Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdogan will meet next month to restore a relationship that descended into icy hostility after the Turkish air force shot down a Russian Su-24 jet in November. The renewal of direct contact comes after Mr Erdogan formally apologised to Mr Putin last month for the incident. The potential rapprochement promises to have a significant effect on the regional balance of power and on efforts to resolve a Syrian crisis now in its sixth year.
The two leaders are looking for both immediate and longer term gains. The first priority is domestic security. Mr Erdogan is shoring up his domestic position following the attempted coup this month. The Turkish president has overseen the arrest of tens of thousands of perceived opponents while paying scant regard to calls for restraint from Nato and the European Union. In contrast to western complaints, Mr Putin has encouraged him to restore order.
In response to recent terrorist attacks in Turkey and the cross-border threat posed by extremists, Ankara and Moscow are likely to agree to enhanced intelligence sharing. Investigators have concluded that the suicide attack on Istanbul’s main airport in June was carried out by ISIL-affiliated operatives from Russia and the former Soviet republics of Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. The Russians would welcome Turkish assistance to prevent ISIL operatives returning to their own unstable North Caucasus region.
The key issue for both sides is the future of Syria. Since it broke off all diplomatic ties with Damascus in September 2011, Turkey has provided active support to anti-regime rebels. After five years, the Erdogan government has been left struggling with a huge influx of refugees and an upsurge in domestic terrorist attacks. Moreover, Russian military intervention since last winter has shored up Bashar Al Assad’s regime and put the Syrian opposition on the defensive.
Although Ankara continues to insist that Mr Al Assad must step down, there are signs that the government is looking for a way out. Two days before the attempted coup, Binali Yildirim, Turkey's prime minister, stated that having normalised relations with Israel and Russia, he was “sure we will go back to normal relations with Syria as well”.
After adopting an ambiguous policy towards groups fighting Mr Al Assad, the Erdogan government has now belatedly recognised that the collapse of state authority in Syria and Iraq is posing an increasingly urgent threat to Turkey itself. Combating ISIL and containing Kurdish separatism and insurgency in Syria and south-east Turkey accounts for Ankara’s new emphasis on stabilisation rather than regime change in Syria.
Turkey’s tacit acceptance of Mr Al Assad’s continuance in power would not mean that an Alawi-dominated Syria will be acceptable. Ankara will want to protect the rights of its moderate Sunni allies and also enlist Russian help to cut local Kurdish factions down to size. As the Kremlin is aware that Damascus does not have the strength to reassert its control over all of Syria, Mr Putin has made it clear that there can be no return to the pre-civil war position and that the Syrian people have to be consulted on any settlement.
In the broader strategic context, Mr Putin is enough of a realist to know that Ankara will not discard the ultimate security guarantee offered by its Nato membership. But better bilateral cooperation would enable both parties to ensure that they have the decisive say on Syria’s future. Moscow and Ankara are now in a position to devise a new plan for a settlement and providing ISIL is neutralised, the United States may accept it.
Though Mr Erdogan is prepared to change tack on Syria, he will not completely burn his bridges with western allies alienated by his continuing purge of suspected anti-government plotters. While the Turkish president will no doubt continue to play off Russia and the West against one another, this will be acceptable to Mr Putin so long as he can preserve his Syrian client regime’s hold on power. While Russia accepts that Turkey will remain in the western alliance, it would settle for a “Finland” status for Turkey whereby the country would remain a Nato member without adopting a hostile posture towards Russia.
For Mr Putin, persuading the Erdogan government to abandon efforts to overthrow Mr Al Assad would effectively put a seal of success on Russia’s intervention in Syria. The rapprochement with Russia may also signify the end of Mr Erdogan’s neo-Ottoman ambitions to build up Turkey as a dominant Middle East power. Though Ankara will retain its freedom of action to tackle residual terrorist threats, Mr Erdogan’s quest to bring about regime change in Damascus has effectively failed.
There is considerable irony in the fact that while he seeks to reinvent Turkey as a “managed democracy” built on authoritarian Islamism, the Turkish president is also reviving some of the basic principles outlined by the founder of the secular republic created after the First World War.
As Mustafa Kemal Atatürk pursued his vision of a self-reliant, modernised state, he defined his foreign policy as “peace at home, peace in the world”. Mr Erdogan is preparing to heed the latter clause in Atatürk’s maxim while recasting his country in a new guise that would be largely unrecognisable to the republic’s esteemed founder.
Stephen Blackwell is an international politics and security analyst
