A returned guest, she's a professor of political science at Istanbul's Marmara University, a non-resident fellow at Washington's Middle East Institute, and now a fellow at the Center for Applied Turkey Studies of SWP Berlin.
In this conversation, we discuss two of her recent thought-provoking essays, one short a piece in the journal Survival called A Bridge No More, Turkey's Geopolitical Significance in the 21st Century,
and a longer, more detailed rumination in the journal Turkish Studies called A Bridge Pushed to the Periphery, Turkey's Geopolitical Significance in the Asia-Pacific Century.
As those titles suggest, Çağdaş Üngür has a rather sober take on Turkey's recent geopolitical direction.
In Turkish official and media rhetoric, there's a constant sense that Turkey is a rising power, increasingly important in an emerging multipolar world order.
Indeed, in Western media coverage as well, Turkey is often presented as a prime representative of the spirit of the age, a middle power with rising clout, rising appetite, flexing its muscles and leveraging its ties to both East and West.
Of course, most recently, we've seen new reports about Ankara potentially joining the BRICS group of emerging market countries, which perhaps exemplifies Turkey's conscious tilt away from its traditional alliances in the West.
We had this conversation just before those reports gained momentum.
But as you'll hear, Cardash Uygur has a pretty skeptical take on where all this is heading, not from any great love of the West, but due to straightforwardly practical real political reasons.
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In her articles she talks about Turkey's geopolitical bridge status between Asia and Europe as being crucial to the idea of the country's key strategic importance among scholars, policy makers, journalists and indeed in its educational curriculum over the course of the 20th century.
So I started by asking her to outline how that narrative developed and what it signified.
I mean, this is mostly about the second half of the 20th century.And we should all remember here that Europe is very much at the center of things at this period, right?I mean, 20th century, right after World War II.
Yes, it's a divided continent, but still the rest of the 20th century will become an Atlantic century, and Turkey is very much close to the center.
Of course, there's the Eastern Bloc and Soviet-led part of Europe, but in terms of cultural, economic, etc.significance, the Western Hemisphere is a big center of gravity at this time.
And Turkey is very, very close, of course, to Europe, partly in Europe, And at the same time, very close to the Soviet Union.And being close to the Soviet Union is, of course, it brings in some danger, right?
There is this physical threat perception with regard to the Soviet Union.And at the same time, this pushes Turkey to be, to join this emerging bloc against the Soviet Union.
Geography is key to all this because Soviet Union is nearby, but Turkey is basically NATO's closest member to the Soviet Union, sharing a border and whatnot.It has a big military.
So militarily, I mean, in terms of manpower, etc., Turkey is very significant.And for espionage and for various purposes, I mean, that geographical proximity, of course, makes Turkey an ideal
power base, very useful partner for its NATO partners at the time.But of course, at the top of all this, there is a sense of ethnocentrism.This is not peculiar to Turkey.I mean, I've lived in China and the United States as well.
And wherever I lived, I have seen that people, on the average, are very much interested in their own geography, their own local problems.What's going on in your geography, in your country and nearby, it always takes precedence.That's the priority.
If you ask, for instance, Turkish international relations scholars, if you ask them about the most important regions around the world, even in the 21st century, they still come up with the neighborhood. like mostly Middle East.
They think, for instance, Middle East still takes precedence.It's still a geopolitically very significant region.And of course, Middle East has a lot of problems, civil wars, etc.
But the rest of the world, as I see it, is pretty much talking about Asia, the rise of Asia, economic dynamism there, the Asia-Pacific century.You may talk about Asia, rise of Asia as a good thing or as a threat.
But whatever your perception is, most of the world, especially the Western world, is focusing, has been focusing on Asia, Asia Pacific, but I don't really see that becoming a major focus in Turkey in any kind of debate.
Of course, we talk about Chinese investment, we talked about, used to talk about the Belt and Road Initiative, et cetera, but the life-changing nature of what's going on in the rest of the world, especially in the Asia-Pacific landscape.
It doesn't really become like a top story for us.That's my impression.
