Turkey is no ally.
They pretend to be one to get advantage on the infidels.
For this right now - YES!
“Perdicaris alive or Raisuli dead!”
Continuing to hold Pastor Brunson is obviously much more important to Turkey and Erdogan than any alliance with the US.
Start helping the Yazidi Kurds to form their own separate nation carved from Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran. I know, the US should not be into nation-building, but that is a prohibition that should be applied much more so for Sharia-compliant Muslim regions.
We have an alliance with Turkey?
We sure give up a lot to 1) keep the fiction of NATO alive, and 2) pretend we have Russia bounded on all sides.
Meanwhile, Turkey cuts its own deals with Iran, Syria and Russia. Attacks the Kurds, does business with ISIS, and tries to undermine the Saudis. In other words, business as usual in the mideast - but please don’t call it an “alliance.”
Turkey was a strategic partner important enough to force a NATO membership despite that country's complete lack of proximity to the North Atlantic. That was when the Soviet Union wanted access from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean - Erdogan is now dealing with the Russians with regard to the natural gas pipeline that promises to make Turkey rich and naval access is no longer that much of an issue. It's a different world from the Cold War one and the Turks are acting accordingly. So should we.
What was he doing there? Shouldn’t have been there. I don’t want moslems....or any other religion... knocking on my door proselytizing.
What alliance???
“Is Andrew Brunson’s Release More Important Than Alliance With Turkey?”
Sometimes Christians really piss me off. This question is an example of why because the real problem here is that Turkey is holding an American hostage as a bargaining chip so they can try to force us to give them an opponent of their dictator. Then they’ll murder the opponent and maybe they might release Pastor Brunson.
So Turkey made the decision that holding an American hostage is more important than their alliance with the USA.
There fixed the title of the article for you.
What a steaming pantload. As a Christian, this moron thinks you should be willing to sacrifice another Christian for the sake of good relations with Turkey, because they’re a NATO member?
He has it ass backwards. If that relationship is so important, Turkey needs to worry about pleasing US.
Please show me exactly WHAT Turkey has done for US interests. What a twisted viewpoint.
Turkey is not an ally. Quite the contrary
Lets ask the Armenians.
The ones that are still alive.
Turkey is a bad actor. That they are holding Pastor Brunson is just a symptom of the larger whole. And it shows that they have no intention of being allies. Shouldn’t be in NATO. Shouldn’t have an air field there. Should not be friends.
A country that holds your citizens is no ally.
.
>> “Is Andrew Brunson’s Release More Important Than Alliance With Turkey? <<
Yes, absolutely!
Is Andrew Brunson’s Release More Important Than Alliance With Turkey?
One is possible. The other is not with the government currently in power.
So yes.
Next question?
No ally would keep a US citizen as a hostage like this. Turkey made this choice, we are just reacting to it (and only because DJT is the POTUS - if it was the Fake Hawaiian or Felonia Milhous von Pantsuit, we’d still be kissing Erdogen’s arse and Brunson would rot until he died.
Turkey as a secular state was our ally. Turkey as a radical Moslem state is our enemy. I hope that we can return to the former, and for the same in Iran. These results are at least possible now, under Trump, whereas under any other leader we’ve had for the past 35 years it was not.
I don’t get these Christian hand wringers. Turkey most definitely should not be an ally. Why would Christians want to be allied with a state that’s ideology is one to persecute Christians?
It all happened in 1904, when the 64-year-old Perdicaris and his stepson found themselves taken hostage from their villa in Tangier, Morocco by a flamboyant, black-bearded Mulai Ahmed er Raisuli, and he wanted to extort a heavy ransom from the Sultan of Morocco -- not to mention embarrass the sovereign by showing his powerlessness to protect foreign citizens.
This was more than a simple kidnapping in a distant land. For President Theodore Roosevelt, it was an opportunity to start waving his "big stick," sending battleships steaming toward the African coast to ensure Perdicaris' safe release.
It also gave Roosevelt the chance to issue one of his most blood-curdling proclamations, a statement that helped ensure his re-election while sending Americans wild with joy:
"Perdicaris alive or Raisuli dead!"