On July 18 here at Jihad Watch, I asked why Turkey was still in NATO. It’s a question that merits being asked frequently.
It has been a busy few years for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Back in 2020, in his insensate desire to curry domestic favor with devout Muslims in Turkey, and to promote himself abroad as the leader of the Muslim world, he turned the Hagia Sophia, that had been made a museum in 1935 by Kemal Ataturk, back into a mosque. It was a wildly popular move in Turkey: a huge overflow crowd of 350,000 Turks gathered outside, for its first services, as a reopened mosque, of Muslim prayers. There was despair and outrage from the world’s Christians at this transformation – even the usually Islamophilic Pope Francis declared his “sadness” at the news, but that had no effect on Erdogan.
Erdogan then doubled the dose, by doing the same in May 2024 to another church turned museum, converting the Church of St. Savior in Chora (with its beautiful Byzantine mosaics, and 14th century frescoes, that are in much better condition than those in Hagia Sophia) from a museum back into a mosque. With Turkey’s economy is on the skids, what better way for Erdogan to deflect attention from economic distress than to reclaim those two great edifices for Islam?
In Syria, Erdogan has sent in his army to Idlib Province, where the Turks have established 65 military bases and observation posts. The Turks will remain, according to Erdogan, until “Syria is free.” Since Assad’s forces control more than 70% of Syria, those Turkish troops will have to remain for a very long time. Erdogan has also used his army to push the Kurdish YPG fighters out of Afrin, their center in northwest Syria, and away from the Turkish border. These YPG troops were the most effective and loyal allies of the U.S. in the fight against ISIS. Erdogan calls them “terrorists.” Yet Turkey remains a member of NATO.
In Libya, Erdogan has also been active, sending his troops, and 4,000 Syrian mercenaries besides, to help the Government of National Accord (GNA), which controls western Libya. His troops, and especially Turkish drones, have helped to lift the siege of Tripoli by General Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA), and pushed Haftar’s forces further eastward, where just outside Sirte an uneasy truce prevails. The GNA, that Erdogan supports, includes Muslim Brotherhood members and other Islamists in its ranks, while the LNA firmly rejects both. The LNA is supported by the UAE, Egypt, and France. Israel too, has had dealings with General Haftar since 2017, and has supplied him with sniper rifles and night vision equipment. Israel has also trained some of Haftar’s fighters. General Haftar spent 20 years living in the U.S., near Langley, Virginia, where he was a consultant to the CIA. Both he and several of his children became American citizens. Erdogan is determined to defeat General Haftar, the most pro-American leader Libya has ever known, and to help the GNA, which welcomes Islamists in its ranks. Yet Turkey is still in NATO.
When the UAE-Israel deal was announced, Erdogan was angrier than any Arab leader, save for the tantrum-prone Mahmoud Abbas. He even threatened to suspend diplomatic ties with the UAE. A peace deal brokered by the Americans sent him into a fury. Despite this, Turkey is still a member of NATO.
After Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Erdogan has criticized Israel in lurid terms, and repeatedly threatened the Jewish state. Erdogan is now Hamas’ stoutest defender. He treats the jihad terror group, outlawed by the U.S., Israel, and all the members of the EU – which includes all the members of NATO save Turkey — as a legitimate government. Despite this, Turkey is still a member of NATO. Far from hiding his support for Hamas, Erdogan flaunts it, deliberately antagonizing both Washington and Jerusalem. He put a known terrorist, with a $5 million bounty from the American government on his head, seated right beside him in the place of honor As Hamas is also supported by Iran, Turkey’s support for the group has also helped to improve its ties with Iran.
And so, given Erdogan’s record, as laid out above, we need once again to ask: Why is Turkey still in NATO?
Yabbadabadoo says
*incessant*, and yeah, Turkey ought to be kicked out of NATO until it becomes non-Islamist, anti-Hamas, etc.
JS says
Which will most likely be NEVER!
Condor says
On that note, why is America still in NATO, considering the Biden Administration is sending millions of dollars to Muslim militant organizations and Iran?
JS says
Biden won’t be in office much longer, and hopefully his “yellow school bus” nutter won’t either.
That has nothing to do with NATO. Go to (and they’re all .gov sites) DHS (dot gov), foreign assistance (.gov), DOJ, and the U.S. State Department. Also try USCIS ( .gov). I’m warning you though, you’ll be outraged. Get a drink or a grab an alkaseltzer first!
Proud American says
Excellent piece, again, Hugh.
Nikki Haley indicated she believed that Turkey should be thrown out of NATO. She would have been an outstanding nominee. As would have Mike Pence.
Trump, though very good, is a mixed bag. He’s friends with the jihadist radical of Turkey. He deluded himself into thinking he became friends with the dictator of North Korea, who supplied a lot of the arms for the October 7th terrorist massacre. He betrayed the Kurds who did virtually all the on-the-ground fighting versus ISIS. He legitimized the Taliban backers of al-Qaeda, the perpetrators of 9/11. He sacrificed 20 years’ worth of American blood, effort, and treasure to give a strategic victory to those responsible for 9/11! They laugh at his warnings that they better not start up terrorism again, which, even if they followed during his administration, they likely would not adhere to once he would be out of office and a Dem would be in the White House again.
