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21 A. Lukin. Nuzhno li rasshiryat ShOS? [Is it necessary to expand the SCO?] // Rossiya v globalnoy politike. 2011. № 3 - http://www.globalaffairs.ru/number/ Nuzhno-li-rasshiryat-ShOS-15227
22 Charter of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Singapore,20 November 2007. P. 22-23 - http://www.asean.org/archive/publications/ASEAN-Charter.pdf
23 D. Litskay. Shanghayskaya organizatsiya sotrudnichestva na poroge rasshireniya [Shanghai Cooperation Organization on the threshold of enlargement] // Mezhdunarodnaya Zhizn, number 4, April 2015. p. 81-82.
"Aziya I Afrika Segodnya", Moscow, 2015, № 10. pp. 2-7.
M. Bakalinski,
Ph.D. (Philology), Zaporozhye, Ukraine
TURKEY AND THE WAR WITH AN ISLAMIC STATE:
GEOPOLITICAL AND ECONOMIC ASPECT
Introduction: Historical significance of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire for Asia Minor
Turkey is a major international actor, and one of the candidates for regional leadership in the Greater Middle East1, in particular, in Asia Minor. Turkey has the right to be called so not only because of the military-political and economic reasons, but also due to the historical reasons. Turkey is a country with an imperial past, this is the last "Caliphate" united the Muslims of different ethnic origins from the Western Balkans to the Arabian Peninsula. In comparison with the Islamic Republic of Iran, another leader of the Islamic world, that "has died quietly" as a state under the control of the Russian and the British Empires since the 19th century and began its revival only after the Islamic revolution of 1978, Turkey has controlled a number of "problem" regions from the Western Balkans to Asia Minor for a long time and quite successfully, being shattered and weakened by internal factors and external influences. Attempts to destabilize the Greater Middle East through the collapse of Turkey occurred in the 19th
century, when Britain and France tried to commit "first world perestroika" of the 19th century, destroying the Ottoman Empire using a rebellious Egyptian emir Muhammad Ali (according Fasih Badarhana, a senior researcher of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the deputy head of Research Center "Arab dialogue"). A. Manachinsky, an orientalist, notes that the "powder keg of Palestine" was founded as a result of secret agreements in the course of signing the contract, "Saika-Picot" about the separation of the Arab lands of the Ottoman Empire in May 1916. [2, p. 40]. The collapse of the Soviet Union becomes the "second world perestroika" in the opinion of the aforementioned scientist. But according to the author of the article, the Russian-Turkish war of 1877-1878 should be considered "the second world perestroika", when the Ottoman Empire had lost control of the Western Balkans, which had led to the global geopolitical catastrophe - the First World War, laying the foundation of all military conflicts of Asia Minor and the Middle East in the 2nd half of the 20th century. Redistribution of the Arab lands of the Ottoman Empire had led to the creation of the Arab national states in the territories, inhabited by different ethnic and religious groups, including non-Arab origin. The consequences of such redistribution of lands in Asia Minor are observed in Syria and Iraq. Thus, the First World War and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire have become the "third world perestroika", and the transformation of Asia Minor (as well as the Greater Middle East as a whole) in the "zone of instability" and "Eurasian Balkans" was one of its consequences [1, p. 65]. The war with the radical organization "Islamic State of Iraq ante" or "al-Dawla al-Islamiya al-Iraq al-Sham" (ISIS) is the biggest and also the most violent example of the region balkanization.
ISIS: Another Attempt of the
World Reorganization
When Turkey and the Arab monarchies presented a united front in the civil war against Bashar al-Assad, the legitimate President of the Syrian Arab Republic, then not only long-standing principle of Turkish foreign policy "no problems with neighbors" has been violated [24], but also a new common enemy of all region - ISIS - has appeared.
ISIS epitomizes Islamic fundamentalism, which has adopted effective policy and PR-technologies, as well as the principles of network warfare, although it was originally created as a counterweight to Islamist organization "Al-Nusra Front." In addition, ISIS engaged in illegal trade in oil and oil products: according to the Ministry of Oil Industry of Turkey, ISIS revenues from the sale of Iraqi oil are amounted to $ 1 million / day during the first two weeks of July 2014 [25]. Terrorist activities of ISIS can lead to a revision of the boundaries of the Greater Middle East, formed after World War I, as published in Foreign Policy, [17; 16], i.e. after the "third world perestroika" resulted of the collapse the Ottoman Empire.
