OPINION — Donald Trump as president displays weakness toward those he envies as strong foreign leaders, while he acts like a bully toward leaders he considers less powerful than himself. Those contrasting natures were on full display last Wednesday.
At the same time Trump was offering unwarranted concessions to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the House Intelligence Committee was hearing testimony that Trump’s designees were demanding that Ukraine’s new president, Volodymyr Zelensky pledge publicly to investigate the Democrats’ 2016 election activities and the Biden’s, Joe Biden of course, being his potential 2020 presidential opponent.
Erdogan had already disregarded Trump’s verbal and written requests not to invade Syria, where in recent weeks Turkish forces have reportedly carried out killings of Kurds, who were U.S. allies in the fight against ISIS in Syria. “I am fully prepared to swiftly destroy Turkey’s economy if Turkish leaders continue down this dangerous and destructive path,” Trump said after the invasion began.
That threat was quickly dropped though when Erdogan agreed to a ceasefire and limitations of how far his Turkish troops would go inside Syria to establish what Turkey was calling a ‘safety zone’ along the Syria/Turkish border.
Before the first of three meetings last Wednesday with Erdogan, Trump said, “We’ve been friends for a long time, almost from day one. And we understand each other’s country. We understand where we’re coming from.” Trump left out that they first met in 2012, when Erdogan, then prime minister, was present for the opening of Trump Towers Istanbul, a licensed Turkish residential and office pair of skyscraper buildings that have since provided the Trump Organization with a steady flow of $1 million or more of income each year.
Trump said the November 13, agenda with Erdogan would include Syria, commercial trade, and the Turkish $2.5 billion purchase of two batteries of the Russian S-400 anti-air defense system. Turkey’s purchase of the S-400 was made under threat of U.S. economic sanctions. Pentagon officials said the Turkish purchase would endanger the U.S. Air Force’s fifth generation F-35 fighter-bomber, 100 of which the Turks had planned to purchase and the U.S. purchase of more than 900 parts for the F-35’s landing gear and fuselage, which under agreement are being produced in Turkey.
When the first elements of the S-400 arrived in Turkey last July 19, Trump’s White House announced, “Turkey’s decision to purchase Russian S-400 air defense systems renders its continued involvement with the F-35 impossible…The F-35 cannot coexist with a Russian intelligence collection platform that will be used to learn about its advanced capabilities.”
Under the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA), which Trump himself, signed into law in August 2017, economic sanctions are authorized to be imposed against a country that becomes a “significant” customer for Russian weaponry. It was specifically directed at countries that purchased arms from Iran, North Korea and Russia. Trump, in a September 2018 Executive Order, delegated implementation of CAATSA sanctions to the Secretaries of State and Treasury.
In a June 2019 letter to Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar, then-Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan wrote that there was a “strong bipartisan . . . determination to see CAATSA sanctions imposed on Turkey if Turkey acquires the S-400.”
Congress specifically wrote into the CAATSA law that if the president didn’t invoke sanctions against Russia, Congress could.
After those first S-400 elements arrived, Turkish personnel being trained in Texas for the F-35 were told they would have to leave the U.S. by July 31, and Turkey was told that purchase of F-35 parts being made in that country would end by March 2020. Meanwhile, other sources for the Turkish-made parts would be located.
During last Wednesday’s discussions, it was clear that Trump wanted to avoid sanctions on Turkey. He brought in five Republican senators, each of whom was concerned with the Turks’ purchase of the S-400s. Trump told reporters in between meetings that there were a lot of alternatives to reconcile the Turkish Russian S-400 purchase that would allow the Turks to continue participating in the F-35 program. He said, “I project that we will it will work out fine. Okay?”
At the closing press conference with Erdogan, Trump, after more than two hours of discussion, said “I’m a big fan of the President [Erdogan], I have to tell you that.”
He then proved it.
He praised Turkey for increasing its defense spending, although it had not yet reached the NATO 2024 goal of two percent of its GDP. He pointed out U.S. military sales to Turkey amounted to “many billions of dollars,” and that the Turks manufacture components for some U.S. weaponry, specifically noting they “make parts of the frame…for the F-35.”
Trump called Turkey’s acquisition of Russia’s S-400 created “some very serious challenges for us, and we are talking about it constantly. We talked about it today. We’re talking about it in the future. Hopefully, we’ll be able to resolve that situation.”
He then said, “We’ve asked our Secretary of State, and [Turkey’s] Minister of Foreign Affairs, and our respective national security advisors to immediately work on resolving the S-400 issue.”
