Posted on 02/22/2006 10:35:13 PM PST by Wiz
The U.S. military is quietly preparing to withdraw its forces from Turkey.
Government sources said the military and Defense Department have concluded that Turkey is no longer a reliable military ally. The sources said that by 2008 the United States would have no more than a token military presence in Turkey.
"For two years, the Pentagon waited for a turnaround in Turkey," a source said. "That hasn't happened and the Pentagon will be looking elsewhere for basing and deployment."
The Bush administration was deeply disappointed by Ankara's refusal to host U.S. troops in 2003 as part of plans to form a northern front against the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq. Last year, despite numerous pledges, Ankara blocked another U.S. effort to expand its military presence and use of Turkish military installations.
As a result, the Pentagon has been changing its deployment in Turkey and ended incentives for U.S. soldiers to be based in that country, which is also a member of NATO. The Pentagon has also terminated Turkey's certification as an area in direct support of the U.S. military operation in Iraq.
On Dec. 31, the Pentagon ended most incentives for U.S. soldiers to be based in Turkey, an area deemed as high risk amid rising anti-American sentiment during the war in Iraq. The Pentagon ended the exemption of U.S. soldiers from federal taxes in an arrangement known as combat zone tax exclusion.
U.S. soldiers in Turkey began receiving this benefit in January 2003 in anticipation of the war in Iraq. But in a review in late 2005, U.S. European Command determined that Turkey no longer fulfilled combat zone requirements.
(Excerpt) Read more at kurdistanobserver.servehttp.com ...
It's the Turks who kept us from rightfully partitioning Iraq after Saddam was deposed.
I should live so long.
And create a greater Kurdistan incorporating a 1/3 of Turkry and 1/4 of Iran. Sounds good to me.
This has been the nightmare for Turkey (and Iran, Iraq, and probably Syria) for the last who-knows-how-many years. Consider: if a sovereign and independent "Kurdistan" were to be carved out of those countries (with political borders covering all the regions where the Kurds now live and constitute a majority of the population), it would control not merely a huge amount of oil (fields in place and reserves), but also the headwaters of both the Tigris and Euphrates. This would give it enormous leverage over its neighbors.
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Turkey has never been reliable. My father spent many years there, and every so often he and his company would have to leave and go to Greece because the Turks had decided - either because of an upsurge of Communisim or an upsurge of Islamism - that they hated America.
Right now Turkey is under the gun from Islamics, and that, coupled with their blatant deviousness in denying us passage over their territory at the last minute in the onset of the Iraq war, is very reasonable justification for this.
Please.
The Port Deal is a good one. As a former CG officer involved in Port Safety, this deal is not just smart, but forward looking and a good turn to a good neighbor and ally.
We could take your ridiculous example a little further and say, "Just think if Chad were running our ports . . ."
Interesting. The question is, what the European members (and I am not talking only of Germany and France) of NATO are thinking about a enlargement into the middle east. I doubt that they want to have Georgia, Azerbijan, Armenia, Afghanistan and Iraq as full NATO-members that they would have to defend in a case of war. Very unlikely. Since America has no sole right of representation in NATO it could get quite difficult to find backing for such an enlargement. NATO-decision making has to be done unisonous.
Furthermore Turkey is the only country in the middle east that was strong enough to give itself a democratic system with western values. All others like Irag i.e. needed the help from outside. The Turkish practice of laicism is indeed the only hope for the muslim world. If the muslims are allowed to vote free, they obviously vote for muslim parties. It happened recently in Iraq where the shiite United Iraq Alliance Party won, it happened in Westbank and Gaza where the islamiac Hamas won. Centralized presidential countries like Afghanistan have a islamistic system that has nothing to do with western democracy. I.e. the Afghan constitution describes Islam as its sacred and state religion. A system of civil law is described, but no law may contradict the beliefs and provisions of Islam. It was widely reported that Sharia law is not specifically mentioned, but in fact Hanafi jurisprudence is one of the six branches of Sharia law. Moreover, concessions are made to Shia jurisprudence in cases arising strictly between Shi'ites. Followers of other religions are "free to exercise their faith and perform their religious rites" within the limits of the (shariah) law. There is no mention of freedom of conscience and religion.
Therefore we should be really happy that such a good and relatively free system like Turkey does exist.
