciary, national education and the military. Moreover, Fuller’s CIA associate, Henri Barkey, also under arrest warrant, admitted following the failed coup that he had been in the Istanbul area the night of the coup.

Apparently Turkish authorities now have evidence that Fuller was also there and reportedly flown out of Istanbul across the border to safety in Greece as it became obvious the coup was failing. The Istanbul prosecutor’s office reportedly determined that Fuller had direct contact with former CIA official Henri Barkey and other suspects involved in the coup attempt. Both Barkey and Fuller, who both co-authored a book on Turkey titled Turkey’s Kurdish Question, are accused of organizing a meeting at Splendid Hotel in Büyükada, a 20 minute boat ride from Istanbul on the day of the coup in July 15 2016.

To read Fuller’s words on news of the Turkish arrest warrant, one would come away with the impression that Graham Fuller was a minor CIA figure. He wrote, “I served only once in Turkey…as the most junior officer in the CIA Base in Istanbul in the mid 1960s. I met Gülen exactly once in my life, long years after retiring from CIA, in an interview I conducted with him 15 years ago in Istanbul.”

Fuller may have been junior CIA officer in Istanbul in the 1960’s; careers begin somewhere. However he didn’t stay so for long.

By 1982 the CIA named him National Intelligence Officer for Near East and South Asia. This was in the early years of the CIA Operation Cyclone, the vast CIA covert war in Afghanistan using Mujahideen and using Saudi Osama bin Laden to recruit fanatical jihadist terrorists from the Arab world to kill Soviet soldiers and bog the USSR into what Zbigniew Brzezinski and others referred to as the Soviet’s own Vietnam. Graham Fuller was certainly involved in that CIA Afghan war. He was Kabul CIA Station Chief until 1978, on the eve of the CIA’s launch of their Mujahideen Operation Cyclone.

Then Fuller was posted to CIA Langley where by 1982 the CIA appointed him National Intelligence Officer for Near East and South Asia, which included bin Laden’s Saudi Arabia as well as Afghanistan and Pakistan and Turkey. In 1986, the CIA appointed Graham Fuller vice-chairman of the National Intelligence Council, where he presumably was in a deciding role in the entire Afghan war and more.

In 1987 according to the New York Times, Fuller as vice-chair of the CIA National Intelligence Council wrote an “instrumental” memo advising what became the explosive Iran-Contra scandal, in which the CIA would arrange covert arms sales to Iran to feed the US-orchestrated Iran-Iraq War and use the proceeds to illegally fund the Nicaragua right-wing Contras. In 1988 as media began to investigate the illegal Iran-Contra details, Fuller left his very senior CIA for a post with the Pentagon and CIA-tied RAND corporation where he remained until 2000. Some suspect it was to get out of the Congressional Iran-Contra limelight.

Gülen, Fuller and Central Asia Geopolitics

Notably, while at RAND he co-authored a highly revealing book with Paul B. Henze in 1993 titled Turkey’s New Geopolitics: From the Balkans to Western China. The book describes precisely the geopolitical network that Gülen has been accused of creating with the CIA after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Henze was also a key CIA figure in the Turkish coup in 1980 that Fuller describes positively in connection with Gülen.

In the US Congressional Record, Fuller is quoted as saying, “The policy of guiding the evolution of Islam and of helping them against our adversaries worked marvelously well in Afghanistan against the Red Army. The same doctrines can still be used to destabilize what remains of Russian power.”

In this context highly interesting is an interview in 2011, by the Washington Post with Graham Fuller. There Fuller categorically denied charges by former head of Turkish MIT intelligence that Gülen schools across Central Asia served as cover for CIA agents to infiltrate the Muslim republics of former Soviet Union. Fuller stated, “I think the story of 130 CIA agents in Gulen schools in Central Asia is pretty wild.”

Yet Fuller, the former CIA senior official responsible for operations in East Asia and the Middle East wrote a book in 2007 titled The New Turkish Republic: Turkey as a Pivotal State in the Muslim World. At the center of the book was praise for Gülen and his “moderate” Islamic Gülen Movement in Turkey:

“Gülen’s charismatic personality makes him the number one Islamic figure of Turkey. The Gülen Movement has the largest and most powerful infrastructure and financial resources of any movement in the country. . . The movement has also become international by virtue of its far-flung system of schools. . . in more than a dozen countries including the Muslim countries of the former Soviet Union, Russia, France and the United States.”