He endorsed and campaigned for Jew and Israel hater Thomas Massie, against the urging of the Republican Jewish Coalition. He refused to condemn the anti-Semitism of Kanye West, and refused his advisors’ advice that he not meet with him.
He cursed Prime Minister Netanyahu, and said that the terrorist sponsoring and inciting Abbas was more interested in peace.
And yet Kamala Harris, who knows nothing about military affairs, yet ignorantly and condescendingly preaches down at Israel for supposedly causing too many Gazan casualties — a terribly false blood libel spreading Jew hatred — instead of putting the blame for those Gazan casualties on Hamas, where it belongs — is orders of magnitude worse than Trump.
I’m cautiously optimistic that Trump will listen to former Ambassador David Friedman and other pro-Israel Republicans for counsel.
Trump is, after all, very good on the issues of supporting the Jewish State and countering jihadis. So I’ll be definitely voting for him, but I’m not holding my breath that he will expel Turkey from NATO.
I continue to dream of someone like Senator Tom Cotton in the oval office. Someone like Senator Cotton, or Nikki Haley, or Mike Pence, or likely Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio would throw Turkey out of NATO.
For now, I’m just hopeful that these types of Republican will steer future president Trump in the correct direction as much as possible.
If there is enough groundswell of support from Republicans in general to kick Turkey out of NATO, we just might be able to persuade future President Trump.
So great piece, once again, and keep raising the issue. Hopefully it will gain greater traction in conservative circles and influence as many Republicans in Congress as possible, and future President Trump.
࿗Infidel࿘ says
Proud American
I don’t recall Nikki Haley saying a thing about Turkey. She was just a blind supporter of NATO, against Russia. She’s pretty much the GOP version of Kamala. Pence was pretty worthless as well
࿗Infidel࿘ says
This is the question I always ask! Why are we still in NATO? In fact, why does it still exist? The Cold War ended 31 years ago, and all that NATO has done since then are destructive wars of aggression, such as Kosovo and Libya. It was supposed to be a defensive pact against the Soviet Union, & opposed to a world communist revolution
I do hope that in the next administration, there are people who make a serious case for our leaving NATO, as opposed to forcing them to pay up, as Trump does! We resurrected the Cold War, and not just that, we’ve driven Moscow into the arms of Beijing. Whereas during the Cold War, we did everything to ensure that those 2 were at loggerheads
Also, as long as we are opposed to Russia, Turkey will always have blackmailing power over us. The only way to end it, as I’ve pointed out in recent threads about Turkey, is to fix relations w/ Russia so that Turkey is strategically useless. Then we can oppose their neo-Ottoman ambitions – be they pan-islamic or pan Turkic. In fact, we can even unite the Arabs against them, as opposed to against Iran, whose regime should collapse in the next 5 years
James Lincoln says
࿗Infidel࿘ says,
“Also, as long as we are opposed to Russia, Turkey will always have blackmailing power over us. The only way to end it, as I’ve pointed out in recent threads about Turkey, is to fix relations w/ Russia so that Turkey is strategically useless. ”
Yes.
And, IMHO, President Trump is the best person to tackle this.
SC says
To remove someone from NATO requires a decision. Not something most appointees nowadays are capable of. The whole planets representatives have become spineless parasites hiding behind committees. I intentionally will not use the term leaders, there are so few of those.
࿗Infidel࿘ says
Not just that, NATO does not have any mechanism for expelling any country. They are stuck w/ Turkey. Which is why the countries that don’t want an alliance w/ Turkey, be it us or Greece or anyone else – should leave NATO and start a new organization
We need to stay out of such organizations. We need flexibility to operate in the Indo-Pacific as well: something we can’t do while we’re beholden to NATO. Europe can defend itself – the EU even discussed having an European Army, so that could be the replacement for NATO. We need to instead focus on decoupling Moscow from Beijing, maybe using Hanoi and Delhi as levers. Vivek Ramaswamy had the best ideas on these during his campaign: maybe it can be a part of the new foreign policy of the GOP
truth says
A lot of lefty’s in Nato want their countries to be like Turkey.. ??
࿗Infidel࿘ says
Not quite. Turkey has ambitions to resurrect the Ottoman Empire. These Leftists, by contrast, are anti-colonialists as far as their own countries go, but believe in the same communist ideals of a world revolution or a world government
gravenimage says
One More Time: Why Is Turkey Still In NATO?
…………………………….
Damn good question, Hugh.
Reziac says
Turkey is in NATO so it has an excuse for an open border with Greece, whether Greece likes it or not. Who d’ya think shuffled all those Syrian ‘refugees’ into Europe?
[Cynical? Me??]
࿗Infidel࿘ says
Turkey doesn’t have an open border w/ Greece. What started this wave was Merkel’s disastrous decision in 2014 on behalf of not just Germany, but all European countries, to take in all Syrian refugees, w/o vetting them. Europe has been a ?show ever since