Ambassador's remarks and public events

The United States and Turkey:  Democratic Partners in 2007
Ambassador Ross Wilson

ASAM Eurasian Studies Center, Ankara, Turkey

January 25, 2007

It is a great pleasure to be here today.  I am grateful to my good friend, Ambassador Faruk Logoglu, President of ASAM, for giving me this opportunity.  I am deeply honored to be in the company of so many distinguished citizens of this country and to have the opportunity to work and serve here at a pivotal time in history.

Besides Ambassador Logoglu, a number of you are diplomats, and I want to say to you how saddened I was yesterday to learn of Ismail Cem’s passing.  He was a patriot, a fine public servant and a friend of the United States.  It was an honor for me to have met him.  Please join me for a moment in remembrance of him.

My remarks today will lay out some thoughts regarding relations between the United States and Turkey at the start of 2007.  This is not a speech to speculate about what will happen this year.  As the American baseball player Yogi Berra once said, “It is tough to make predictions, especially about the future.”  Instead, my words will focus on three themes the nature of our partnership; how we leverage that partnership to mutual advantage on issues from Iraq to the Middle East and Central Asia; and the simple truism, often overlooked, that our democracies are works in progress but embody the ties that will bind us most strongly together.

Establishing a Partnership Based on Shared Interests and Values

Our countries have a long history that, of course, predates our history as countries.  Talking with people here about my American Indian roots inevitably leads to speculation about linguistic and other connections among Native Americans and the Turks of Central Asia.  There are the Melungeons of Tennessee, thought by some to have come from Turkey or other parts of the Ottoman Empire.  Only 24 years after our Declaration of Independence, the USS George Washington sailed into Istanbul for the first official contact between our governments.  (Raids on American shipping by Barbary pirates living on the edge of the Ottoman Empire were the backdrop to that voyage; our cooperation on terrorism got an early start.)  In 1830, our countries signed a treaty of commerce and navigation.  About that time, American missionaries and teachers began coming to Istanbul and Anatolia.  Robert College, the American hospitals in Istanbul and Gaziantep, and American schools in Tarsus, Izmir and Uskudar that are now run by the Saglik ve Egitim Vakfi, or SEV foundation, reflect this.

Our relationship transformed in 1947.  Soviet threats against Turkey and Communist-led unrest in Greece led sixty years ago to the so-called Truman Doctrine.  It stated that

 

“… it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures… (and that) we must assist free peoples to work out their own destinies in their own way.”

President Truman called for large-scale assistance to Greece and Turkey and, later, Europe as a whole.  US economic and military assistance to Turkey under the Marshall Plan and since (through 2005) has totaled the equivalent of $57 billion in 2005 dollars.  The United States supported Turkey’s entry into NATO in 1952.  These and other efforts helped Turkish citizens to build their economic, security and democratic infrastructures of freedom for the balance of the Cold War and beyond.

We should be proud that our American and Turkish government predecessors had the wisdom and foresight to collaborate in this manner.  They decided that our countries would work together and help one another based on the shared pursuit of democratic values and freedom from Soviet domination.  Our militaries, under extraordinary leadership, protected NATO’s southeast flank – and remain, together, a bulwark of peace in the region and the world.  We value that military-to-military relationship today.  For President Truman, Turkey was obviously important because of its location where southeast Europe and the Middle East adjoined the USSR.  Resisting Soviet expansionism required partnership with this country.  Turkey was obviously important, too, as a developing Western democracy, having been put on that path by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and those who came after him.

It is easy to forget these enduring bases of US-Turkish relations when one thinks about some of the dramatic, negative headlines of yesterday and today:  the Johnson letter, the arms embargo, March 2003 and the awful incident at Suleymaniye later that year, to name a few.  Relations between a proud and progressing Turkey and the United States, especially given the volatility of this region and sometimes competing perceptions and goals, have produced disruptions and disagreements.  This is natural, including among allies.  These disagreements make great headlines.  Those headlines, occasional tensions, and even public anger over this or that policy that we all see in the polls should not cloud reality.  That reality, more true today than ever before, is that our countries want the same things.  And we need each other to achieve those things to advance our countries’ interests and for freedom, prosperity, stability and peace in the region and the world.

Where Are We Today?

We are partners today on Iraq, on Iran, on the Middle East, on the Caucasus and Central Asia, on Cyprus, on Turkey’s efforts to accede to the European Union, on energy, in the fight against international terrorism and on many other issues.

No problem looms as large – for the world, for Turkey, for my country and in US-Turkish relations – as Iraq.  Honest people can disagree about whether we and other Coalition partners were right to go into that country; this is debated at least as heatedly in my country as here.  We can all acknowledge that mistakes were made; President Bush was clear on this several days ago.  Iraq today is what it is – messy, conflict ridden, undermined by terrorists and a government that among other problems has not delivered the security and stability expected by the millions of Iraqis who voted in 2005.  We cannot, however, turn back the clock.

