Russia and Turkey

sepheronx wrote:This is why it's wrong and how Turkey is an enemy

System pesticide channel @pezdicide writes about Qirim News, which openly supports aggressive and pro-Ukrainian rhetoric on Crimea. Given the Turkish roots of the resource, such a position towards Russia is completely unsurprising.

After all, the Turkish Cooperation and Development Agency (TIKA), which owns the media, generally specializes in maintaining conflict moods in different regions of the world. The famous Turkish “soft power” is effective and at the same time aggressive, progressively seeking favor from the local population towards Turkey.

Here are just a few examples:

TIKA has been active in Tatarstan within the framework of the Turkology project, promoting the Turkish language, a common Turkic identity in local cultural centers.

The same can be said about Bashkiria, which is actively sought to tie to Turkey: through private entrepreneurs and the Chamber of Commerce, ideas of cooperation with the Turks are being promoted. This is also the basis for homegrown separatism.

TIKA is actively penetrating the Balkans, creating infrastructure for Muslim areas. This escalates the already difficult inter-ethnic relations due to the increasingly dense presence of the Turks.

At the same time, Turkey implements 4.1% of investment projects in Serbia, yielding in this indicator only to the EU countries, China and the United States. The presence of TIKA plays an important role in this, including through the creation of a cultural ground for such economic projects.

In the traditionally pro-Russian region of Gagauzia in Moldova, TIKA is opening kindergartens and helping build roads. The purpose of these simple actions is to turn the region into a stronghold of the Turkic world in the Northern Black Sea region.

TIKA is actively cooperating with Hungary, on whose territory the symbols of power of the Ottoman Empire are being restored.

Therefore, Crimea and the support of the radical part of the Crimean Tatars is only part of the overall strategy for the penetration of the Turks into strategically important regions.

And the distribution of a letter from the deputy chairman of the banned organization "Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people" Nariman Dzhelyalov, in which he hopes for the return of Crimea to Ukraine, fits perfectly into this program.
#Russia #Turkey #Ukraine #separatism
@rybar

This is why No Turkish business needs to be allowed in Russia.  They are actively funding terrorism and separatism in Russia and abroad.  They are working hard with Kazakhstan.  it all has to do with it.  You cannot say there is no correlation.  When you provide money to them, they will use that money against you.

I never expected much from an American but you really do show yourself and lack of critical thinking.  I know, you guys see "money" and "private industry" but dont actually know what any of that means.  Tax exemptions to build means government funding so it isn't exactly private. But whatever, I am talking to a genius that Russian government should listen to.  A nation caught "unprepared" yet doing way better without leveling an entire fucking country than someone else we know.

Building facilities on land in the region might prove problematic due to melting permafrost. I guess this is why they decided to choose a ship.

If that was the case, then the LNG plant wouldn't be there as of right now which it is.  Don't disprove yourself so easily please.

lol

Turkey stirs shit wherever it goes. You're not Columbus discovering America here. That's why literally all of its neighbours or countries that have had extended contact with it have some variation of the proverb "don't trust the Turks". Russia is no different, Tolstoy was the one who coined Russia's own version.

Only Turkey's activities are not directed at Russia. Or at any other country specifically. They step on everybody's toes the same way - the key theme here is what is good for Turkey and where they want to build influence. They don't care if it's in Russia's backyard, or the EU's backyard, or anyone else's.
Here you can read an article about how Turkey has been building cred among the Palestinians in Jerusalem and undermining Israel there - much to the latter's evident annoyance:

https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2019/10/israel-turkey-palestinians-east-jerusalem-erdogan-katz.html

They've been buying up influence in Georgia's Adzharia region. In the 90s they were active in Uzbekistan, and are trying to return there now. In China they've been supporting Uighur Islamists. Sure, they try and break into everywhere, and it's rarely good news for established brokers.