Erdogan, on the other hand, blamed the need to purchase the S-400, as he had in the past, on the Obama administration’s failure to allow Turkey to purchase the U.S. Patriot anti-air system. Erdogan’s solution was for more dialogue around a suggestion that now “under suitable circumstances, we [Turkey] could acquire Patriot missiles as well [as the S-400].”
Here, Erdogan was reacting to an American informal suggestion that Turkey could buy U.S. Patriots and remove the S-400 from its country or never activate the Russian system, keeping its elements stored in warehouses.
The S-400/F-35 problem was hardly the only conflict with the U.S. that Erdogan spoke about during his part of the closing press conference.
He criticized the House of Representatives for passing a symbolic resolution on October 29, which labeled the deaths of roughly 1.5 million Armenians from 1915 to 1923 in the Ottoman Empire, which is now modern-day Turkey, as "genocide."
Erdogan said that resolution “hurt deeply the Turkish nation, and they have a potential of casting a deep shadow over our bilateral relations.” The next day, Trump’s Senate supporter, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), blocked that body’s consideration of a similar resolution saying he was acting “not because of the past, but because of the future.”
The Turkish president also referred to his plan to return some two million Syrian Arab refugees that had fled to Turkey during the fighting against the Bashar al-Assad regime to the “safe zone” his troops had taken along the Syrian border, an area once run by Kurds. When Erdogan first announced that plan during a speech at the United Nations, a U.S. State Department official was quoted as saying it was “probably the craziest idea I’ve ever heard.”
More serious was Erdogan’s claim during the press conference that he was providing Trump with documents seeking extradition to Turkey not only of Fethullah Gulen, the Muslim cleric in exile in the U.S. whom Erdogan has accused of being a terrorist and running a coup against him.
Erdogan said, “We have once again accentuated our expectations vis-à-vis our friends at the U.S. administration to once and for all eradicate FETÖ [the Gulen organization] presence here.” When a question about Gulen came up again, Erdogan said, “We send the terrorists back, if they ask for them, and I’m sure they will do the same for us.”
More light was shed on the Trump/Erdogan meetings one day after the Turkish president returned home.
Last Friday, Ibrahim Kalin, Chief Counselor to the President of the Turkish Republic, told reporters that he and Trump’s National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien had begun bilateral talks, outside NATO, “to evaluate the impact of the S-400s on the F-35s.”
Ismail Demir, president of the Turkish Undersecretariat for Defence Industries, also told the Turkish press in Ankara that Trump’s agreement for the Kalin/O’Brian talks showed an easing in the position of the United States. He added that Turkey was ready to take measures that will address U.S. concerns over the S-400, such as using it “independently without being integrated into the NATO defense system.”
One more sign of Trump weakness appeared last week, this time related to North Korea and its leader Kim Jong un.
Last Wednesday, Defense Secretary Mark Esper, on his way to meetings in South Korea, told reporters there was no need to adjust or reduce joint military exercises with South Korea “at this time.” An already reduced joint air exercise was scheduled to begin shortly.
On Friday, at a joint press conference in Seoul with South Korean Defense Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo, Esper hinted that the exercises, which had drawn North Korean opposition, could be halted “to ensure that we do not close any doors that may allow forward progress on the diplomatic front.”
Two days later, on Sunday in Bangkok, again at a joint press conference with South Korean Defense Minister Jeong, Esper said the scheduled joint air exercise was being indefinitely canceled.
Esper added, “I see this as a good-faith effort by the United States and the Republic of Korea to enable peace, to shape ... to facilitate a political agreement — a deal, if you will — that leads to the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.”
That same morning, Trump had tweeted, “Mr. Chairman,” meaning Kim, “I am the one who can get you where you have to be. You should act quickly, get the deal done. See you soon,” implying another summit could be arranged.
North Korea’s foreign ministry quickly responded saying his country had “no plans to negotiate over its nuclear programs, even if talks were to resume, unless the U.S. offers to first discuss the withdrawal of its ‘hostile’ policies against Pyongyang.”
Hours later, North Korean state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported that Chairman Kim had just overseen air force drills. KCNA quoted Kim saying, “It is necessary to wage a drill without notice under the simulated conditions of real war” for “improving the preparedness” of North Korean military units and developing them into an “invincible army.”
Yesterday, to finish it off, North Korean Foreign Ministry Adviser Kim Kye-gwall said in a statement quoted on KCNA that Pyongyang was no longer interested in holding a "fruitless" summit with the United States. "We will not give the U.S. president anything to boast of without getting anything in return," he said.
With impeachment heating up, it will be interesting to see what Trump does faced with challenges from Erdogan and Kim Jong un, two strong leaders he has been publicly wooing.
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