"As the Congressional Research Service recently observed, "The Israeli connection enables Turkey to circumvent U.S. and European arms embargoes and what it believes to be the influence of anti-Turkish ethnic lobbies in Congress."
Of course, Turkey's main military supplier is the United States. Eighty percent of Turkey's weapons imports are stamped MADE IN THE U.S.A. and, over the last decade, Ankara has received more than $12 billion in direct and indirect U.S. military assistance. In recent years, however, mounting human rights criticism in the United States and Europe has been a persistent thorn in Ankara's side. In 1996, Turkey angrily accused the U.S. Congress of imposing a "shadow embargo" after a coalition of arms-control and human-rights groups succeeded in blocking two pending sales of Cobra helicopters and frigates. Last December, Europe rejected Turkey's application for membership in the European Union, in part because of Turkey's failure to improve human rights.
Israeli weapons offer Turkey a way around such sanctions. David Ivri, an adviser to the Israeli Defense Ministry who was instrumental in bringing about the Turkish-Israeli accord, was asked by the Jerusalem Post last year whether Israel considers human rights when it sells arms to other countries. "Israel to this day has a policy of not intervening in any internal matters of any country in the world," Ivri responded. "We don't like it when others interfere in our internal matters. For this reason, our policy doesn't touch on such matters."
Over the next twenty-five years, Turkey plans to spend an astonishing $150 billion to modernize its military. U.S. arms manufacturers will continue to lobby hard for these lucrative sales but, increasingly, Israel will be a major competitor. Already, Turkey and Israel have signed a number of arms deals, with many more in the works. Two of these involve Israeli contracts worth $715 million to upgrade Turkish F-4 and F-5 combat planes with high-tech radar and avionics to improve their performance in bombing missions. Israel also has orders for night-vision systems, tank upgrades on F-16 fighter planes, and 200 Popeye missiles. In May 1997, the two countries agreed to co-produce advanced Popeye II missiles, with a range of ninety miles, which will involve a significant transfer of technology and manufacturing capability to Turkey. This year, the two partners also sealed a controversial deal to jointly produce a new medium-range missile, similar to the Arrow missile that Israel has been developing using U.S. technology and $785 million of U.S. funding. Such sales raise questions about whether Israel will become a back door conduit for Turkey to obtain American technology. Arms control advocates fear that Ankara's access to Israeli weapons could exacerbate the arms race between Greece and Turkey (by breaking the military parity that the United States has sought to maintain) and jeopardize resolution of their dispute over Cyprus. The Israeli connection could also further strengthen Turkey's military-the country's ruling power behind the scenes-just when international pressure is mounting for Turkey to democratize and find a political solution to its fourteen-year conflict with the Kurds."
The role of Syria, which was the president of the UN Security Council at the time of the described shipments, in the whole affair was also highly important. Obviously, Syria was violating the UN arms embargo on Iraq by sending weapons and military equipment delivered to Syrian ports on to Iraq via trucks and rail.
But, the Syrian-Iraqi relationship was not of the quality usually explained in the western press.
It was – and perhaps still is - a purely commercial relationship has developed between Iraq and Syria since Basheer Assad – which is heavily investing in the Syrian economy and development – came to power in Damascus. This cooperation is usually badly exaggerated – foremost by Israeli sources. So, while the Syrian purchases of arms for transfer to Iraq – carried by several Syrian and Iraqi shell companies (one of which is owned by Firas Tlas, the son of the Syrian Defense Minister, Mustafa Tlas, and all of which are surely controlled closely by Basheer Assad to one degree or the other) – which included large shipments of refurbished T-55-tank engines and other replacement parts for T-72s, from Bulgaria and Belarus; military trucks from Russia; anti-aircraft guns from the Czech republic; 80 engines and an unknown number of whole radar systems (as well as spare parts for them) for MiG-29s from the Ukraine (important because the RD-33 engines of the MiG-29 have only a very short life); spare parts and refurbished engines for MiG-21s, MiG-23s, and MiG-25s from Serbia, Belarus, and Hungary, the actual meaning of these deals for the relationship between Damascus and Baghdad mean nothing more and nothing less, but that the Syrians are earning good profits (of course, the governments of all these countries strongly denied any direct involvement or involvement on the part of their citizens: however, on 9 or 10 September, just for example, two Czechs and a German were arrested in the Czech Republic, for allegedly organizing illicit exports of Russian, Ukrainian, and Bulgarian arms to Syria and Iraq over a period of three years; the Czech authorities would not reveal any names, except that involved was a Czech pair, a 28-year-old man, and a 69-year-old-woman; also, in Germany, a Russian with Canadian citizenship was arrested for organizing delivery of Mi-8 and Mi-17 helicopters, Kalashnikov rifles, anti-tank grenades and MANPADs to Iraq).
