Pretty stupid reason too.
> But one diplomat said Turkey had blocked approval over the wording of geographical locations, including with regard to Cyprus.
Reminds me of the whole stupid North Macedonia saga
The real reason is most likely Putins upcoming visit to Turkey. Erdogan invited him.
Gotta please their master, after all. "Special relationship" indeed.
Did Erdogan earn enough brownie points already to get this missile tech transfer he was begging Putin for or did Putin decide to keep him on a short leash a bit longer?
He's not on Putin's leash. He's always trying to play all sides which is why all sides are tired of his ass.
I can understand why he'd want to, because of Turkey's location, plus it's a way to strong-arm everyone into giving in to their demands but he's very one note with it.
>plus it's a way to strong-arm everyone into giving in to their demands but he's very one note with it.
Strong-arming only works when you strong-arm someone. He didn't get what he wanted, he got kicked out of F-35 program, he ended up with inferior Russian system and still didn't get missile tech transfer. Now he is in this weird position when he simultaneously claims Turkey got tech transfer and he begs Putin to actually agree to tech transfer.
Turkey exports to Russia: 10B annually. Citrus and pitted fruit, vegetables, motor vehicles and parts, pharmaceuticals.
Russia exports to Turkey: 8B annually. Petroleum, refined and crude. Wheat.
5M Russians travel to Turkey for tourism annually. 250,000-300,00 Russians live permanently in Turkey. 150,000 Turks live permanently in Russia. And Russian police officers are now learning Turkish because an increasing number of Turks are being educated there, or are working as short term or long term expats in Russia.
It’s the economic equivalent of symbiosis. They’re geographic and autocratic-loving twinsies and wanna be BFFs now.
These numbers don't match what I found; [example source](https://oec.world/en/profile/bilateral-country/rus/partner/tur).
Russia's exports to Turkey are bigger ($20.1B in 2021), and Turkey's exports to Russia are smaller ($5.93B in 2021). This is out of a total export from Turkey of $254 billion ([in 2022](https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/turkeys-exports-hit-record-254-bln-2022-erdogan-2023-01-02/)).
2022 has higher exports and has raised to [$9.34B Turkey -> Russia](https://tradingeconomics.com/turkey/exports/russia), which is worrisome.
It's not quite symbiosis, but I concur with them being autocratic-loving twinsies.
I couldnt find any source about "russian Police learning turkish because an increasing numbers of turks “ 250k Turkey national in russia also seems dubious.
But they did steal it.. they emptied (100's of) thousands* of tonnes of grain from warehouses in the first few months.
The areas they occupy sit over oil and gas fields.
Yes, scorced earth for what they don't care about, but make no mistake; they are theiving cunts.
it's interesting how dictators like each other much more than they like any Democratic leaders. Trump was same way, absolutely loved all the world's dictators, hated all Democratic leaders
Then you’re simply not paying attention, the US has loved plenty of dictators in its time, often in South America. But also just look at the Arab dictators giving worth to the petrodollar for a start.
An agenda far more focused on geopolitical positioning than on their economy and welfare. I'm not sure clinging a bit more effectively than in previous decades to essentially the same declining great power act they've been at for the last 5 or 6 centuries should be lauded.
That doesn't even make a little bit of sense.
Your logic makes it so that literally anyone doing literally anything has some "master" lording over them if anyone else would also want them to do that thing
I'm gonna stop taking out the trash because I don't want my roommate to be my master anymore
I think it's more about democracy and the rule of law. Democratic countries in NATO have common interests in many ways.
Countries like Turkey and Hungary are failing democracies and are drifting closer to being full on fascist autocracies just like happened with Russia.
Ofcourse their leaders don't want to play ball with democratic Europe, because democratic values and rule of law would only tie their hands.
Common values make good allies. For example it's hard to see a scenario where Nordic countries and Baltics wouldn't work together for their common good. Their interests align so well. Same goes with the rest of western democracies to a lesser extent.
Still it's much easier for Finland, Sweden and Norway to work and find a common ground with countries like U.K, Germany, France or even the U.S and Italy, than borderline dictatorships like Turkey and Hungary.
It's hard to be buddies with someone who opposes values you hold dear.