And you argue in your article that, quote, the conviction that Turkey's geographical location confides unique strategic leverage lingers in Ankara today.
But it's questionable whether the country's physical geography is enough to shore up its leverage in a new Cold War between China and the US.
Turkey is not geographically close to either of these two poles, nor does it appear to enjoy a privileged relationship with either Washington or Beijing.And you actually argue that Turkey faces the risk of
further sliding into the geopolitical periphery in the 21st century, basically in a world whose centre of gravity has shifted to the Asia-Pacific.That's a pretty bracing argument, and it's not one that we hear that much today in Turkey.
Could you just delve into this?How do you substantiate that quite bold thesis?
you know, I was just writing this article, I was just trying to look at the future trends.And since I'm a China observer, this is what I look at.
And the economic dynamism and how all these things and I'm talking about material things here, basically, I mean, the number of ports, for instance.The world's biggest ports, I mean top 100 ports or something.
When you look at these lists, you don't really see a Turkish maritime choke point there.Of course, the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles, the straits, the idea of straits and the physical feature
that brings together this, the Asian landscape together with Europe, is and has been very important for us.And strategically speaking, again, since 20th century was mostly an Atlantic century, and the Black Sea, the Marmara, etc.
This part of Turkey is, of course, very much close to the geography as it mattered in the 20th century, the second half of it. It did provide Turkey with a lot of leverage, especially in times of military crisis, etc.
Now we see it, we have seen it recently with the crisis in Ukraine.So I'm not really saying that the Bosphorus or Dardanelles, they are irrelevant, or it has completely become obsolete in a geopolitical sense.But when you focus on the geoeconomic
dynamics, reshaping the world today, right?Chinese economic development.Of course, there are many other emerging economies in the Asia-Pacific region.This is why all the other countries are devising their Asia pivot strategies.
Everybody, basically every major country developing and advanced country had to look at China and had to look, had to gear their attention towards this huge landscape, which has also become the manufacturing center of the world in the last 40 years.
So when I look at these grand dynamics, I mean maritime ports, where all these goods are coming from, they are usually maritime routes, connections are very important here.And in that sense, Malacca Straits, the Suez Canal.
And if you go, for instance, up north, there's, of course, a Chinese-Russian railway connection, which also goes into Europe.
So this has been, up until the Ukraine crisis, this has been an uninterrupted and a very long established way to transport goods, etc.
So when you look at all these connectivity projects, of course, we don't really know where this middle corridor, the Trans-Caspian connection, etc., how it will evolve.
It has always been popular in Turkey, for Turkey, for the Turkish officials, but it is now also popular in Europe because
very few people or merchants, et cetera, business people in Europe, they don't want to use the Russian Trans-Siberian Railway anymore.So everybody's seeking like alternative connections.
So again, I was not willing to get into some kind of fortune telling here, like saying Turkey is doomed basically, and it will never regain that kind of leverage or geopolitical significance, but
Let us all remember here that Middle Corridor has been on the agenda at least for a decade now.
The first partnership treaty Turkey signed with China about the Middle Corridor initiative, this was in 2015, and the same partnership agreement also allowed Turkey at the time to become a member of this new Belt and Road initiative.
And if you go back, for instance, to 2013, there was still this idea that because Turkey has such a central location, again, our old conviction that Turkey has always been so central to things because it has a very crucial location here between Asia and Europe, etc.
It was again very, very useful at the time of the launch of this new project
When you come to 2024 and recheck the maps, and now you see, of course, Belt and Road Initiative has not only become a connectivity project between Asian and European countries, it has become a truly global project.
But when you see, for instance, the whole investment scheme or the total FDI that poured into Turkey, because of the Belt and Road Initiative.
After all these years, almost 10 years, whatever we have been talking about back in 2015, very little of it is built, really.
And we don't really see Turkey becoming, just due to its crucial geographical location, etc., we don't really see Turkey having some kind of upper hand. in the Belt and Road Initiative.
Currently, for instance, the European Union has its own alternative projects linking Asian and European countries.You don't see Turkey there.Most recently, they have signed this agreement between
Turkmenistan, I think, Romania, and Georgia, etc., that will be bringing goods, transporting goods from Central Asian countries, China originally, and into Europe.
