Preparing for War<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n\tThe United States has requested the right to use Turkish air bases, ports and military facilities in a possible war with Iraq. As in the case of the 1991 Persian Gulf War, Turkish officials have hinted that the United States could be allowed to make use of air bases and Turkish logistical support.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tThe stickiest issue remains Washington’s demand to use Turkish territory to deploy nearly 80,000 troops, most of whom then would occupy northern Iraq. Turkey is the only friendly country through which U.S. troops could conduct operations into Iraq’s north.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tPrivately, Turkish officials said they worry that a large U.S. military presence in northern Iraq could end the Turkish Army’s leverage on Iraqi Kurds, whom Ankara fears could declare independence from Iraq if Saddam falls.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tU.S. and Iraqi Kurdish assurances that this would not be the case so far have not dissipated concerns. Defeating its own Kurdish insurgency in 1999, Turkey fears an independent Kurdish state on its southeastern border again might incite Kurds.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tAnalysts said time is drawing near for a U.S. decision on war. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tIf the United Nations-led efforts for a peaceful solution fail, it seems America would want to intervene before the spring, said Soner Cagaptay, head of the Turkish program at the Washington Institute for Near Eastern Policy, a think tank. It also seems the United States has received the support of all other countries needed in the region, including Saudi Arabia. So only Turkey is missing in that list, and to avoid military complications, the Americans want to know as soon as possible what exactly the Turks will do.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tTurkey’s indecision is causing disappointment in the U.S. administration, especially at the Pentagon, and continued Turkish hesitation would be perceived here as a negative reply, said Bulent Aliriza, head of Turkish studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, another Washington-based think tank. If Turkey’s response falls short of Washington’s expectations, and if the Iraq operation falters because of lack of Turkish cooperation, there would be a price it would pay in terms of its relationship with the United States, its closest ally.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tAs part of intensive talks, two senior U.S. officials visited Ankara Dec. 26-28 to discuss planned U.S. economic and military assistance in return for Turkey’s Iraq support. But the results were sketchy.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tOn the economic assistance package, we’ve made some good progress. We’ve established an agreement on the overall structure of the assistance, John Taylor, the U.S. Treasury Department’s undersecretary for international affairs, told reporters after talks in the Turkish capital. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tHowever, Turkish officials said Ankara is demanding around $25 billion in direct and indirect support, while U.S. sources said Washington is considering a package worth about $5 billion in five years. Having received tens of billions of dollars in loans from the International Monetary Fund after facing in 2001 its worst financial crisis since World War II, Turkey fears a war in Iraq will further cripple its fledgling recovery.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tAs part of the planned assistance package, Turkey also wants partial forgiveness of its nearly $5 billion military sales debt to the United States and transfer of military equipment. U.S. response to those requests is not yet clear.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tTalks on Turkish support for any operations against Iraq and U.S. assistance for Turkey will continue this month. U.S. Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is expected to visit Turkey later this month, sources from both sides said.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tWe must negotiate on a strategic axis rather than a tactical one. We must not leave one single dubious point, said one senior Turkish Foreign Ministry official. We have not forgotten Washington’s vital support in numerous critical matters over the past two decades, but at the same time, we must clearly see the future in this part of the world.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tThe same official said U.S. assurances do not satisfy Turkey.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tOnly a few weeks before a crucial U.N. decision on arms inspections, we still don’t know what level of U.S. assistance we may get in return for what level of Turkish support, the official said. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tChief U.N. arms inspector Hans Blix is scheduled to present a report to the U.N. Security Council Jan. 27 declaring the level of Iraq’s compliance to a U.N. order to eliminate Baghdad’s suspected weapons of mass destruction. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\t[Notre recommandation est que ce texte doit \u00eatre lu avec la mention classique \u00e0 l’esprit, Disclaimer: In accordance with 17 U.S.C. 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only..]<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"L’inconnue turque 8 janvier 2003 Dans l’\u00e9chiquier g\u00e9n\u00e9ral autour de l’Irak et autour de la guerre partout annonc\u00e9e contre l’Irak, La Turquie est une inconnue de taille, et une inconnue somme toute inattendue si l’on se r\u00e9f\u00e8re aux habitudes des relations de ce pays avec les USA. Il ne fait d\u00e9sormais plus aucun doute que… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[857,2613,2804],"class_list":["post-65415","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faits-et-commentaires","tag-irak","tag-turquie","tag-usa"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65415","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65415\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}