Then Fuller went on in the 2011 Washington Post interview to deny ever knowing George Fidas, a 31-year-long fellow career CIA senior officer and co-signer with Fuller of the letter asking the US State Department to admit Gülen on a special visa: “I did not recommend him (Gülen-w.e.) for a residence permit or anything else. As for George Fidas, I have never even heard of him and don’t know who he is.” Would so prominent a figure as Graham Fuller, former top CIA official bother to sign an appeal for Fetullah Gülen, a man he claims he met only once, and not examine who else signs? Highly implausible.

More unlikely, as another co-signer of the Gülen US visa appeal was former Istanbul US Ambassador Morton Abramowitz whose career, like that of Fuller, has involved him with both the Afghan Mujahideen networks. In 1986 as Fuller was running oversight of the Afghan Mujahideen from his senior post at CIA, Abramowitz, as Assistant Secretary of State for intelligence and research in the Reagan administration, helped arrange delivery of the Stinger missiles to the Mujahideen. Abramowitz later co-founded the George Soros-funded International Crisis Group that played a key role in justifying the illegal 1999 US bombing of Serbia and later became a director of the CIA-linked National Endowment for Democracy.

Whatever the outcome of the Turkish charges against Graham Fuller and his close former CIA associate, Henri Barkey, for their alleged involvement in the failed July 15, 2016 Turkish coup d’etat, it clearly throws a major spotlight of world attention on the relation between the CIA and the Fetullah Gülen organization. To open that can of worms could help fumigate more than thirty years of covert Central Asia and other CIA operations with Osama bin Laden, opium trade, Kosovo drug mafia, Turkish dirty CIA operations and far more. Little wonder Graham Fuller writes a blog with the pathetic title, “Why did Turkey Issue an Arrest Warrant Against Me?”

F. William Engdahl is strategic risk consultant and lecturer, he holds a degree in politics from Princeton University and is a best-selling author on oil and geopolitics, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”

Strained Turkish/US Relations

President Donald Trump with President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the White House on May 16, 2017 in Washington, DC. [image: Michael Reynolds-Pool/Getty Images]

According to a spring 2017 poll, nearly three-fourths of Turks see Washington as a threat to Ankara’s security.

Bilateral relations are the lowest depth in decades. Most Turks believe the Obama administration was behind the aborted July 2016 coup attempt against President Erdogan.

He’s outraged over Washington’s support for Kurdish YPG fighters in Syria, supplying them with heavy weapons.

He’s reconsidering Turkey’s NATO membership, increasingly shifting his allegiance East. Allying more with Russia harms Washington’s imperial agenda.

Following the arrest of US Istanbul consulate employee Metin Topuz by Turkish authorities, Washington suspended all non-immigrant visas from Turkey indefinitely.

He was charged with ties to US-domiciled opposition cleric Fethullah Gulen Erdogan wants extradited. Washington refuses.

If Trump recognizes Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, rumored to be coming, Erdogan will cut diplomatic ties to the Jewish state in retaliation, he said.

After the May 2010 Israeli attack on the Mavi Marmara humanitarian ship to Gaza, killing Turkish nationals, he cut relations with Israel, later restored them.

Cutting ties with Washington, along with opposing its imperial agenda would be far more significant.

He won’t go this far, despite saying US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital is a “red line” for Muslims.

In response if it happens, he’ll also convene the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Istanbul to discuss what further steps to take.

“Has the US completed everything and only this is left,” he asked?

Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon responded, falsely calling Jerusalem “Israel’s capital for 70 years” – recognized by no other countries, America the first if Trump acts in flagrant violation of international law.

Israeli intelligence minister Israel katz tweeted: We don’t take orders or accept threats from the president of Turkey,” repeating the long ago discredited canard about Jerusalem being “the Jewish people’s capital for the past 3,000 years…”

Erdogan blasted Washington for continuing to arm Kurdish YPG fighters, asking:

“Against whom will the US use the truckloads of weapons massed on our borders. Against (ISIS)? There is no (ISIS) there anymore. Against Syria?”

“No, they are now in the same coalition. Iraq? No, they have already invaded there. They will use them against Iran, Turkey or Russia if they dare,” adding:

“No one can lecture Turkey on the war against (ISIS) because Turkey is the only NATO member directly fighting the terrorist group.”

“ISIS terrorists that were set free in the Raqqa operation will be deployed in the deserts of Sinai in Egypt. They will serve there from now on, and we will be monitoring this.”

According to White House spokesman Hogan Gidley, Trump was “clear on this issue. (Recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital is) not a matter of if. It’s a matter of when.”

Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyadh Malki called for an emergency Arab League meeting on this issue.