Our countries share the same goals for Iraq:  unity, territorial integrity, security, democracy, and prosperity.  In support of its aims, Turkey has helped draw rejectionists, especially Sunnis, into the Iraqi political system.  It has facilitated large-scale movements of food, fuel and aid by land from its ports and across the Habur Gate that have been lifelines to the Iraqi people.  It has provided training, assistance and other support, and its business presence in that country is surely the largest of any foreign investor and partner.  Turkey has facilitated our expanded use of Incirlik Air Base for Iraq and Afghanistan-related operations.  Some of these contributions followed US requests.  I do not for one minute believe they were favors to the United States.  This country’s leaders took these steps because they determined that doing so would advance Turkey’s interests.

Attention has focused recently on Kirkuk.  Many Turks suggest that Kirkuk is like Iraq in miniature and that a referendum in 2007 will ignite new sectarian violence there and undermine prospects for reconciliation and stability in Iraq as a whole.  We are listening to Turkey on this issue.  We agree Kirkuk is sensitive; many in Iraq think so, too.  We also believe that no outside power, including the United States, should dictate to the Iraqis how to deal with their internal issues.  We support the Iraqi constitution which was approved by nearly 80 percent of the voters and, of course, reflected compromises among competing interests in that country – just like Turkey’s constitution and my country’s own.  Countries can respect that and express their concerns to leaders in Iraq on Kirkuk and other issues.  I am sure Turkey will continue to do so.

If Iraq as a whole is complicated and easy solutions are not obvious, so too is the problem that northern Iraq is being used as a base for PKK terrorists who attack Turkish security forces and civilians.  This is bad for Turkey, and it is bad for Iraq.  In 13 months here, I have come to understand that some Turks really believe the United States supports the PKK – something that I know to be untrue.

So what do we do now?  We believe that the US-Turkish alliance and Turkish-Iraqi friendship and partnership are a means to address the PKK problem collaboratively.  We believe that successful work in this way would not just relieve frustrations or set the PKK back a few years, but would fundamentally end the problem, or at least its international aspects in the region.  This requires a combination of tough measures against PKK terrorists; stopping the financial and other support that comes to the PKK from its criminal networks in Europe; and cooperative actions by Turkey and Iraq, including the Kurdistan Regional Government authorities in the north, to better secure the border.

Our goal remains to ensure that northern Iraq shall not be a base for terrorist attacks against this country.  President Bush, Secretary Rice and General Ralston stand by their commitments to the Turkish government that the United States will work as effectively as it can toward that end.

We are working together on many other problems around Turkey.  I don’t want to be exhaustive, but let me touch briefly on several items.

On Iran, our countries agree that Tehran’s acquisition of nuclear weapons would be dangerous and destabilizing.  The Turkish government has supported US, EU and Security Council efforts on the issue.  I would maintain that it does so not as a favor to us, the EU or others, but because it shares our grave concern about the defense, security and political implications of a nuclear-armed, missile-equipped Iran in what is already a volatile part of the world.

On the Middle East, our countries agree on the vision of two democratic states, Israeli and Palestinian, living side-by-side in peace and security, and we are working toward that goal in a complementary manner.  The Erez Industrial Zone that we support is emblematic of that.  We both strongly support the Lebanese government of Prime Minister Siniora.  We have a tactical disagreement about the potential for moderating Syrian behavior, but this does not detract from our collaboration in the region.

In the Caucasus and Central Asia, our two countries want the same things:  stability, democratic development, and economic growth.  Together, we made a difference as these countries achieved independence.  When I served in Baku, it was my privilege to work closely with Turkey’s ambassadors, Evcet Tezcan and Unal Cevikoz, in promoting market democratic change, energy development and the settlement of Nagorno-Karabakh.  That is a good model.  In this region as elsewhere, Turkey often has a different and better perspective than we do.  To take advantage of that, Undersecretary Burns talked last week in Ankara about strengthening our collaboration in Central Asia and the Caucasus.

On energy, the BTC pipeline was made a reality through our hard work together – despite opposition and doubt about its viability, including in my own country.  It provides a secure route for Caspian oil to international markets.  We are working now on a gas counterpart, the South Caucasus gas corridor to Turkey and across it to Greece, Italy and East-Central Europe.  The additions of a trans-Caspian pipeline and Iraqi gas for export via Turkey can make this country a key global energy hub and further diversify Turkish and European energy sources of supply.