Terrorist activities of ISIS are aimed at further destabilization of Syria and Iraq, which are the "soft underbelly" of Ankara, so the situation is dangerous for Turkey as from the position of regional security and from the economic perspective, because a further escalation of the conflict will affect the investment attractiveness of the region and, as a result, the capital may flow into "more stable" regions. There is a geopolitical explanation for anxiety Ankara. Nowadays there is a change in the world order: the mortgage crisis in the US in 2008 and the consequent "New Great Depression" have demonstrated the failure of the world economic system, based on financial capital. Russian President Vladimir Putin noted in his speech at the plenary meeting of the discussion club "Valdai" that if change of the world
order is not accompanied by a global war or a global clash, then a chain of intense conflicts of a local character.[3] In fact, the situation with ISIS in Asia Minor and the broader Middle East is quite logical on the background of the failure of the financial capital model: the similar financial crises in 1913 and 1929 resulted in two world wars and the collapse of the existing world order system for that period. The collapse of the world order on the basis of the First and Second World Wars resulted in strengthening the position of finance capital through infusion of investment in the destroyed economy based on the industrial capital (obvious example - the Marshall Plan for Europe after World War II).
For today there is a similar situation in the world: the US economy, based on financial capitalism and built on speculation and the principle of "casino" (according to D. Henderson, economic expert, USA) [12], begins to give way, and the proof is the emergence of China on the first place in the world in terms of GDP and the transition of the USA into the second place. The logic of the United States and other countries, which economies are based on financial capital, becomes clear: to create the conditions for countries with industrial capital, under which they will be dependent on countries with financial capital (like after two world wars).
By a strange coincidence, ISIS situation is developed in the region, where economies are based precisely on industrial capital. Turkey has felt the negative impact of the systemic crisis of financial capital to its economy even before the crisis of the world order: in 2013, experts noted that linking of Turkish business to the banking system of the EU have created problems to fulfill their obligations for Turkish operators and financial groups (the reason - financial instability EU market) [10]. ISIS armed forces came to the southern and south-eastern border of Turkey on a number of areas, so the imposition
of a direct conflict clearly has two objectives: geopolitical -reformatting of the Greater Middle East and the entire Eurasian continent through it, and economic - returning to the era of financial capital domination at the expense of weakening or destruction of industrial capital positions, including Turkish.
2. Turkey, Iraqi Kurdistan and ISIS:
Economic Points of Contact
The escalation of the conflict in Iraq has demonstrated unproductive policy of an alliance with radical Islamists in the fight against Syrian President Assad since the attack of ISIS units on the city of Mosul in early January 2014. President Erdogan and the Davutoglu government do not intend to involve Turkey into a military confrontation with militants of ISIS, despite Ankara's imperial past and the concept of "neo-Ottomanism", elevated to the level of state policy2, but they use the military forces of Iraqi Kurds - Peshmerga.
Turkey has to participate in the fight against ISIS, at least indirectly, because of the Iraqi Kurdistan, since Ankara extends the scope of cooperation with it and tries to play an increasing role in the internal politics of this autonomous region of Iraq, and Iraqi Kurdistan acquires the status of "strategic depth" - territory of neighboring state, entering into a zone of immediate interests of another international actor. [4] Turkey considers Iraqi Kurdistan as its "strategic depth" in Iraq that can be described as "hydrocarbon policy" [4, pp. 232-235], i.e. a combination of geopolitics3 and oil and gas economic interests: Ankara and Arbil have been negotiating the construction of gas- and pipelines to Turkey since the beginning of this year, ignoring the official prohibition of the Iraqi authorities and in spite of all the protests from Washington and Baghdad. [7] Oil and gas interests of Turkey in Iraqi Kurdistan are explained with the aspiration of Turkey to diversify
the sources of oil and gas for the Turkish industry. Today, 58% of all gas supplies to Turkey come from Russia. [14] Also, Turkey is objectively interested in further diversification of gas suppliers due to excessively high price of Iranian gas, which is the only alternative to the Russian, in terms of the volume of deliveries for today4 ($ 505 / 1000m3 at the price of Russia's $ 400 / 1000m3) [26], and potential gas supplies from Iraqi Kurdistan would do Ankara less dependent on Tehran and Moscow, including on issues of geopolitics.