Now is this all a reason for every country to declare Turkey an enemy and cut all ties with it?
Well I'd say this. That can work if every country does it at the same time. From Russia, to Syria, to the US, to Greece, to Cyprus, to Israel, to Armenia, to Iran, everyone. But that's not going to happen - many of those countries have bigger rivals than Turkey and actually more to gain by co-operating with Turkey in the areas where both have common interests.
Turkey knows it can get away with most things for just that reason.

As long as Russia keeps tabs on Turkey's influence and agents on its own territory then it's not more than a minor problem. Turkey is more of an issue for smaller countries such as Syria. While Kazakhstan's elite are really in bed with London and Washington; Turkey just functions as an intermediary.
Turkey is also a reliable trading and industrial-technological partner. It hasn't backed out of the S-400 purchases, or the nuclear power plant project. Or any other project with Russia I'm aware of. It hasn't enacted sanctions on Russia, tried to launch a color revolution there or made demands of its government. If Turkey can build a ship that Russia needs in a pinch then there's little reason not to do business with them. I don't see them folding like the French did over the Mistrals.

More trustworthy than the Americans and you can talk to them...

I am of course biased... our country as part of a commonwealth coalition sent troops to go and murder them... but thanks to British leadership we ended up running away.

We left graves of a lot of our men there and they looked after them and treated them with respect and they let us go back each year to remember our dead and their dead.

Would Kiev do that?

Even the EU are not inviting Russia to commemorations of WWII any more and are equating the Soviet Union with Nazi Germany...

It is pretty clear which countries Russia should be breaking ties with till they can grow up and IMHO Turkey is not one of those.

Russia does not have to be best buddies with Turkey but they can cooperate in a few areas and help each other out without creating an enemy.

There are pollsters predicting a Erdogan election loss. I am skeptical. These alleged pollster results are part of the scheme by the US to get who they want.

We should also be skeptical of this opposition candidate. He sounds kinda pro Russian and pro multi polar now. But maybe that is all just campaign bullshit. We don't know

Politicians promise anything they think will get them votes but once in power they often find they can't deliver or actually its not in their interests to deliver, and of course it also comes down to what their major funding sources want because they didn't get funding for nothing... his economic and political supporters will expect certain things.

The irony is that I would prefer Erdogan because he realises what bastards the Americans are after they tried to get rid of him once in a coup, and now again in an election.

The west talks about democracy like it means something and then they go and destroy it with their underhanded tactics to get the politicians they want based on whether they do as they are told by Washington or not.

Nothing to do with what sort of people they are or how democratic they might be.

I disagree, Turkey is an important country and if Russia can have good relations with them then they should try.

Wanting to squash everything that isn't you or isn't exactly the same as you is the mistake the US made and the world is revolting against them and their attitude.

Turkey probably has the most powerful armed forces in Europe... having Iran as an ally is good and has a lot of value for both countries, but for all the same reasons good ties with Turkey also make good sense.

I would also say good relations with Europe would also be good for both parties but right now it simply is not possible because Europe has fallen into the same trap the US has fallen in to and thinks diplomacy is getting strength and advantage and leverage over the people you are talking to and then trying to strong arm them into doing everything you want while conceding as little as possible of what they need or want.

They are doing the same thing now with China and it simply only works on weak countries like the ones they have gathered around them.

Europe does not do as the US says because it admires the US or thinks they are wonderful... they accept the US is the alpha dog of the pack and don't want to get a beating... public or private...

It is actually very sad really... because half of these mongrels used to be the alpha dog themselves and now they are pathetic... and the US wants Russia and China to join their ranks... they also wanted North Korea and Iran and Cuba and quite a few other countries to do the same.

Serbia is in the worst place geographically but is still resisting...

HATO seems to be trying to move into Asia too... a new HATO setup in Japan.... China needs to say... well if you want to group countries against us then we will support the countries you oppose even more... funding and support for North Korea perhaps... maybe they need a military upgrade... ironically their artillery levels are amazing and we have seen how devastating they can be... perhaps an upgrade in their ability to fire accurately and over great distances is just what NK needs from China...

