In the fall of 2018, when I was in Istanbul, the journalist Jamal Khashoggi went to the Saudi Consulate for a routine formality and never came out. After that disappearance, the grisly details of his visit and death came out slowly like in a horror film.
The world went into shock. There was some international uproar that did not go very far. $110 billion arms sales to Saudi Arabia by the U.S.were in the picture. In the meanwhile Yemeni civilians, children, women, sick and old were being killed, maimed, starved on an ongoing basis with these weapons. Mostly silence from the West...
This year in October the Turkish Forces went into Northern Syria for the very just cause,i.e. to secure the country's borders and clear out the ever-expanding PKK related PYG/YPD/SDF militants who have been terrorizing Turkish soldiers and civilians since 2016.
The uproar, the hysteria, the one-sided attacks, the negative propaganda with fake videos ( ABC), fake allegations of poison gas usage (BBC) on and on...The cacophony was deafening.
I realized one of the reasons for this excessive reaction: President Trump is trying to put an end to "endless wars"
Endless wars have been and still, are major foreign policy tools of superpowers and empires all through the history.
"If we are to maintain our position as a first-rate Power", Queen Victoria wrote, "we must ... be Prepared for attacks and wars, somewhere or other, CONTINUALLY."[156] Victoria saw the expansion of the British Empire as civilizing and benign, protecting native peoples from more aggressive powers or cruel rulers: "It is not in our custom to annexe countries", she said, "unless we are obliged & forced to do so."[157] "
The US foreign policy in the 21st century follows this outdated approach, daintily expressed by the old Queen almost 150 years ago.
Endless wars being mostly in the Middle East, President Trump's decision may be the beginning of the real end of WW1, 100 years later. The colonial Kurdistan dream appears to be put to rest. That is probably a major reason for the bitter attacks on Turkey. Since the Turkish Republic was established in 1923, the West has shown an increasing preoccupation with southeast Turkey. Foreign politicians directly fly to Diyarbakir, European capitals became centers for PKK activity, western liberal media mouthpieces for romanticized Marxist Kurdish fighters, on and on.
Colonialism and missionary zeal were and still are running deep in the subconscious of the West.
However one wonders why the US zeal does not apply to Native Americans who were forced into desolate camps much different their former lush lands, who were deliberately infected with diseases and relentless ethnically cleansed in previous centuries.
In 1974 when Turkey intervened in Cyprus to stop the ethnic cleansing of Turkish Cypriots, we were in England for a year enjoying every cultural activity England has to offer. I was lost in admiration of the great British civilization. Then Turkish intervention happened. Civilized Britain changed into shrieking fish wife!
The papers had even articles about the suffering of the donkeys in Cyprus, but not one word about the murders of Turkish Cypriots, decades-long EOKA terror activities and the thug Nikos Sampson taking over the island.
The Western media was relentless and the Turkish communities were not prepared to take the onslaught.
The concept of fairness, human rights, justice evaporated into thin air when it came to the Turks.
Until then I was 100 percent pro-West. I am the second generation of Ataturk's Republic. We looked up to the West and craved to reach their standards. After I regained my senses I realized Ataturk turned to West on his own terms. First, he cleared the country of the occupying Europan colonial powers. He stood strong and relied on his own will to determine what is best for Turkey. He chose the concepts of progress, law, equality, secularism, free will and they happened to be in the West.
Turks intervened in Cyprus for a just cause. I can choose too.
My unconditional admiration for the West dropped to 50 percent.
Now the Syrian affair. US response to Turkey's defending its security and borders really looks excessive.
Since 2016 Turkey has been complaining bitterly about PKK related PYD/YPG to the US government and military. "As a matter of fact our own U.S. National Counterterrorism Center (NCC) had officially listed the YPG as an affiliate of the PKK on its website under the heading of Kongra-Gel (KGK) stating:
"The Kurdistan People's Congress (KGK, formerly the Kurdistan Worker's Party, PKK) is a Kurdish separatist group primarily active in part of northern Iraq and southeastern Turkey ... the KGK's Syrian affiliate, the Democratic Union Party (PYD), has increased its presence in northern Syria along the border with Turkey by establishing control in Kurdish areas, resulting in concerns of a heightened threat to Turkey and increased tensions along the border". But once the Obama Administration started to cozy up to the Kurds the above statement was quietly removed from the NCC website in March, 2016." Ref.Enis Pinar 5/17/2017Now the media and the Congress act like they just heard it today and they appear to be tone deaf.
The use of the term "Kurds" is totally wrong. It is the Marxist Syrian Kurdish guerillas we are talking about.
One gets the impression Turks are smothering 15 million Kurds living in Turkey and many more in Syria.
The impression given is that Kurds and Turks are eternal enemies which is false. Turks and Kurds fought together in many wars throughout the history most recent being WW1 and Turkish Independence wars. In fact, Kurds living in Eastern Turkey bore the brunt of horrible Armenian atrocities when Armenians joined the invading Russians during WW1.
As the Kurds became more aware of their cultural and historic heritage Turkey gradually implemented measures to address these needs. Granted that there is more to do.
On the other hand, efforts to eliminate the terror group PKK was set back by the chaos created at Turkey's long southern borders by the Gulf War,(1990), Iraq war (2003) and finally by the recent US alliance with the terror group YPG/PYD in Syria.
Now I am down 75 percent less in my respect for the West.
My 25 percent is for the few who took great pains to be fair and balanced about the Turkish intervention in Syria. I thank them all.
My 75 percent now is for Turkey, who handled this mortal threat to its sovereignty and borders patiently in the last several years as a long strip of land at its entire southern border was deliberately being prepared for a " Kurdistan" with the ragtag gangs of YPG/PYD.
To the Turkish American organizations which responded with vigor and energy to the attacks, for the Turkic nations who declared their unanimous support in their summit in Baku, to Azeri community and their effective letter campaign, to Somalians and many other friends and ethnic communities who stood by Turkey.
In summary, it appears that Trump's decision-whether he realized or not- maybe a watershed event for the US foreign policy. In recent decades, a huge chasm has appeared between the domestic and foreign policies of the US especially since the Iraq war. In the domestic policies the practice of the democratic process, rule of law, free press, tolerance, respect for human rights place the US, a country of more than 300 million, as the leader of progress and liberal values in the world. In fact, my dream has always been to see the same practices firmly established in my mother country.
But the US foreign policy did not keep up with these ideas and practices. It became the source of bloody regime changes which threw poor countries into worse chaos, covert actions which created civil wars, partnering with shady characters for the sake of expediency (Mujahideen in Afganistan, extreme-right leaders in South and Central America, now PYD/YPG in Syria.) and mad rush, cruel sanctions.
I sincerely hope that my adopted country can replace its colonial and outdated foreign policies with enlightened ones and take the position of leadership in the world once again.
One last note the term "our interests" should not be used when the "interests" of allies are so openly ignored.
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