Ankara was in a difficult position regarding participation or non-participation in the campaign against ISIS due to the problem of energy security. Turkey has been accused of illegal deliveries of Kurdish oil to the international market, particularly in Israel, and Turkish Energy Minister has been even forced to provide explanations. [22] Recently there have been accusations against Turkey in secret collaboration with the militants ISIS regarding resale of the oil, produced in the occupied fields in northern Iraq, as well as the supply of diesel fuel from Iraq's oil, produced in refineries, controlled by ISIS, in Syria. [25]. In this regard, Ankara reluctantly has provided for the Peshmerga a pass through its territory to the Syrian frontier city Kobanov, beleaguered by militants of ISIS.
3. Economic reasons for non-participation
of Ankara in the military operation against ISIS
Turkish President Erdogan made it clear during his visit to France that the Turkish armed forces would not be directly involved in battles with ISIS [11, c. 1]. The main efforts of Erdogan and his prime minister Davutoglu were aimed at resolving the corruption scandal, that occurred ahead of the elections in 2014, so Ankara has avoided military settlement of the situation at the borders of the southern and southwestern Anatolia, populated by Kurds mainly, disloyal to Ankara
(opposed to Kurds in Iraq ). In our opinion, this is not the only reason for the reluctance of Ankara to join the active opposition to ISIS. Using the Peshmerga creates a counterbalance to military forces of the Syrian Kurds, that will be able to obtain political weight and return to the issue of creating a Kurdish autonomy in northern Syria again in case of a successful military campaign. This situation represents a serious problem for Turkey [15], because it creates another precedent for Kurdish autonomy and provides the ground for the Turkish Kurds' requirements to create a similar autonomous region in Turkey. Thus, Ankara is trying to play ahead, taking an indirect part in the fight against ISIS. It is common knowledge that politics is the most concentrated expression of economics. Analysis of materials from leading Turkish media has proved that indirect participation of Turkey in the fight against ISIS can be explained by its difficult economic situation. [9; 19; 24]. The analysis allowed to identify the following economic reasons for non-participation in active opposition to ISIS:
Decline of the Consumer Confidence Index
Consumer Confidence Index (CCI) is an indicator of readiness of the population to the cost of purchase of consumer goods. According to the Turkish national statistical agencies, the indicators of the index decreased onto 4.6% in October in comparison to the same period in September. Analysis of the data showed that there was a reduction of all categories of consumer confidence in Turkey:
a) Index of Expectations of the General Economic Situation for 2015 fell by 10% in October in comparison with the same period in September. This means that the number of people expected economic improvement over the next 12 months, decreased in October, which means a reduction of objective factors of potential growth of the Turkish economy;
b) Index of Unemployment Expectations over the next 12 months decreased in October by 6.3% in comparison to the same period in September. The reason for the fall is the result of increasing the number of people, fleeing rising unemployment. These fears are substantiated, because the unemployment rate was 9.8% in July this year, that is more than 3 times higher than the permissible level of the EU, where Turkey has been trying to join unsuccessfully for more than 50 years;
c) Index of Expectations of growth in household income over the next 12 months decreased by 1.1% in comparison with those in September;
d) Index of Growth of Savings increased by 9.4% on a monthly basis. This is a pessimistic forecast, because indicator is only 26.1 points (the forecast is considered to be optimistic for the index in the range of 100-200 points). General Dynamics is downward for 10 months in 2014, growth in the consumer confidence index was registered only in September [23].
Loss of Four Positions in the Ranking
of Business Activity of Doing Business in 2015
In 2015, Turkey will fall by 4 positions in Doing Business rating of the World Bank in the light of the escalation of the conflict in the southern borders of Turkey, in spite of the fact that Turkey has improved indicators in the framework of rating to 3 points in 2014 [21], and the outlook for index of business activity of Doing Business is expected positive until the end of 2014 [20]. Subsidence of Turkey's position can have the following negative effects: first, it may adversely affect the level of its investment attractiveness, and secondly, 'it may lead to an outflow of capital from the country.
General Aggravation of External Economic Relations Due to the Shortsighted Foreign Policy of Ankara
According to the Turkish Exporters Association, Turkey's exports to Iraq was reduced in 2014 because of the terrorist activities of ISIS. As a result, suppliers of the United Kingdom have taken Turkey's niche. It was a strong blow to the positions of Turkish exporters, as Iraq is te second largest market for Turkish goods.