Cyprus has eluded serious and high level efforts to arrive at a comprehensive settlement for four decades.  We disagreed sharply over Cyprus in the 1970s.  Together, we supported UN Secretary General Annan’s efforts just a few years ago.  Today, we want the same thing:  a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation achieved through peaceful negotiations and that is acceptable to majorities on both sides of the island.  We have been in touch with incoming Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon regarding Cyprus, and we hope that 2007 can be a year of building momentum toward comprehensive settlement talks.

The United States has given strong support to Turkey’s EU accession bid for decades.  We think it is good for Turkey, good for the EU, and good for the world.  The Cyprus problem has complicated the accession talks, of course.  Also important is the nature and pace of change required of Turkey.  There are many political, economic, administrative, military/security and other issues this country will have to grapple with – and that only this country can resolve.

On the fight against international terrorism, I’ve already mentioned the PKK.  ASALA, DHKP-C, al-Qaida and other terrorist groups have also attacked Turkey and Turkish interests.  We condemn all those groups and their actions.  Our countries cooperate closely in addressing these threats to our world.  Turkey has seen its interest in maximizing cooperation with others to disrupt and defeat them.  In helping rid the world of al-Qaida, Turkey has been especially engaged in Afghanistan – a country where Ataturk launched ambitious assistance efforts in the 1920s and 1930s, despite Turkey’s own privations. 

As our countries face these and other challenges – I haven’t mentioned global warming, HIV/AIDS, promoting trade and investment, just to name three – we will continue to have similar interests and goals.  Whatever problems and misunderstandings arise, and they will arise, we need to preserve the relationship and ensure that we can continue effective collaboration to protect and advance our common interests in the region and the world.

Thoughts Looking Ahead

I promised at the outset no predictions, but we all know there are a number of tough issues and important events coming in 2007.  Besides what I’ve already talked about, two that bear mention now are a possible Armenia resolution in the US Congress and Turkey’s domestic scene.

On the Armenia resolution issue, I can say the following.  The foreign policy of the United States on this matter, as determined by the President, will not change.  My government has recognized that among the terrible things that happened during World War I, many, many Armenians were forced into exile and death in what was one of the great tragedies of the 20^th Century.  We oppose attempts to make political determinations on the terminology of this tragedy.  As Undersecretary Burns indicated here last week, the Bush Administration will continue to oppose a resolution on this issue in Congress.  We call on Turks and Armenians to come to terms with the past through candid and heartfelt dialogue, and we urge the two sovereign countries of Armenia and Turkey toward reconciliation and the normalization of relations.

In that connection, I was deeply saddened by the murder last week of the Turkish Armenian journalist Hrant Dink because he was such a prominent advocate for reconciliation and mutual understanding.  Hrant wrote that “Turkish-Armenian relations should be taken out of a 1915 meter-deep well.”  He believed that Turkey and Armenia need to get away from the traumas of the past and search for reconciliation through dialogue and free debate.  That sounds right to me.  The sadness over Dink’s assassination among Turks and Armenians, here and abroad, provides an opportunity to work on that.  I hope it is utilized.

That is a good lead-in to my closing thoughts on Turkey’s domestic scene.  It will be no surprise that I am not going to predict the outcome of the upcoming elections.  I am tempted to say that we have no candidate, but of course we do.  It is the ballot box, the wisdom of representative democracy with all its imperfections, and power of free speech in a free society of free men and women.

For Turkey, as for every country— including my own, democracy and freedom are goals, not states of being.  They are redefined or at least re-measured from time to time.  I was struck by the reaction to Hrant Dink’s murder.  Over 100,000 people on the streets of Istanbul for his memorial Tuesday made a profound statement on behalf of the democracy that Turkey has been striving toward – proud of its accomplishments, aware of its strengths and weaknesses, and an accommodating home to all its citizens.  Many people I respect – former Foreign Minister Ilter Turkmen in Hurriyet on Tuesday is one example – have posed important questions to their countrymen about tolerance, equality, and freedom of speech.  They seem to me to be arguing that Turkey should continue striving, as Ataturk and his successors did, toward higher standards of democracy, human rights, fair play and rule of law, as well as for economic and social liberalization, while also preserving stability and security in a complicated part of the world.

Whenever I talk about this wonderful country, I like to express my confidence and my country’s confidence in it, its institutions and its citizens.  This country will continue to progress not because it copies our experience or does what the EU has demanded.  It will progress because free and responsible Turkish citizens, debating and securing their own future and voting for competing ideas, will continue on the journey to democracy, freedom, security and prosperity that Ataturk launched this country on over 80 years ago.

I believe that the Republic of Turkey and the United States will continue to be partners because we know that when we work together, we work stronger, smarter and better.  We will continue to be partners, despite occasional differences, because we want the same things for the region and the world.  It may not be easy, but we should continue to be partners because of our commitment to democratic values and freedom.

Thank you.