There is no trace of any kind of wider military cooperation between Syria and Iraq – as usually claimed by several Israeli sources, or caused by the boasting of several Syrian diplomats to which the revelation of these operations brought quite a respect from other Arab countries: on the contrary. Most – if not all - of the 80 RD-33 engines and other spare parts purchased from the Ukraine, for example, ended in Syria any way. It is easily possible, that the same happened also with five Su-24Ms Iraqis reportedly purchased from the Ukraine in 1999 (this report was never confirmed, however). The Iraqis have to pay Syrians for each and every shipment – mainly in oil. And still, the Syrians are very carefull: last week, several units of the Syrian Army – including a tank brigade equipped with T-62Ms and two squadrons of fighter-planes - were put on alert for deployment to the Iraqi border, as scurity precaution against any kind of Iraqi attacks against Syria in the case of a possible US invasion of Iraq. This shows very much how “safe” is Syria feeling in regards to its “new partner” (Israeli press) Iraq.
In Iraq, such deals are mainly controlled by Quasay, (Saddam Hussein’s son), and the specialized brach of the SSS (Special Security Service), which is the most powerfull of all Iraqi security services, and generally tasked with security of the leadership, control of the military organizations (meanwhile, the SSS has at least one officer in each unit – down to the brigade level – of the Republican Guards and the regular Army, as well as down to the squadron level in the Air Force, and the Army Air Corps), and military industry.
Nevertheless, it must be mentioned, that on 23 February 2002 a large shipment of military equipment – organized in the Czech Republic with Syrian and Yemeni export licences – including SAMs and parts for SS-1B Scud ballistic missiles arrived in the Syrian port of Laddakiyah. Two more shipments followed soon after, in March and April. The Israelis became so nervous about these deliveries, that in late April they have sent one of their reconnaissance UAVs into the Syrian airspace, obviously with the task of tracking the movement of a truck convoy carrying military items from Laddakhiyah to Iraq. The “drone”, however, was shot down by Syrian MiG-23 interceptor shortly after crossing the border, and a Jordanian effort to recover it was prevented by a swift deployment of a Syrian team, broght to the crash site by a Mi-8 helicopter.
Earlier this year Ukrainian bodyguard Nikolai Melnichenko revealed recordings of the private conversations of Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma to a court in San Francisco. The tapes, which were inspected by Virginia-based BEK TEK experts, captured a discussion in which Mr. Kuchma approved the sale of three Kalchuga radar systems to Iraq through a Jordanian middleman for $100 million. The Kalchuga is a mobile, passive radar system which can overcome US stealth technology and detect air and land targets up to 500 miles away.
Czech arms company Tesla Pardubice has produced a similar system, called Tamara, which brought down two US bombers during the 1990s Balkan wars. Czech arms dealers tried to sell Tamara systems to Iraq in 1997, but at least one deal was halted in Turkey. How about the rest?
During the cold war, Czech arms companies supplied much of the Third World, including Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan, and North Korea, with high-tech military equipment and explosives. Sanctions against clients have drastically cut into profits, but sales continue in various shades of gray. Last year, despite pressure from NATO allies, the Czech Republic officially sold 20 L-39 Albatross light jet fighters to Yemen, a country notorious for reselling weapons to embargoed states such as Sudan.
Meanwhile, several recent arrests suggest that the black-market trade in Czech-made Semtex, a virtually undetectable plastic explosive popular with terrorist groups, is booming.
http://www.acig.org/artman/publish/article_15.shtml