Turkey has reduced the trade turnover with Egypt and Syria because of the foreign policy conflict. The Turkish economy has not recovered from the fall of trade with Damascus by 69% so far since the beginning of the civil war in Syria. Egyptian media are calling to boycott Turkish products because of Erdogan's support, which was provided to President Mohammed Mursi (now deposed) and the Islamist organization "Muslim Brotherhood" in Egypt. In addition, the Egyptian authorities have declared the non-renewal of the Agreement on International Trade for the above reasons, which expired in April 2014. Non-renewal of the agreement means rise in price of goods transportation up to $ 12,000 for a truck, that will reduce the competitiveness of Turkish goods in the end.
Disappointing forecasts of experts about the prospects for the export of Turkish goods, ousting of Turkey by the United Kingdom from the leading positions in Iraq, and the increasing presence of China in the countries of Asia Minor, may lead to a significant deterioration in the Turkish economy, and will be an additional argument for the movement of capital in the "more favorable regions", that quite corresponds to the plans of international actors, whose foundation of the economy is financial capital.
Conclusion
Analysis of the geopolitical situation in Asia Minor considering the economic situation in Turkey indicates Ankara's reluctance to be drawn into an armed conflict with ISIS due to the further aggravation of its economic indicators. Study of changes in the world order in historical aspect showed that weakening of the positions of Turkey led to the escalation of conflicts in the region of Asia Minor on a regular basis. Thus, Ankara restricts itself by diplomatic statements only and providing the Iraqi Peshmerge with the passage through its territory to the besieged Syrian Kurds, as a result of the above mentioned situation, combined with internal political tensions due to the corruption scandal, miscalculations in foreign policy, accusations of economic cooperation with ISIS and concern because of the worsening of the Kurdish question in Turkey. So Turkey is determined to prevent the reduction of its investment attractiveness and falling income levels of its citizens.
Ankara undermines its prestige of the international actor, a contender for leadership of the entire Greater Middle East. This situation is beneficial to the Islamic Republic of Iran, it will strengthen its international position in the fight against ISIS, depriving Ankara the opportunity to diversify oil and gas supplies from Iraqi Kurdistan, (where the positions of the pro-Iranian movement "for change" steel reinforced), or the ability to achieve revision of gas prices from Iran.
Turkey faces the threat of another global perestroika" with the consequent collapse of its economy based on industrial capital. Radical revision of its foreign policy and rapprochement with international actors such as Russia, China and Iran (designated as the major players in opposition to financial capital in the "Valdai speech" of Vladimir Putin) can change the situation for Ankara. It is believed that Turkey can not go for rapprochement with Iran because of the historical, ideological and geopolitical reasons, however, such a precedent took
place in 2010-2011. Ankara acted as guarantor of the transparency of the transaction for the purchase of Iran's uranium ore in Brazil and showed a trend of displacement of its foreign policy towards Asia [18]; then it showed the real strength of Turkey and caused "serious concern" in the West. Last year, Erdogan twice put ultimatums to the European Union, announcing a possible revision of Ankara's foreign policy and a choice of his country's course to join the SCO instead of the policy of the EU.
Erdogan's statements about the rapprochement with the SCO, the strengthening of economic cooperation with Russia amid escalating economic and geopolitical confrontation between Moscow and the West [6], as well as the situation around ISIS, gives reasons to make an assumption about the possibility of another rapprochement of Ankara with the ideas of Eurasianism. This will enable Turkey to take its rightful place in the emerging Eurasian geopolitical center of power in the new multipolar world.
Notes
The term "Greater Middle East" is used in the modern theory of international relations for combining of regions of North Africa, the classic Middle Eastern and Central Asia, [5] in one concept
Despite the failure in Bulgaria [24], the implementation of the policy of "New Ottomanism" in the Balkans based on the concept of soft power has been successful as a whole [13].
It is about realization of the concept of "new Ottomanism": Erdogan achieved the political subordination of Iraqi Kurdistan before his election as President, forcing official Arbil close all Turkish schools in the territory of the subject of Iraq, opened at the expense of Fethullah Gulen, his main political and ideological opponent [8]. There is Azerbaijani gas at $ 330 / 1000m3, but its volume is not enough to meet the needs of the Turkish economy. [26]
Ranking of the World Bank, responsible for the comfort of doing business in 189 countries.
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