The Sultan 2.0 Will Heavily Tilt East, by Pepe Escobar for the Cradle. 06.04.2023.

The collective west was dying to bury him – yet another strategic mistake that did not take into account the mood of Turkish voters in deep Anatolia.

In the end, Recep Tayyip Erdogan did it – again. Against all his shortcomings, like an aging neo-Ottoman Sinatra, he did it “my way,” comfortably retaining Turkiye’s presidency after naysayers had all but buried him.

The first order of geopolitical priority is who will be named Minister of Foreign Affairs. The prime candidate is Ibrahim Kalin – the current all-powerful Erdogan press secretary cum top adviser.

Compared to incumbent Cavusoglu, Kalin, in theory, may be qualified as more pro-west. Yet it’s the Sultan who calls the shots. It will be fascinating to watch how Turkiye under Erdogan 2.0 will navigate the strengthening of ties with West Asia and the accelerating process of Eurasia integration.

The first immediate priority, from Erdogan’s point of view, is to get rid of the “terrorist corridor” in Syria. This means, in practice, reigning in the US-backed Kurdish YPG/PYD, who are effectively Syrian affiliates of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) – which is also the issue at the heart of a possible normalization of relations with Damascus.

Now that Syria has been enthusiastically welcomed back to the Arab League after a 12-year freeze, a Moscow-brokered entente between the Turkish and Syrian presidents, already in progress, may represent the ultimate win-win for Erdogan: allowing control of Kurds in north Syria while facilitating the repatriation of roughly 4 million refugees (tens of thousands will stay, as a source of cheap labor).

The Sultan is at his prime when it comes to hedging his bets between east and west. He knows well how to profit from Turkiye’s status as a key NATO member – complete with one of its largest armies, veto power, and control of the entry to the uber-strategic Black Sea.

And all that while exercising real foreign policy independence, from West Asia to the Eastern Mediterranean.

So expect Erdogan 2.0 to remain an inextinguishable source of irritation for the neocons and neoliberals in charge of US foreign policy, along with their EU vassals, who will never refrain from trying to subdue Ankara to fight the Russia-China-Iran Eurasia integration entente. The Sultan, though, knows how to play this game beautifully.

How to manage Russia and China


Whatever happens next, Erdogan will not hop on board the sanctions-against-Russia sinking ship. The Kremlin bought Turkish bonds tied to the development of the Russian-built Akkuyu nuclear power plant, Turkiye’s first nuclear reactor. Moscow allowed Ankara to postpone nearly $4 billion in energy payments until 2024. Best of all, Ankara pays for Russian gas in rubles.

So an array of deals related to the supply of Russian energy trump possible secondary sanctions that might target the steady rise in Turkiye’s exports. Still, it’s a given the US will revert to its one and only “diplomatic” policy – sanctions. The 2018 sanctions did push Turkiye into recession after all.

But Erdogan can easily count on popular support across the Turkish realm. Early this year, a Gezici poll revealed that 72.8 percent of Turkish citizens privilege good relations with Russia while nearly 90 percent rate the US as a “hostile” nation. That’s what allows Interior Minister Soylu to remark, bluntly, “we will wipe out whoever is causing trouble, including American troops.”

China-Turkiye strategic cooperation falls under what Erdogan defines as “turning to the East” – and is mostly about China’s multi-continent infrastructure behemoth, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The Turk Silk Road branch of the BRI focuses on what Beijing defines as the “Middle Corridor,” a prime cost-effective/secure trade route that connects Asia to Europe.

The driver is the China Railway Express, which turned the Middle Corridor arguably into BRI’s backbone. For instance, electronics parts and an array of household items routinely arriving via cargo planes from Osaka, Japan are loaded onto freight trains going to Duisburg and Hamburg in Germany, via the China Railway Express departing from Shenzhen, Wuhan, and Changsha – and crossing from Xinjiang to Kazakhstan and beyond via the Alataw Pass. Shipments from Chongqing to Germany take a maximum of 13 days.