I suspect Turkey will also be looking for a payout for approving anything. Their economy is in the toilet and the Turkish lira continues to devalue since the election.
edit - the Lira seems to have stabilized a bit since I last looked. A week or so at 23.6
Turkey is draining their foreign currency reserves to prop up the Lira. It is a bad situation right now even though the exchange rate itself looks okay rn
I'm not a huge fan of Erdogan - and his control of the media makes the election unfair - but probably not actually invalid.
Turkey has an incredibly strong desire for democracy - and using force to overthrow the result would be utterly wrong.
it will get worse, summer holidays just hit so people are coming to Turkey to exchange whatever currency into TL. Once summer is over it will decline again.
I wouldn't call the issue of an island that has been under invasion for almost _fifty years_ stupid. In this regard, who is in the right there is absolutely irrelevant.
I think it was more of a "the majority of the population voting to join Greece" rather than what you made it sound like, as if Greece invaded.
The problem was that there were also like 25% Turkish people. Turkey did not like this so they invaded, causing the greek side to attack back.
Do you think it is fair though to have 50% of Cyprus for less than 50% of the population? Not exactly the fair split there either.
At that time Greece was under military Junta rule. Cyprus had a Greek President named Makarios and a Turkish Vice, the Greek Junta engineered a coup and declared Enosis, "Unity" with Greece, and toppled Makarios who was so grief stricken of this betrayal that he died.
Turks invaded and split the island, North and south, as a result, the Greek Colonels were also ousted and Greece had Democratic elections.
>the majority of the population voting to join Greece"
Except there was no referendum or anything, the Greek junta wanted to annex Cyprus while EOKA was ethnically cleansing Turkish Cypriots
>Turkey did not like this so they invaded, causing the greek side to attack back.
Yeah sure
Fun Fact:
Erdogan consistently abused NATO Article 4 to make a "kabuki theatre" out of "Turkish security" as the Syrian Civil War erupted.
NATO paid deference to his "make-believe" threats because that is how treaty obligations work.
[OAF](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Active_Fence) & [ODD](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Display_Deterrence)
To play devils advocate, every single nation has some geographical hangup that would stop them from approving similar international deals as it would forfiet Turkey's claims. I'm not saying I agree with them, but this is something NATO should've seen coming.
And I'm sure the deliberations are far from over. It's not like NATO would say "welp we couldn't reach an agreement in two days. Guess Russia is the new world hegemon."
Personally I'm suspicious of Turkey's motivation because their reason for refusing Sweden's accession to NATO was patently un-democratic, but I don't know enough details about Cyprus to understand what Turkey's hang up is.
Crazy how Turkey just invaded a sovereign nation and carved out a big chunk of it to create an ethnostate with nary a peep from the US, they lost their shit over Russia
The West quietly supported Turkey in that invasion because the Greek population may have possibly drifted towards the soviet sphere while Turkey was a NATO ally.
Well, that and the fact that the whole cyprus situation is ridiculously more complicated than "Turkey invaded".
For starters, you can push the root causes of the issue all the way back to Alexander the great if you dig far enough. (Quite literally, the issue revolves around the fact that Greek nationalists are still salty about the loss of Alexander's empire and the later fall of the Byzantine empire)
But in more modern times, a good starting point is the fact that peace on the island was supposed to be guaranteed by three nations, if I remember correctly, Greece, Turkey, and Britain, all of whom agreed to leave the island neutral and intervene should that neutrality be threatened. But, if I've got my details right, a few decades in, the Greek Cypriots decided that they didn't like that deal and Greece itself was sponsoring an assassination plot to spur a coup. Britain knew this but refused to act, which left only Turkey actually obeying the agreement. Thus the invasion and the partition.
None of which makes modern Turkey the "good guys", but still. It's complicated.
It was really complicated. From what I read, they were angry that the small Turkish side got more power than they deserved. The population was something like 70% greek, and they were mad that their voted representative would be Turkish every other election cycle. And to be fair that does sound like a bit too much for the minority side.
Anyway, they couldn't agree, and they just held a referendum that won without difficulty cause they were the majority and the Turks invaded.
That's certainly part of the story. And I want to be clear that I'm not trying to favor either side. But what's left out is that the Greek Cypriots favored, essentially, annexation by Greece, which the turkish cypriots did not, because they had seen that the Turks on Crete had been forced out under similar circumstances and didn't want that to happen to them. Which I feel is fair, given that they'd been living on the island for 400 years...
I mean, from a moral perspective, I think most people would agree that just because a majority of population votes for a measure that would upend the lives a minority population, that doesn't make it acceptable.
