Despite tensions between Turkey and the United States in recent years, especially after the failed 2016 coup, the United States hopes to keep Turkey on the path to the West. Thus, they tolerate the abolition of human rights in Turkey, the aggression against Greece, the invasion and occupation of part of Cyprus, Syria and Iraq. Despite cross-party anger against US President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the United States, Joe Biden a few days ago proposed to Congress the sale of new F-16s in Turkey and the upgrading of others.
A possible Turkish veto on Sweden and Finland joining NATO will dispel the last illusions of the Allies that they can accept Turkey’s behavior at no cost to them. At a time when two countries with very strong Armed Forces and a long tradition of neutrality are feeling the immediate threat of Russia rushing to join NATO, Turkey, which promotes its backward neutrality as a virtue, is trying to prevent them from joining. from the war in Ukraine.
The Turkish president believes that this move will satisfy his internal public, claiming that Sweden and Finland support Kurds and other “terrorists” while, by excluding these two countries from NATO, he keeps away two countries that would put pressure on him. for human rights violations in Turkey. So, according to this reasoning, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan wins votes either if the candidate countries give in and harden their stance against the “terrorists” or prevent them from joining NATO.
In addition, the President of Turkey may believe that he can blackmail the US to offer him in exchange for lifting the veto-like, e.g. the supply of new f-16s or even f-35s or even to obtain a very satisfactory “pocket money” – funds useful for the Turkish economy.
Accepting the request of Finland and soon Sweden to join NATO, US President Joe Biden and his Western allies are betting that Russia has made a huge strategic mistake over the past three months and that now is the time to pay a significant price. : to endure the expansion of the Western Alliance that he wanted to destroy. This decision, however, leaves many serious questions pending.
Expanding NATO to 32 members, soon with hundreds of kilometers of border with Russia, helps the alliance ensure that Russia does not launch another vicious unprovoked attack. But on the other hand, it can consolidate the division with an isolated angry nuclear-armed adversary who is already paranoid about Western encirclement.
Moving on as a “quicksand” ally, Turkey may find that while at times blackmail can be profitable, at other times the risk to the victim is so great that their only choice is to turn against the source of the threat. NATO is at a turning point. If it does not accept Sweden and Finland as full members, it will lose all credibility due to its existence, further encouraging the imperial bulimia of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
83 years ago the Soviet Union attempted to occupy Finland. Today’s threat is taken seriously by the Finns. Also, it does not escape anyone’s attention that the tactics of the President of Turkey serve the Russian President the most, either when he buys Russian weapons or when he tries to obstruct NATO’s plans, in Eastern Europe and the Baltic a few years ago, on the issue of accession of Sweden and Finland today.
In groups, members are recruited to eliminate what threatens their cohesion. This is also the case in NATO. Now that the threat concerns the same group, the Turkish president will learn the limits of delusion. He will see that he can not gamble constantly without consequences for his country and for himself.
