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The World From Berlin

'The West Needs Turkey as a Reliable Ally'

Tensions between the US and Turkey are growing as Ankara considers attacking PKK bases in northern Iraq and a congressional committee in Washington pushes forward a resolution calling the World War I massacre of Armenians "genocide." German commentators are concerned at the deteriorating relations between the NATO allies.

Relations between the United States and Turkey have hit a new low point as a US congressional committee labels the Armenian massacre as genocide and Turkey prepares the ground for military operations in northern Iraq.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Friday that Ankara was prepared to face up to international criticism if his country launched an attack on Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq.

"After going down this route, its cost has already been calculated," Erdogan told reporters when asked about international reaction to such an operation. "Whatever the cost is, it will be met."

Erdogan's government has decided to seek approval from parliament next week for military incursions into northern Iraq to pursue Kurdish rebels there. The bill would give the government a one-year authorization to launch military operations across the border against the banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).

On Wednesday, Washington warned Turkey against unilateral action in northern Iraq. The US does not want to rock the boat in what is Iraq's most peaceful region, fearing that a Turkish offensive could potentially destabilize the wider region. Turkey is a key US ally and has the second-largest army in NATO.

US-Turkish relations have also been soured by a move on Wednesday by the Congressional Foreign Affairs Committtee to approve a resolution that would label the Ottoman massacre of Armenians during World War I as genocide. The resolution now goes to the floor of the House of Representatives, with a vote expected by mid-November. The resolution is supported by the powerful Armenian-American lobby.

The decision, which is expected to ramp up anti-American sentiment in Turkey, was strongly condemned in the country, with street protests erupting in Ankara and Istanbul. Expressing its diplomatic displeasure, Turkey on Thursday recalled its ambassador to the US for consultations, and the government in Ankara said the resolution, if passed, would damage US-Turkish relations.

Commentators writing in Germany's main newspapers Friday expressed concern at the deteriorating relations between the two allies.

The center-left Süddeutsche Zeitung writes:

"The (congressional committee's) decision could cause great damage, on two levels: on the one hand to fundamental realpolitik interests, but also to efforts to deal with the past in Turkey itself. … The United States and the West need Turkey as a reliable ally. The country has the second-largest army in NATO and is an important anchor of stability in an increasingly hostile and unstable region. … However, it is the timing which is fatal: The resolution coincides with a rising wave of anti-American and anti-West rhetoric in Turkey. … It is hardly a coincidence that Ankara's motion on cross-border military operations in northern Iraq comes at the same time as the resolution in Washington."

"Something strange has been happening in Turkey in recent years. The old taboos have started to crack as intellectuals, writers and journalists push for a genuine reappraisal of the massacres. … Resolutions by foreign parliaments do not help these timid attempts to come to terms with the past. On the contrary, they play into the hands of the nationalists and those who deny the massacres."

The center-right Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung writes:

"The decision ... is a lesson in American politics. In this lesson, a whole variety of people and factors are in play in the background: the influence of a strategically placed lobby, the meaning of history and human rights in conflict with security and political interests, the relationship between Congress and the president, the calculations of leading politicians, and so on ... . It's clear that Ankara henceforth will have less regard for Washington's interests and wishes."

The Financial Times Deutschland writes:

"Politically, it's a inexpensive gift to a few voting blocks in the US, and a very expensive affront to Turkey ... An open fight between Ankara and Washington mostly endangers supply-chains for troops in Iraq that arrive through Turkey. ... The timing for an uproar over history and etiquette could not be more inauspicious."

"American representatives appear little interested: Recently they officially concluded it would be best to have Iraq divided into Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish areas ... For Turkey, a neighboring independent Kurdish state is a horror to imagine."

The left-leaning Die Tageszeitung writes:

"From the Turkish viewpoint, yesterday's resolution looks like a provocation. The reputation of the United States has long been at a low point. You have to go back a long way to find a similarly bad atmosphere -- perhaps to 1974, when Washington and Ankara fell out over Cyprus."

"Since the US invasion of Iraq, the Kurdish PKK has operated from northern Iraq against targets in Turkey without being hindered by the US Army or its allied Kurdish militias. This is a catastrophic political failure on both sides. The United States -- whether out of ignorance or calculation -- has allowed its Kurdish allies in northern Iraq to play the PKK card… . If the US government does not visibly act to hinder PKK attacks in the coming weeks, then there is the risk of a new theater of war emerging in Iraq."

-- David Gordon Smith, 11:30 a.m. CET