It is basically bypassing Turkey, and it is connecting Georgia and Romania over the Black Sea.So there are all these alternative routes.
Most recently, again, it is not likely to be materialized because of the Gaza crisis right now, because of the Israeli-Palestinian issue.But we have seen the United States having its own plans launched by India at the most recent G20 summit.
So they were envisioning something from India, Indian ports into the Arabian Peninsula, and then from Israel to Greece over Cyprus. So again, Turkey was bypassed.
If you go up, for instance, now because of the climate change, all these, you know, icicles melting, etc.The northern seas are going to be negligible.And some of the Asian countries, including South Korea, etc.
they will be using this northern route because it's going to be cheaper and maybe more feasible.We don't know yet, but clearly Russia is investing in this, trying to make this northern route somehow feasible, profitable and commercially viable.
So whether it is intentional or not, because the core manufacturing centers and all of these new 21st century dynamics have changed, there are so many different ways of connecting Asia and Europe.This was one of my arguments.
Because bridge means there is no other way, right?I mean, you cannot avoid the bridge.You cannot bypass the bridge.You have to use it if you want to go from one place to another.That's the only way to go.
But now there are so many different ways of getting to Europe, reaching Europe.So anyway, these were some of the dynamics, geoeconomic dynamics mostly that I wanted to emphasize.
Something else you talk about is this classic idea that we've all heard now of the energy hub.Turkey is an energy hub linking Central Asia to Europe.
This has been a constant in Turkish discourse since probably the 1990s, I'd imagine, maybe even before then.
Obviously, Turkey doesn't have great energy resources within its own territory, but being linked to various continents or being centred at the middle of them geographically gives it this opportunity to be an energy hub in this thinking.
and there are these several pipeline projects.There's the Baku-Tiflis-Erzurum pipeline, TurkStream, or the Trans-Anatolian project, TANAP.
which are often touted as part of this grand ambition to become an energy hub and therefore boost Turkey's geopolitical importance and basically bridge these various continents.
But that's something else that you pour a bit of cold water over, actually.You say that this vision faces many roadblocks, aside from just the practical and financial difficulties.
Could you just talk about how this energy hub idea, which is often touted in Turkey, is also perhaps a bit of a red herring, really, not something that is actually going to be a massive game changer in terms of Turkey's geopolitical role?
My point about Turkey being an energy hub was, I was not really talking about what's happening right now or what's going to happen in five or 10 years time.But if you look at all these futuristic visions, again, these things may not materialize.
Again, fortune telling is not possible for us.We cannot really predict the future as it's going to happen, et cetera.Nobody can do that.But based on what we know, based on what we see European Union doing, and what they envision for themselves.
There is a deadline for it, right?2050s, I mean, some European countries aim at earlier dates, they have earlier schedules, etc.Some at a later time, but the world, mostly even China, is agreeing to this.
most of the polluters, the biggest polluters around the world, all agree and make commitments to a green future.
These countries' major economies are all aiming at reducing their carbon emissions, which basically means they will not be consuming fossil fuels, natural gas and conventional fuels, etc.They wouldn't be in demand.
We cannot say this for every single developing country.We cannot even say this for China because China has a later deadline to go green.China is an ambitious player in all renewable energies, electric cars and whatnot, but they have a later deadline.
So, of course, there is another parallel development here, the shale revolution and how the United States has become self-sufficient and even an exporter, right, in those traditional conventional fuels.What does it mean?
It means, well, except for the Israeli issue, Middle East as a region has sort of declined in Washington's list of priorities. Yes, Israel and Gaza, we have seen now that the United States has made a comeback.
But other than that, oil or fossil fuels, etc., the energy dynamic that has been perhaps the easiest and perhaps the most simplistic answer to everything about the Middle East.
So the future, the years ahead, will be a completely different dynamic, will present a completely different dynamic in this region, in this neighborhood. What does it mean for Turkey?