On Sunday, Arab League secretary-general Ahmed Abul Gheit said the move, if taken, will foster regional “fanaticism and violence. (It’ll) benefit the anti-peace Israeli” regime.

It’ll intensify the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, maybe ignite another intifada, causing considerable bloodshed like two previous times.

It’ll be more proof that Washington can never be trusted as an impartial broker, especially when it comes to long denied Palestinian rights and anything to do with Russia.

The post Strained Turkish/US Relations appeared first on The Sleuth Journal.

8 Things To Consider Before Raising Turkeys

Image source: Pixabay.com

On our farm, some of our favorite critters are the turkeys. Watching the Toms strut and hearing their gobbles are just some of the fun of raising these big, majestic birds.

Beyond their entertainment value, though, they produce lots of eggs that we raise and sell, and they provide the annual Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners.

If adding turkeys to your homestead is something you desire to do, there are several things you should consider first.

1. What is your goal in raising turkeys?

If you are after a holiday meal or meals and want a big, quick maturing bird, then a Broad-Breasted variety may be what you need. However, if you are willing to wait on a more slowly growing bird or plan to raise new turkeys each year, then you will definitely want to look at the Heritage varieties.

2. Heritage and Broad-Breasted birds are VERY different.

Knowing the difference between the two types of turkeys makes all the difference when deciding what to raise. Heritage birds grow much more slowly (we butcher our excess Toms at nine months old for good weight), can mate naturally and are plagued by fewer health issues.

Diatomaceous Earth: The Best All-Natural De-Wormer For Your Livestock!

Broad-breasted birds can be ready for harvesting as early as five months old if raised correctly, cannot reproduce naturally, and often succumb to heart, lung or joint issues if raised beyond the recommended harvest age.

3. Turkeys have different nutritional needs than other poultry.

Compared to other forms of backyard poultry, turkeys require a much higher protein count, especially as poults. The recommended percentage is 28 percent, which is higher than most available chick starters. Additionally, standard chick starter is often medicated, which can cause organ issues with developing poults.

During the laying season, hens and Toms both require closer to 18 percent protein, higher than the normal commercial layer feed which tends to run about 16 percents.

4. Turkeys are LARGE.

Although turkey poults are hardly much larger at hatch than large breed chickens, they don’t stay that way for long. In heritage birds, a hen will go anywhere from 10-20 pounds at full maturity and range from two to two and a half feet in height. Toms can range from 25-50 pounds and can stand easily over three feet tall.

Keep those sizes in mind when designing accommodations. Coop doors will need to be at least 24 inches tall, and nest boxes should be about two feet by two feet square. Perch materials should be a minimum of 3 inches in diameter.

5. Chicken wire does not always work to hold turkeys.

If you plan to keep turkeys in a run using standard chicken wire, think again. A full-sized Tom that wants out can make quick work of chicken wire with just his feet. Hens are slightly less destructive but just as capable. We find that 2×4 (inches) welded wire works best, with a layer of chicken wire behind it if you don’t want them sticking their heads out.

6. Turkeys don’t always get along with other poultry or livestock.

While some turkeys peacefully cohabitate with a number of other species, don’t expect this always to be the case. Hens and Toms both can be territorial and will often fight other poultry to keep them away from food, water and nesting areas. I have also seen turkeys fight off goats, dogs, cats, sheep and even horses.

7. Male turkeys can be aggressive during breeding season, and/or try to mate EVERYTHING.

When the spring-breeding season rolls around, Toms become big strutting balls of testosterone. While some boys are content to gobble their hearts out and court the ladies, some boys decide that all they want to do is fight. And that means fighting anyone or anything in their space.

Most homesteaders are equipped both mentally and physically to deal with an ornery rooster, but a 30-pound bird that suddenly has something to prove is another matter entirely. This is something to keep in mind if you have youngsters that either help or are responsible for the care of the homestead poultry.

If you are raising turkeys alongside other poultry, remember that Toms in the throws of breeding season often do not discriminate against the ladies of other species. This includes trying to breed chicken hens, duck hens, and the occasional goose. The weight difference can be fatal, however, so you may want to reconsider if your initial plan is to raise all your birds together.

8. Turkeys are seasonal layers.

Lastly, turkeys are seasonal layers, so if you plan to raise your turkeys for meat as well as eggs, just know that for five to six months of each year they won’t lay at all. This also means that for hatching purposes you will only be able to produce birds from early spring to early fall.

What advice would you add for raising turkeys? Share it in the section below:

Syrian End-Game: An Albatross Around Turkish Neck?