It’s no wonder that nearly 10 years ago, when he first unveiled his ambitious, multi-trillion dollar BRI in Astana, Kazakhstan, Chinese President Xi Jinping placed the China Railway Express as a core BRI component.

Direct freight trains from Xian to Istanbul are plying the route since December 2020, using the Baku-Tblisi-Kars (BTK) railway with less than two weeks travel time – and plans afoot to increase their frequency. Beijing is well aware of Turkiye’s asset as a transportation hub and crossroads for markets in the Balkans, the Caucasus, Central Asia, West Asia, and North Africa, not to mention a customs union with the EU that allows direct access to European markets.

Moreover, Baku’s victory in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war came with a ceasefire deal bonus: the Zangezur corridor, which will eventually facilitate Turkiye’s direct access to neighbors from the Caucasus to Central Asia.

A pan-Turkic offensive?


And here we enter a fascinating territory: the possible incoming interpolations between the Organization of Turkic States (OTS), the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the BRICS+ – and all that also linked to a boost in Saudi and Emirati investments in the Turkish economy.

Sultan 2.0 wants to become a full member of both the Chinese-led SCO and multipolar BRICS+. This means a much closer entente with the Russia-China strategic partnership as well as with the Arab powerhouses, which are also hopping on the BRICS+ high-speed train.

Erdogan 2.0 is already focusing on two key players in Central Asia and South Asia: Uzbekistan and Pakistan. Both happen to be SCO members.

Ankara and Islamabad are very much in sync. They express the same judgment on the extremely delicate Kashmir question, and both backed Azerbaijan against Armenia.

But the key developments may lie in Central Asia. Ankara and Tashkent have a strategic defense agreement – including intel sharing and logistics cooperation.

The Organization of Turkic States (OTS), with a HQ in Istanbul, is the prime energizer of pan-Turkism or pan-Turanism. Turkiye, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan are full members, with Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Hungary, and Ukraine cultivated as observers. The Turk-Azeri relationship is billed as “one nation, two states” in pan-Turkic terms.

The basic idea is a still hazy “cooperation platform” between Central Asia and the Southern Caucasus. Yet some serious proposals have already been floated. The OTS summit in Samarkand late last year advanced the idea of a TURANCEZ free trade bloc, comprising Turkiye, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, and as observers, Hungary (representing the EU) and Northern Cyprus.

Meanwhile, hard business prevails. To fully profit from the status of the energy transit hub, Turkiye needs not only Russian gas but also gas from Turkmenistan feeding the Trans-Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP) as well as Kazakh oil coming via the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline.

The Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TIKA) is heavy on economic cooperation, active in a series of projects in transportation, construction, mining, and oil and gas. Ankara has already invested a whopping $85 billion across Central Asia, with nearly 4,000 companies scattered across all the “stans.”

Of course, when compared to Russia and China, Turkiye is not a major player in Central Asia. Moreover, the bridge to Central Asia goes via Iran. So far, rivalry between Ankara and Tehran seems to be the norm, but everything may change, lightning fast, with the simultaneous development of the Russia-Iran-India-led International North South Transportation Corridor (INSTC), which will profit both – and the fact that the Iranians and Turks may soon become full BRICS+ members.

Sultan 2.0 is bound to boost investment in Central Asia as a new geoeconomic frontier. That in itself encapsulates the possibility of Turkiye soon joining the SCO.

We will then have a “turning to the East” in full effect, in parallel to closer ties with the Russia-China strategic partnership. Take note that Turkiye’s ties with Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan are also strategic partnerships.

Not bad for a neo-Ottoman who, until a few days ago, was dismissed as a has-been.

https://www.unz.com/pescobar/the-sultan-2-0-will-heavily-tilt-east/

https://translated.turbopages.org/proxy_u/ru-en.en.4b19958a-67254fb4-6579d2ab-74722d776562/https/interaffairs.ru/news/show/48584

Lavrov: military cooperation between Turkey and Ukraine causes confusion


Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with the Hurriyet newspaper that the military-technical cooperation between Turkey and Ukraine against the background of statements by the Turkish authorities about their readiness to mediate in the Ukrainian conflict is puzzling.

