Turkish-American Relations: A Challenging Transition

摘要

With the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, Turkish-American relations seem to have taken a turn for the worse, and Turkey has been breaking records of anti-American sentiments for the last five years. Although this represents an unprecedented decline in this 60-year-old strategic alliance, the relationship has been of a highly dialectical nature throughout time, encompassing factors of both continuity and change. This essay identifies the geostrategic dimension, Turkish domestic politics, and the role of ethnic lobbies in the United States as factors of continuity, whereas the new paradigms of Turkish foreign policy, the war in Iraq, and the rise of anti-Americanism in Turkey appear as factors of change. The final synthesis of this equation will be determined as much by international circumstances as by internal developments in both countries, including the new administration in the United States.