While the Syrian end-game is only beginning to take pace, as the latest Sochi summit showed unambiguously, what can also be seen on the horizon is that the unfolding of this game is making certain regional countries, particularly Turkey, uncomfortable. If Turkey’s prime interest in Syria was to permanently settle the Kurdish question, this objective has not been achieved in a manner Turkey would have ideally wanted. Kurdish groups remain strong in Syria, and to Turkey’s disadvantage neither Russia nor US see them as their enemy; hence, the continued friction, making Turkey—once again—look like the sick man of Europe. What is adding to Turkey’s worries is the dualism it has been following vis-à-vis Russia and the US. On the one hand, it remains a NATO member, and on the other hand, Erdogan’s entente with Russia is being seen as a red line by its NATO allies, pushing them to use the ‘NATO-eviction card’ against Turkey, leaving it with little to no option to influence the final outcome of the Syrian end-game.

The friction on Kurdish question became evident right after the conclusion of recent summit in Sochi when Erdogan ruled out—yet again—any possibility of accommodating Kurdish factions, the PYD and YPG, in the Syrian end-game. “We discussed the issue of the Syria national dialogue congress in detail. We, as three countries, will decide on who will be invited to the congress” said Erdogan after the summit, adding further that Turkey’s position on “terrorist organizations such as the YPG and the PYD is clear.”

What it shows is that despite two years of military co-operation in Syria, Turkey’s obsession with the Kurdish question remains a major hurdle in the way of transforming its relations with Russia into a strategic alliance. Let’s not forget here that the Syrian Kurds were where Turkey and the US had diverged, pushing the former into rapprochement with Moscow. However, beyond calculated co-operation in Syria, Turkey-Russia relations still remain a limited affair—and, as Erdogan indicated after the summit, Kurdish question remains unsettled even when intense dialogue has been going on in Astana and Sochi for quite some time now.

Notwithstanding the friction, Turkey is still engaged in negotiations with Russia and Erdogan has already indicated his willingness to ‘keep all political options open.’ But that explains only a part of Erdogan’s worries in Syria and the region on the whole. A lot of it is also due to what the US is doing in Syria, and to Turkey.

For example, there is as yet no evidence that the US is going to or will withdraw from Syria and  leave the military bases set up in the territories recaptured by the US-supported Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), of which Kurds are an integral part. The US support for Kurdish forces, therefore, continues to be seen as a “red line” by Ankara.

Ankara’s position on this highly contentious issue was made abundantly clear in a piece Ibrahim Kalin, Erdogan’s spokesperson and adviser, wrote for Daily Sabah. He wrote:

“the misguided policy of supporting the PKK’s Syria branch will only weaken Syria’s territorial integrity and political unity that is expected to be achieved at the end of the current Geneva and Astana processes and also continue to pose a national security threat to neighboring countries. We are yet to see the U.S. keeping its promise of cutting relations with the PYD-YPG after clearing Raqqa of Daesh.”

And he continues further saying, “The question of the PYD-YPG remains a red line for Turkey. They cannot be part of any political solution because they are the PKK in Syria, a terrorist organization designated as such by Turkey, the U.S., Europe and others. It is disrespectful, to say the least, to the Syrian people to present them as representatives of Syrian Kurds.”

But the way Turkey-US relations have evolved ever since Turkey’s entente with Russia reveal that the US wouldn’t deliver on its “promise.” Apart from regional geo-politics, elsewhere in the US, the FBI has opened a file to implicate Erdogan, his family members and his close circle in a scam that involves Turkey’s state bank for trading with Iran and stands accused of violating US sanctions and breaking the US banking laws. A negative verdict in the US federal court can not only lead to criminal charges against Erdogan and key associates, but also pave the way for US sanctions against Turkey and even possible eviction from NATO.

While such actions may further drift Turkey towards Moscow, it is obvious that, given the state of affairs, Turkey can hardly expect from the US any concession in terms of forcing the Kurdish factions back to their pre-war political position. And, it is this crucial distance, roots of which can be traced back to a failed coup attempt, between two NATO allies that has largely forced Turkey to embrace Russia and Iran to protect its interests in Syria.

But this embrace hasn’t led to an absolute materialization of Turkey’s crucial interests. With Russia holding the Kurdish card, there is little left for the ‘sick man of Europe’ to manipulate and control in the Syrian end-game. The only silver lining for Turkey is that Moscow understands its concerns—and the fact that Moscow values its relations with Ankara, for at stake here is not just Syria or Kurds but Russia’s own larger counter-manoeuvers against anti-Russia Western alliance, sitting on its door steps.