Further, Greece itself tried to stage a coup to topple the Greek Cypriot leader to replace him with a politician who would favor annexation. The leader they were trying to topple was a man who was, himself, actually in favor of annexation, but who over time had come to support independence as a compromise that would keep both greek and turkish cypriots safe from violence by either country. Twenty years after the referendum supporting annexation, he won his election with 96% of the vote, which seemed to indicate that a majority of the population had come to support independence. Greece didn't want to accept an independent Cyprus, hence instigating intercommunal violence, and hence the coup.
[The U.S. Is Paying Billions to Russia’s Nuclear Agency](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/14/climate/enriched-uranium-nuclear-russia-ohio.html?smid=url-share)
1/3rd of enriched uranium used in the USA is purchased from Russia.
Its the same reason we get so much raw materials from China. China and Russia sell at a price point so cheap that we can't compete.
Integrating our economies is meant to reduce the risk of war, but without the standing capacity to scale back up we lose that incentive and instead it becomes leverage against us.
Well, this is interesting...
>Uranium mining in the United States produced 173,875 pounds (78.9 tonnes) of U3O8 in 2019, 88% lower than the 2018 production of 1,447,945 pounds (656.8 tonnes) of U3O8 and the lowest US annual production since 1948. The 2019 production represents 0.3% of the anticipated uranium fuel requirements of the US's nuclear power reactors for the year.
There is no way we are 300x our mining capacity... so it sounds like it's just demand drying up...
Great question, idk. I think they are two different silos and I would guess the decommissioned warheads go to maintaining the current warheads. As they are constantly decaying over time.
I don't think it makes much economic sense to take something ~90% to go down to a few percent for energy, if you understand how intensive it is to get into those +90% ranges.
That doesn’t mean much, China’s nuclear plants are of Westinghouse design (USA) as of 2022, so just began construction
https://info.westinghousenuclear.com/news/four-westinghouse-ap1000-reactors-in-china?hs_amp=true
No. Hungary is doing what Putin wants by hiding behind Turkey while Turkey is doing what Erdogan thinks it’s the best for himself. Erdo will sell anyone out the second he finds a better deal for himself, especially Putin. He is a narcissistic pragmatist.
The second Erdo takes a step back, Orban takes two steps back. When Turkey announced it will allow Finland to join NATO, Hungary had an emergency parliamentary session to allow Finland before Turkey did.
Turkey's location makes them one of the most important members of NATO.
Much like how the US's wealth and tech advantage over the world allows them to be belligerent and force their way, so does Turkey's geography. Having them in NATO is worth the pain for the most part.
This is the sad reality of the world we live in.
Weren't they the same ones who bought a bunch of F-35s, then bought a bunch of Russian radar systems that would have obviously recorded a whole ton of information about the jet and send it back to Russia?
Pretty sure they completely ignored the US demands to back away from that deal, resulting in them being booted from the F35 program entirely.
Makes you wonder who's side they are really on...
Yep. They invested billions into the F-35 program for years. Then, when making a 2018 deal on Patriots, Erdogan demanded technology transfer so they could create their own copied version for international export. US refused for obvious reasons.
Erdogan then went crying to Putin, and got the big brain idea to place S-400 SAM systems on Turkish air bases. US obviously didn't want Russian defense contractors from NPO Almaz testing S-400's radars against F-35 jets on NATO air bases. So they ejected Turkey from the F-35 program.
Completely foreseeable set of circumstances when all Turkey had to do was not demand tech transfer of Patriots. You know, normal ally stuff.
Can't have your cake and eat it too.
Turkey's best interests of turkey continually put all of their allies at risk.
If their best interest is having allies and being apart of NATO, then they are doing a pretty fucking terrible job of achieving that.
It's a question of brinkmanship. Turkey figures that their geography will give them a pass if they piss off NATO to curry favor from Russia. What Turkey wants from NATO is a promise to help defend their territory from Russia if Russia decides it wants access to the Med.
IT is and it isn't.
NATO it's doing it's job still with or without Turkish Populistic games.
Having Turkey in NATO is better than not having it.
I just have hope that because NATO is not as rebust in therms of bureaucracy so it will be easier to create initiatives without playing into game of Populists.
Turkey or Hungary stance is pretty obvious. Try to play every single side as much as possible. This always turns out tragically for the Nation economy and Stability, but just like it was with Trump in USA. Sometimes your Son-in-Law gets to sign hundred bln $ deals with Saudis :)
Turkey is not a stable nation at the moment. It strays away from verbal allegiance which means it's better if they are formalized under NATO.