Furthermore Turkey is by far the most powerful nation in the whole area. Their armed forces, with a combined troop strength of 680,000 people, is the second largest standing force in NATO after the United States. It would be quite helpful to have them on the right side. :-)
One of the reasons, why America denied a independent Kurdish state, is the fact, that the Turkish millitary is going to invade North Iraq if there would be such a development. Important Turkish millitary leaders released such warnings several times. And believe me - since Turkey really has all means to do it, there is nobody who would or could stop them.
It is obvious that there will be deep change within NATO in the next few years. Cold war is definitly over and the US presence in western Europe or Turkey is obsolete. I.e. the US troops in Germany are going to be reduced to (my information) to a small rest of 23.000 men (compared to roundabout 300.000 during the 80ties) in the next few years. Same thing with Turkey. It is simply not nessecary that US troops are stationed in areas where they are for sure not needed. This is a good development. Nevertheless it is nessecary to keep the contact with such old allies like Turkey. Therefore things should be handled with less emotion. The recent wave of Antiamericanism in Turkey should not distort the view on realities: They are still the most western and the most important country in the middle east.
Often. Most of the northern units were never militarily defeated, they just melted away along with much of their weaponry and ammo. Turkey really screwed us.
GOOD POINT!.
Turks are probably some of THE MOST anti-American people on the globe. Hate filled too. They hate Jews, Kurds, Christians, Africans... etc
Don't forget Greeks, they're really good at hating Greeks.
good
We seem th be developing new alliances however we are also adding members to NATO. I don't know what the answer is. I do know Turkey is no ally.
I wonder if the UAE will deny our troops passage when we go after iran?
That's been the typical, historical response of our other islamic "allies", so it wouldn't be surprising.
The more I think about this UAE deal, the more I smell a rat. At first the WH apologists were screaming that the UAE's P & O company was one of the very few in the world that could handle such a big maritame task, and that there were no U.S. companies up to the job. (In fact FR's landscape was littered with this excuse). Then, almost in the same breath, they began claiming this is merely a paper shuffling deal, an ownership takeover that will not change any port operations or bring in new personnel. Put the two lame excuses together and you find that they're claiming that the UAE is one of the few companies on earth that has the ability to purchase P & O for 6.8 billion dollars.
Either the UAE maritime company is going to be performing the physical work and all of which that consists of "because they are one of the few companies in the world qualified to do it", or they're just going to be reaping the profits of a corporate ownership transfer. They can't have it both ways.
I'm seeig the proof right before my eyes that the penguin mentality is contageous and can be passed on to human beings; as I watch the bots fall over the cliff one-by-one in blind obedience to whatever mistakes are made in the WH. (oops, did I say the WH can make a mistake? Shame on me).
Western democracy is something relative. We can see it in stages:
1. "Direct democracy" comprises a form of democracy and theory of civics wherein sovereignty was lodged in the assembly of all citizens. Depending on the particular system, this assembly might pass executive motions (decrees), make law, elect and dismiss officials and conduct trials. Where the assembly elected officials, these were executive agents rather than representatives. It assumes a "mature" population since the citizens must participate and they have to be responsible. A example for a working direct democracy is Switzerland.
2. "Representative democracy" is a form of democracy founded on the exercice of popular sovereignty by the people's representants. It is a theory of civics in which voters choose (in free, secret, multi-party elections) representatives to act in their interests, but not as their proxies—i.e., not necessarily according to their voters' wishes, but with enough authority to exercise initiative in the face of changing circumstances. Another form of representative democracy involves impartial selection of representatives through sortition. The citizens of a representative democracy do not have to be that "mature" than those in a direct democracy since the representatives take over the responsibility for most of the decisions that have to be done. Most people in the western hemisphere live in representative democracys. Examples are the US, UK, Germany etc.
3. "Guided democracy". This is usually a form of gouvernment that combines oppression of opposition with rudimentary elements of representative democracy. It doesn't need very mature citizens since the real power lies in the hands of the "representatives". This can be a reasonable thing to do if we think of the Palestinians i.e.. It is better to have a calculable semi-democratic government in Gaza and West Bank compared to a fully democratic crazy Hamas gouvernment that is a eminent threat to the free world. It is sad but true that this is probably the same thing all over the whole islamic world. Islam as a religion can not be erased. Therefore it is better to control it. This has to be done in different occurrence in the different muslim countries. Turkey is for sure the land with the most mature population within the muslim world. Its democracy is guided but for sure a model where much of the will its the population is transmitted into practical policy. The Turkish millitary and its point of view is something the west can live with. To provoke them without any need is contraproductive.
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