https://tomluongo.me/2023/11/07/the-evo ... ddle-east/
The Evolving Battle Lines in the Middle East
...Turkey’s Big Move
The bigger issue is what’s happening with Erdogan in Turkey. Erdogan is trying to rebuild the Ottoman Empire. We’ve already established one way to view World War I was as an operation to destroy the Ottoman Empire.
I’m not arguing for its return, mind you, just laying out the perspectives.
So, Erdogan’s reactions to Netanyahu’s campaign in Gaza needs to be looked at from this frame. Moreover, he sees himself as the new Sultan, the leader of the Sunni world.
Turkey, however, is in a very difficult position being a member of NATO, which puts Erdogan in a difficult position if he wants to maintain his carefully-crafted leverage over both NATO and the BRICS thanks to Turkey’s geographic, economic, cultural, and military influence in the region.
A point made by col. Doug MacGregor is that Turkey is just one part of the Turkic world and the Turkish-speaking world. At the recent 10th Summit of Organization of Turkic States (OTS) in Astana, Kazakhstan, Erdogan’s influence was felt in their collective statement:
A joint declaration, adopted at the summit, called on all parties to the Israeli -Palestinian conflict to declare an “immediate cease-fire to protect civilians and to provide immediate and unhindered humanitarian aid throughout the Gaza Strip.” “The conflict can only be resolved through peaceful means based on relevant UN resolutions and the two-state solution”.
Erdogan’s influence is massive in this respect. And if he makes the decision to finally and definitively break with the West, which circumstances alone would force on him if he were reluctant, then he leads the entire region with him.
If Erdogan wants to lead the Sunni world then he has to take a maximalist hardline against Israel’s bombing of Gaza.
But, Turkey as a member of NATO is a signal to the OTS that Russia is still weak, because Turkey doesn’t dare really anger the US.
However, if Turkey leaves NATO because of Israel’s behavior that signal reverses. Turkey then stands with Russia in their minds and, in effect, declares Sunni Independence from the old European Colonial remnant.
So, Erdogan has a very unique and powerful opportunity ahead of him. He gets to define the Sunni world’s legacy as either butchers of Jews or arbiters of the peace. This is why he’s been trying to broker peace deals while at the same time making very aggressive territorial moves in the Eastern Mediterranean, Syria, and in the Caucuses.
Because of this, he has a delicate balancing act here. He has to commit the Sunni world to a fight against Israel and the US, the way Hassan Nasrallah did in his speech for Hezbollah representing the Shia. But, at the same time his economic position is very weak after years of attacks not only on him personally as Turkey’s president but the country’s economy as multiple attacks against the country’s financial imbalances have seen the lira hyperinflate against the US dollar from just under 1.8 ten years ago to 28 recently.
As I’ve covered before, Turkey’s Achilles’ heel has been its net foreign-currency debt position, which has been, at times, more than 34% of the country’s GDP. With the dollar in a new bull market the value of that debt keeps rising.
So, for Erdogan, the goal is to get Israel to come to the negotiating table offering Ankara as the site for which a grand peace can be brokered that puts a start date on a new Ottoman Empire.
How does he do that given that Netanyahu is unmoved by any offers from to back down on his plans to wipe out the Palestinians as he assumes full support is always coming from the US.
The way I think Erdogan can achieve this is not with tanks and infantry, frankly. He blows open the wound which lays at the heart of Turkey’s economy and is the backbone of the empire, the debt. So, similar to what I expect from Egypt, Erdogan will unilaterally cancel all Turkish US dollar- and euro-denominated debt, swapping it out for Turkish lira debt.
In essence, defaulting on the debt and paying back bondholders at pennies on the dollar.
He’ll do this by first declaring a USD/TRY exchange rate far below the current market price of ~28 to 1, say 12:1 or even 6:1, then declare force majeure and revalue the debt at that rate in lira.
This would be the nice way of doing this. He could just cancel the debt at current exchange rates and declare the debts paid because of the massive attack on Turkey’s forex reserves which drove the lira into the ground anyway.
In effect, debt jubilee for domestic Turkish corporates.
His speeches this week tell us that he’s preparing for something big. He’s done taking body blows from the US now that he’s past re-election.
If he does this, which would be his strongest move across all of the big vectors, and leaves NATO at the same time, he would force the US out of his country. The protests we saw at Incirlik last week would intensify, if not become a real threat.
I suspect/hope the US nukes stationed there previously are long gone.
The Turkish military could then become the physical guarantors of any peace process with Israel. Erdogan and Putin hold those cards. The US doesn’t because we have lost all credibility in the region with everyone, even Israel with “Biden” at the helm.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s tour of the region is proof of that. The confused foreign policy of the “Biden” administration lies at the heart of the conflict between Davos and the Neoconservatives that pushed us into not only this war but the one in Ukraine.