Well, for Turkey, the future projection, I mean, when you look at these, again, the future trends, long-term trends in energy politics, you see that.
I mean, how was Turkey going to present itself as an energy hub or a bridge again in between Asia and Europe?Well, the Caspian energy sources, Central Asian countries, the Turkic republics, most of which has very good relations with Turkey.
So both politically and economically, it made sense.But what is going to happen when European market is not going to be big enough?
Because again, the long-term trends show us that China is going to become a major market for Central Asian oil and natural gas.And I think it has already happened, some of it, right?Turkmenistan,
Kazakhstan, these countries have major deals with China, major partnerships, pipeline projects, and billion dollar investments already.So you see all this Caspian reserves pouring into China.
And maybe not now, maybe not in five years time, but you see that China will be replacing European Union as a major market of these products. So this in itself makes Turkey's bridge status irrelevant.
Of course, a counter-argument here would be something about renewable energies, right?Hydrogen, different kinds of renewable energies or the technology to work it.
Central Asian countries may also offer that potential and Turkey may still become like a bridge or an energy hub of sorts.But that dynamic we have to wait and see because, again, renewable energy is a completely new dynamic.
it's not even clear how those sources are going to be transported, how you put them and keep them, store them, etc.There are so many logistical hurdles.I wouldn't want the article to be understood like a doomsday scenario.
Of course, there are many other options on the table,
But what I'm saying is that old narrative, the conventional story, the 20th century dynamics that made us accustomed to Turkey's role as a very central, crucial location, like an utmost connection between Asia and Europe, I think it's not there anymore and we cannot really make plans on that.
We cannot design the future based on that presumption.That's my main idea.
Isn't there though an awareness in Ankara that these dynamics are in place?
So we've seen in recent years a real obvious diplomatic focus on improving ties with China compared to before when, for example, the Uyghur issue was a real fly in the ointment essentially between Ankara and Beijing.
That has definitely been downplayed in recent years between Turkey and China.
And that seems to be part of this broader strategic vision of increasing Turkey's focus on improving its relations with China and therefore reaping the benefits in terms of investment.
And we've seen recently the deal that may be one of the fruits of this, which was the BYD electric vehicle investment in Turkey that was signed a couple of months ago.
So there is this idea that China is increasingly important and therefore Turkey needs to readjust its strategic vision essentially based on that reality. Do you also see a positive trajectory about Turkey-China ties?Are they improving?
Are they set to continue improving?And what kind of impact will that have on the thesis that you outline in your articles?
Well, I did talk about in this article, I did talk about the EV electric cars.I think this is going to be a very important dynamic and a very important market in itself.
I mean, something that the Western countries and China will have a trade war of sorts.Right.And it has already begun, like tariffs getting raised, et cetera.
And of course, this BYD investment came after I published this, after I wrote down the draft of this article, it wasn't there yet.But let's again go ahead and try to predict the future on this.
If the BYD investment, I mean, BYD investment is very important, but we know for a fact that it's not big enough to turn the tide about everything, about this industry, et cetera, in Turkey. Why am I saying it's not big enough?
Because look at Hungary, what kind of investment they received from BYD, much bigger.BYD, of course, is a global company and they will be investing in several different countries, Pakistan recently, I think, but many others.
So it's a global company and they will basically invest in wherever they see feasible.But if the BYD investment is basically followed by other Chinese companies,
I think that would be an important step showing us that Chinese-Turkish relations will be entering a different phase.
These are, of course, again, geoeconomic dynamics, and if the BYD investment is followed by other Chinese EV companies, then it will transform the Turkish automobile industry, which is currently relying on Europe, European brands, and also we have a Japanese and South Korean
brand as well.But again, when you look at the geopolitical aspect of it, Turkey is still very much tied by the NATO membership here.
I mean, even if Turkey wants to go all the way with China in the 5G, because Turkey has already signed an agreement, a preliminary agreement with Huawei to build its own 5G network, the infrastructure,
nothing decisive yet, but everything points out in the direction of Huawei at this point.
But still, this is an organization, this is a security organization, an alliance, which basically said, and they take these decisions on a consensus basis, right?They make these decisions unanimously.So we assume that Turkey also said yes to this.