"Unfortunately, Ankara continues to cooperate with the Kiev regime in the military-technical sphere. Turkish weapons are used by the Ukrainian Armed Forces to kill Russian soldiers and civilians. This cannot but cause confusion against the background of statements by the Turkish leadership about their readiness to provide intermediary services," he said.

Lavrov added that Russia appreciates the efforts of the Turkish side to help resolve the Ukrainian crisis. "It was the Turkish side that in the spring of 2022 provided the Istanbul platform for consultations with representatives of Kiev, contributed to the conclusion of the grain deal. The Istanbul talks "buried" the Anglo-Saxons, forbidding Zelensky to conclude agreements that could stop the fighting and ensure a balance of interests of the parties involved, " the minister recalled.

He pointed out that the Russian side is open to a political settlement, but "we should not talk about a temporary cease-fire, but about ending the conflict by eliminating its root causes." "These include the expansion of NATO to the east, the creation of threats to Russia's vital security interests, and the violation by the Kiev regime of the rights of Russians and Russian - speaking residents of Ukraine," Lavrov explained.

"At the moment, peace is not included in the plans of our opponents. Ukraine's response to the peace initiative put forward by President Vladimir Putin in June of this year was the invasion of the Kursk region by the Ukrainian Armed Forces and air attacks on targets in other border regions. Washington and its allies are giving Kiev all-round support, discussing the possibility of using Western long-range missiles to strike deep into Russia. V. Zelensky did not cancel his decree prohibiting negotiations with Moscow. The mediation efforts of any country, including Turkey, are unlikely to succeed in such a situation, " the Russian Foreign Minister said.

Earlier, the magazine "International Life" published an article on the Turkish military-industrial complex. "At the same time, it is impossible to ignore the fact of the growth of the Turkish military-industrial complex, supported by a large-scale PR campaign and Ankara's increasingly explicit claims to be included in the secret club of leading countries in the field of military exports. Special credit for this belongs to the energy and personal charisma of the Turkish president, who, according to the latest amendments to the Constitution, oversees the work of the Executive Committee of the Defense Industry, or, more simply, distributes the state defense order.

So what does this surge in activity mean for Russia? What factors need to be considered? Here, it seems, three key aspects can be distinguished.

First, we should not forget that Turkey's military-doctrinal views are based on the thesis that Turkey's membership in NATO is an absolute priority. Consequently, Turkey's actions in the international arena (and especially in the military sphere) should be perceived not only as a personal success of the country, but also as the activity of a member of the bloc, which occupies a flank position and has the second largest army in the association.

Secondly, Turkey has certain advantages over its partners in the North Atlantic Alliance, which consist in the ability to carry out military supplies to third countries without apparent political complications with its neighbors. According to Dutch experts in the context of the situation in Ukraine, " The West is able to move on to acquiring more modern weapons from Turkey. The main reason may be the fact that Ankara does not have any special problems with the supply of modern equipment and ammunition to Kiev, even if they are used to hit targets inside Russia"[4]. This thesis can be applied to characterize Ankara's military-technical cooperation with other countries located in strategic proximity to the Russian border.

Finally, third, it is necessary to take into account the variability of Turkish politics and the situational nature of making certain decisions in relation to fluctuations in the political situation. We already know examples when the embargo on military products imposed by Western countries partially "acquired" relief after, for example, Ankara's approval of Sweden's membership in NATO. Or how the strengthening of the axis of Turkish-British cooperation and London's support for Turkey's efforts to overcome Germany's veto on the sale of Eurofighter Typhoons to the Turkish side line up in parallel.

All this creates an eclectic image of the Turkish military profile, while aiming at pragmatic and coordinated decisions in the context of the political interests of the country's leadership.