TÜRKİYE ORTA ASYA HABER KKUORDİNATÖRÜ

CARNEGGIE ENDOWMENT FOR INTERNATIONAL PAGE.USA WORLD TURKISH NEWS Erdoğan and Trump: Closeness More Than Disagreement The meeting between Erdoğan and Trump served the domestic and personal agendas of both leaders. For Europe, this meeting shows how America's self-serving approach risks alienating allies and strengthening authoritarians. The meeting between the Turkish and US presidents on September 25th went quite smoothly by today's Oval Office standards. Careful choreography allowed the two leaders to conceal their deep disagreements and instead stage a harsh duet where closeness and friendly words were blended with Trump-esque anger. It was an ideal moment for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who travels with a press delegation composed only of his friends and controls the media in his country. For Donald Trump, diplomacy through big business was the topic of the day. Both men seemed happy. The Turkish President had long awaited this moment in the Oval Office, as he had not been received at the White House during Joe Biden's presidency. Contrary to his usual tendencies, Erdoğan reserved his harshest statements for other platforms, leaving his views on the Israeli genocide in Gaza, Hamas "resistance," and Türkiye's relations with Russia for later discussions. Because the Turkish leader's Washington visit came immediately after his speech at the UN General Assembly, the harsh statements had already been made in New York, and the controversial issues widely discussed among high-ranking officials. Similarly, Erdoğan reserved the official Turkish narrative for his September 23rd interview with Fox News; a narrative that continued after his return to Ankara to reinforce his image as a respected leader. Indeed, Erdoğan desperately needed the invaluable Oval Office press conference to mask his serious domestic problems, especially during a period when White House meetings had become a lengthy televised spectacle under Trump. In the country, the muted and voice-over footage allowed Erdoğan to portray his visit as a major success: the Turkish President meeting with his American counterpart despite his most hostile stance. It instantly seemed like a victory. Trump had opted for a cordial and manly encounter. As US Ambassador to Turkey and Special Envoy for Syria Tom Barrack stated on the eve of the meeting, the president was "tired" of the endless disagreements with Ankara over the use of Russian S-400 missiles or Türkiye's failure to impose sanctions on Russia. Instead, Trump decided to "give Erdoğan what he needs most: legitimacy." In his speech, broadcast live from the Oval Office, Trump greeted his supposed friend with a variety of words: praise for Erdoğan's strong leadership both domestically and in the Middle East, including Syria; a critical comment about Türkiye's "rigged elections"; and regret over Ankara's purchases of Russian oil. And let's not forget the major US-Turkey deals, including aircraft, nuclear power plants, and LNG supplies. Many of these deals require further negotiation, and the value of some is questionable. For example, Turkey discovered a massive natural gas field under the Black Sea, so why should it need to import LNG from the US? But in Trump's world, where diplomacy is seen as business, these things make sense. From a European perspective, these developments reveal a strikingly new US-Turkey relationship: Trump is on friendly terms with Erdoğan and doesn't care about the weakening of the rule of law in Türkiye, a key NATO partner; Trump is pleased with Ankara's "unfriendly takeover" of Syria "by proxy"; Trump approved a large purchase of Boeing aircraft by Turkish Airlines, which usually tries to balance its two suppliers, Airbus and Boeing; and Trump hopes to wean Türkiye off Russian oil and perhaps Russian natural gas as well. In short, the White House's new attitude toward Türkiye will likely further widen the differences between US and European policies toward Ankara. It also perfectly illustrates the lack of coordination between the U.S. and its European allies in implementing the America's First policy on the international stage. As of now, it appears that none of the most pressing issues between the two presidents remain unresolved. The Pentagon views Türkiye's S-400 missile battery as the biggest obstacle to providing the country with U.S.-made F-35 stealth fighter jets. Before being removed from the program by Trump in December 2020, Ankara had ordered the F-35B (naval version), to be deployed on the Anadolu aircraft carrier in the Black Sea or Mediterranean. The biggest hindering factor is that Ankara's normalization with Washington requires the S-400s to be somehow neutralized: sent to or sold to a third party.