During the Madrid summit in 2022, NATO basically in its strategic concept document, that's like a milestone document, they basically singled out Russia.I mean, Russia is clearly a bigger enemy right here.
But they also talked about China as a competitor, as a rival, as a potential threat, strategic, however you call it.
not an enemy, but some country that all NATO members should basically be paying attention to, and NATO as an organization should be paying attention to.And this has an espionage dimension, data privacy.This has all kinds of geopolitical values.
What kind of values do you pursue and do you disagree with, including democracy, democratic norms, because this is a one-party state. but also in so many practical dimensions.
Again, I gave 5G as an example because 5G, once you install 5G, all this data privacy issues will be a problem.
We cannot expect that not to become a problem between Turkey and other NATO members, perhaps primarily with the United States, but let's all remember what happened in 2013.
Turkey was bidding this air missile deal to a Chinese company and then it had to be cancelled, mostly because it was very much protested by the NATO countries, United States and other NATO partners.
And they were all talking about all these, you know, strategic and practical stuff.
about security, military security, because once you install Chinese air missiles, the NATO infrastructure, there is a mismatch, not only technically, geopolitically, because the geopolitical game seems to be turning into a more black and white picture, so to speak.
and in some practical notions, I don't really see how these can be amended.In discourse, you can manage the discourse, right?
You can talk about the benefits of the BRICS or, for instance, the enlargement of the UN Security Council permanent membership, etc.Discourse, rhetoric, okay.But once you install, for instance, a Huawei 5G network,
Is it not going to be a problem for NATO?I mean, that's at least a question, I think, a justifiable question.
I'm just trying to give you concrete examples of, you know, how, for instance, these preferences, priorities might become a problem in the future.
One argument someone might make is that Turkey actually doesn't have to bridge between the West and China.It doesn't have to bridge between the US and China, or Europe and Central Asia.
In fact, according to this argument, Turkey can cultivate its own axis, its own kind of Turkey-centred sphere of influence, essentially.This is the Century of Turkey mindset.
And perhaps that is actually an even more attractive or even likely scenario, because some might argue that the world is actually fragmenting not into two big rival blocks like in the Cold War, but actually into many different fragmented pieces where the picture is much less clear and the alliances are much less rigid.
And perhaps that scenario holds some promise for Turkey.
And there are a number of spheres where Turkey has made big advances in recent years, both diplomatically, thinking of somewhere like the Horn of Africa, where Turkey's playing this increasingly important diplomatic role and expanding its footprint in that part of the world.
And of course, also drones and significant advances in the domestic defence industry.That's also another area where Turkey is flourishing essentially somewhat independently of any big blocks.
So what do you make of that argument that actually Turkey doesn't really need to ally with either the US or China, but can actually somewhat go it alone and cultivate its own alliances around the world, as opposed to being caught between two bigger brothers, essentially?
Well, William, I think if, for instance, from this proposition and from what I read in newspapers and what I see over the media, my impression is, for instance, if I was not a Turkish person born in this country and speaking the language, I would have assumed, for instance, all these TV anchormen, authors, columnists, etc.
I would have assumed that, for instance, Turkey is not a NATO member at all.In fact, Turkey is hostile to NATO, or the United States, the anti-American sentiments, all kinds of anti-Western sentiment.
And some of it is very much justified, obviously, I mean, with the Gaza crisis and all.But there is a choice here, right?Very practical choice.Turkey, as of 1952, chose to become a member of NATO.And this is an alliance.
This is a military alliance in the very, I think, strict and old-fashioned sense, right?
Although NATO tried to improve itself, to change itself somehow, etc., evolve and become a different thing, but still, this very much looks like a military alliance and works like one.
And there is always a choice, leaving it and going your own way and become more independent.
And many in Turkey, I would say, I mean, when you look at the public opinion polls, you would see that NATO has never been a very popular organization in Turkey.
I mean, recent years, if you look at these surveys, you see that eight out of 10 people in Turkey is very critical of NATO, like they don't like it, they don't think highly of what has happened in Afghanistan, etc.So many different things.
