BY OMER TASPINAR
SABAH- The basic message of US President Barack Obama 's speech in Cairo last week was very clear: the US is opening a new page with the Islamic world. Obama put forth a vision cutting off scenarios of a 'clash of civilizations' between Islam and the West and instead promoting cooperation for peace and justice both in the Middle East and the world at large. So what's the role of Turkey's prospective European Union membership in this vision? If you're curious about this, you should have seen the tension during the meeting between Obama and his French counterpart Nicolas Sarkozy only two days after the speech in Cairo.
Obama knew very well about Sarkozy's views about Turkey, but he didn't mince words. Obama said that a cooperation similar to the concept of 'model partnership' that he put forth between Turkey and the US in Ankara should be established between the EU and Turkey as well. Let's remember the vision that was defined by Obama as 'model partnership.' He defined this cooperation as 'partnership with people across the Muslim world, to advance our common hopes, and our common dreams.' Similarly, this time Obama supported Turkey's EU membership by stressing the concept of civilizations like so: ' In all of this, I think Europe and France have a critical role to play, just as the United States does, in sending a message to Muslims around the world that we welcome and want their participation in a world community that is peaceful, that is prosperous, that is economically integrated, that is developing on behalf of all people and not just some people.'
So the resulting picture is clear: Turkish-EU relations concern Washington very closely. US presidents change, but the importance placed on Turkey's EU membership and the support for this remain the same. Remember the Bush administration's strong support for Turkey's EU bid during the 2004 NATO summit in Istanbul? In response, then French President Jacques Chirac angrily told reporters that France wasn't interfering in US' relations with Mexico.
Clearly, Sarkozy also doesn't like Obama's lobbying for Turkey. So we should ask if the US support for Turkey will cause a backlash in the EU. When I spoke with European diplomats and politicians in Paris about this, they signaled that everything depends on Turkey's performance and that Washington's lobbying shouldn't' have much of an impact. But I disagree. The EU sometimes neglects foreign policy in the face of its bureaucratic, economic and constitutional problems and foreign policy coordination issues, often leaving such decisions hanging in the air. And when a decision is urgently needed, a deadlock between Britain and France often emerges.
As a result, an economic giant such as the EU fails to act in unison in its foreign policy, thus making it a dwarf politically and militarily. Remember the disintegration of Yugoslavia? The EU's ineffectual foreign policy and non-existent military policy was a bystander to the killing of tens of thousands of innocents. At that time, the US, constantly accused of pursuing its military interests and oil, went to the aid of Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo. In light of this poor European foreign policy and strategy performance, the US fears the EU will fall flat when dealing with Turkey as well. So, in a friendly way, Obama warned the EU, as it has a tendency to turn inwards instead of thinking strategically. In short, he told Europe that it gives the best response to terrorism and the 'clash of civilizations' idea by accepting Turkey and that this could also help it become more active in the Middle East. We hope that both Sarkozy and the European public will come to grasp this message in time.