Salman Rafi Sheikh, research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

Don"t Just Give Thanks. Pay It Forward One Act Of Kindness At A Time

Authored by John Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

It’s been a hard, heart-wrenching, stomach-churning kind of year filled with violence and ill will.

It’s been a year of hotheads and blowhards and killing sprees and bloodshed and takedowns.

It’s been a year in which tyranny took a step forward and freedom got knocked down a few notches.

It’s been a year with an abundance of bad news and a shortage of good news.

It’s been a year of too much hate and too little kindness.

Now we find ourselves approaching that time of year when, as George Washington and Abraham Lincoln proclaimed, we’re supposed to give thanks as a nation and as individuals for our safety and our freedoms.

It’s not an easy undertaking.

How do you give thanks for freedoms that are constantly being eroded? How do you express gratitude for one’s safety when the perils posed by the American police state grow more treacherous by the day? How do you come together as a nation in thanksgiving when the powers-that-be continue to polarize and divide us into warring factions?

It’s not going to happen overnight. Or with one turkey dinner. Or with one day of thanksgiving.

Thinking good thoughts, being grateful, counting your blessings and adopting a glass-half-full mindset are fine and good, but don’t stop there.

This world requires doers, men and women (and children) who will put those good thoughts into action.

It says a lot (and nothing good) about the state of our world and the meanness that seems to have taken center stage that we now have a day (World Kindness Day) devoted to making the world more collectively human in thoughts and actions. The idea for the day started after a college president in Japan was mugged in a public place and nobody helped him.

Unfortunately, you hear about these kinds of incidents too often.

This is how evil prevails: when good men and women do nothing.

By doing nothing, the onlookers become as guilty as the perpetrator.

It works the same whether you’re talking about kids watching bullies torment a fellow student on a playground, bystanders watching someone dying on a sidewalk, or citizens remaining silent in the face of government atrocities.

There’s a term for this phenomenon where people stand by, watch and do nothing—even when there is no risk to their safety—while some horrific act takes place (someone is mugged or raped or bullied or left to die): it’s called the bystander effect.

Historically, this bystander syndrome in which people remain silent and disengaged—mere onlookers—in the face of abject horrors and injustice has resulted in whole populations being conditioned to tolerate unspoken cruelty toward their fellow human beings.

So what can you do about this bystander effect?

Be a hero, suggests psychologist Philip Zimbardo.

Be an individual. Listen to your inner voice. Take responsibility.

Recognize injustice. Don’t turn away from suffering.

Refuse to remain silent. Take a stand. Speak up. Speak out.

“I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation,” stated Holocaust Elie Wiesel in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech in 1986.

 

“We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere.”

Unfortunately, as I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, too many Americans have opted to remain silent when it really matters while instead taking a stand over politics rather than human suffering.

That needs to change.

I don’t believe people are inherently monsters. We just need to be more conscientious and engaged and helpful.

The Good Samaritans of this world don’t always get recognized, but they’re out there, doing their part to push back against the darkness.

For instance, earlier this year in Florida, a group of 80 people formed a human chain in order to rescue a family of six—four adults and two young boys—who were swept out to sea by a powerful rip current in Panama City Beach. One by one, they linked hands and stretched as far as their chain would go. One by one, they rescued those in trouble and pulled each other in.

There’s a moral here for what needs to happen in this country if we only can band together and prevail against the riptides that threaten to overwhelm us.

Here’s what I suggest.

Instead of just giving thanks this holiday season with words that are too soon forgotten, why not put your gratitude into action with deeds that spread a little kindness, lighten someone’s burden, and brighten some dark corner?

I’m not just talking about volunteering at a soup kitchen or making a donation to a charity that does good work, although those are fine things, too.

What I’m suggesting is something that everyone can do no matter how tight our budgets or how crowded our schedules.

Pay your blessings forward.

Engage in acts of kindness. Smile more. Fight less.

Focus on the things that unite instead of that which divides. Be a hero, whether or not anyone ever notices.

Do your part to push back against the meanness of our culture with conscious compassion and humanity. Moods are contagious, the good and the bad. They can be passed from person to person. So can the actions associated with those moods, the good and the bad.

Even holding the door for someone or giving up your seat on a crowded train are acts of benevolence that, magnified by other such acts, can spark a movement.

Imagine a world in which we all lived in peace.

John Lennon tried to imagine such a world in which there was nothing to kill or die for, no greed or hunger. He was a beautiful dreamer whose life ended with an assassin’s bullet on December 8, 1980.

Still, that doesn’t mean the dream has to die, too.

There’s something to be said for working to make that dream a reality. As Lennon reminded his listeners, “War is over, if you want it.”

The choice is ours, if we want it.