So there is the public opinion here.And there are all sorts of other reasons to go your own way.And I think this is a decision that can be very much justifiable in the eyes of, you know, Turkish people left and right.But
I don't see how, for instance, being a NATO member but, you know, being close with China and Russia at the same time can work.Again, just by its own inner logic.I'm not saying that I'm a big fan of NATO or Turkey should stay in NATO, etc.
But that's a choice that Turkey has made 70-something years ago. So leaving that is, I think, is an option.But nobody talks about that.Everybody is so critical of NATO, but nobody talks about leaving it officially.
And, you know, then, of course, you can join anything, right?BRICS, Shanghai Cooperation Organization.But I don't see how, for instance, you can match these two.Of course, there are other examples like Hungary, right?
Being an EU member, but being very, at the same time, quite cozy with Russia and China. But I think it's a difficult game.It would have been much easier to not be a EU member and NATO member and go your own way to find that maneuvering space.
Because China is on the rise, right?And some countries, I mean, it just depends on your priorities.What kind of priorities do you have?And not only in terms of foreign policy and geopolitics. it also has to do with domestic priorities, right?
Political priorities.Everybody understands that China can invest enormously in different parts of the world, a lot of money, a lot of potential investment, etc.But what kind of common values does Turkey have with China overall?
And I think at the very core of the question is, Again, nobody questions the fact that Turkey is a regional player.Turkey has enormous influence over its own neighborhood, etc.
But designing your own game, finding your own center, becoming your own geopolitical player, calling it a Turkish century, a century of Turkey, you need so much more.
in terms of economic capacity, in terms of also soft power, and in terms of other types of dynamics working favorably for you.For instance, India, although India is, if you look at the GDP per capita levels, it's a much poorer country.
But you see, for instance, India playing that game, trying to find leverage.And I think the drone industry, plus the Turkish TV productions, I mean, it's just a concrete example because it works very much in favor of Turkey, right?
When you go to Indonesia, when you go to the remotest parts of the world, you see people having watched these Turkish dramas and they know a little bit about Turkey, Turkish food, they can pronounce some names in Turkish, etc.It's a good thing.
soft power extended outside.This is a success story.I think drones, I'm not a military expert, but drones are clearly a success story.So there are these niche things, elements that Turkey has indeed been successful at.
But it would have been, I mean, I think it would be a very big exaggeration to say that, you know, Turkey can be decisive in most of the global issues and completely design its own game because it's still a middle power.
And we got to be very much realistic about everything, like especially in economic terms, the kind of economic crisis that Turkey is going through right now, not to mention the domestic polarization, of course.
So, I mean, just think about the TOG situation.The most recent elections, all we talked about was TOG and how it's going to be the Turkish project, made in Turkey, success story, the miracle, electric vehicle, et cetera, brand name.
Now you have the BYD investment. If you have it, what's going to happen to TOG or any other Turkish brand?Is it even possible for them to compete against these, you know, China-made vehicles, which are both inexpensive and high quality?
So what I mean is, you have these little success stories, but it doesn't always match with other priorities, right?Because trying to attract investment from China may also mean that your domestic industries may not excel in the same sector.
It may just backfire.I'm saying this because TOG was such a such a high priority like six months ago for the government, right?So it's not very realistic to imagine Turkey to create its own brand, especially, I mean, now it's the digital age, right?
Which even the European countries are not, they are not able to compete with for instance, American digital companies, some of the technology companies, they have bigger budgets than some countries, trillion dollar companies we are talking about.
So we got to be realistic, the government and the public, etc.We can still do and create many good things in in all sectors, but first we gotta stop bleeding our most talented, most educated, et cetera, skilled people.They're all going abroad, right?
Due to the economy crisis and the political situation.So we gotta stop that first and then be realistic and find some spots and very niche sectors that we can create a lot of value, just like TV producers and these artificially intelligent people
some of the drone technology companies, etc.are doing.
That was Cagdas Ungur.Many thanks to her for joining for episode 227.
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