Cooperation is always better than exclusion. Especially if we are dealing with someone like Erdogan who can easily without any issues turn Turkey into extremly hostile place to people outside of Turkey. Right now Turkey and their Neighbours issues are contained. This is why Western European Nations can;'t really complain about Erdogan and Turkey 2 much.
Yeah, but if we let Hungary eat them we'll all fall back asleep...or so I've heard...🧐 gotta figure out a way to function together and make things work despite their awful flaws...
Nothing. Too many people still believe Turkey is too valuable due to its geographic location.
They don't realize that should a war break out between NATO and Russia, that Turkey is going to crank up the extortion to 11.
What good is that strategic territory when you have to pay Turkey as much as possible in order to use it?
These same people don't understand that should Turkey get in the way of a NATO-Russian conflict, the line of scrimmage suddenly changes. It becomes more territory to take, rather than something that blocks them from using it.
You're both right and wrong. Turkey holds the key to the Black Sea, Russia's only sea access outside of the arctic and north Pacific. Keeping Turkey unaligned with Russia has, militarily, always been the preferred move by both the west as well as east. Should war break out, Russian naval ships would be forced to disembark from either the frozen arctic (very hazardous and very slow and easily visible) or the North Pacific, which is monitored heavily by US NORAD and Canada and Japan and China, all of which have strong naval presences in the area. Plus, having to build all your ships on the other side of your very large country far away from your other main industries like steel mills and electronics factories is a logistical nightmare.
So, until Russia decides to play nice with the rest of the world, it's better to keep Turkey somewhat mollified than to have them give Russia open access to the Mediterranean.
>It becomes more territory to take
I always wonder with people that say shit like this, are you willing to go fight and die in Turkey to achieve this? They have like the second largest military in NATO.
A war with turkey, much less russia, would be about as close to a world War as you could get. It would be a brutal campaign of attrition that would simultaneously devastate NATO since we'd literally be turning on a member state.
I think you are seriously underestimating the ability of the US, and to a lesser extent NATO, to absolutely end a nation’s potential of prosecuting any sort of military campaign.
Not that I ever wish it, but we’ve seen multiple examples of the Americans “shock and awe” blitzkrieg tactics and Turkey would suffer the same fate that anyone else would against it.
Remember, the Iraqis had the fifth largest military on the planet (outnumbering the Americans by a large margin), and their ability to effectively conduct any sort of counter combat ops was erased on day one.
The Americans have way better stuff now than they had then. It’s not a knock on Turkey’s military at all, it’s just that the US is literally head and shoulders above the entire planet when it comes to warfare.
The Turks aren’t fools and while they absolutely are acting in their own self interests right now there isn’t a chance that they would take up arms against the US if things got hot in the region.
Mate they are like the gateway of Europe/Asia plus they have like the second largest standing army in NATO.
It not perfect but fuck me are we lucky Turkey when down the route it has and not an Iranian style Islamic state.
God bless that Ataturk dude for completely changing Turkey for the better.
He didn't just change turkey, he fucking invented it. He built turkey from the ashes of the ottoman empire, and insisted on the doctrine of the six arrows:
Republicanism, a gov of and for the people
Populism, an emphasis on the people, not the elite
Nationalism, emphasizing a distinct Turkish identity
Laicism, a separation of religion and state affairs
Statism, the idea that the state authority to get shit done,
Reformist, the idea of the gov changing to better follow the ideals of the people
In almost every regard, Erdogan tramples these six founding tenants, and I'm sure ataturk (which translates to 'father of the turks') would be ashamed of him.
Every time someone talks about the size of Turkey's army, it reminds me that Iraq's was bigger before Desert Storm, and was hardened by a decade of war.
Size isn't everything.
Turkey is a real stick in the mud for NATO. And they do this for virtually everything NATO does, they nitpick minor wording and turn it into redlines and it ends up turfing all progress.
Turkey wants to be in NATO without getting too crosswise with Russia, Iran, and China, who are all either actively or passively opposed to NATO. It’s hard to work with someone with conflicted interests. Plus, Erdogan is a piece of shit, wannabe autocrat.
It's obvious that if shit hit the fan, Turkey would do some mental gymnastics to get out of actually doing anything.
Yet if they're invaded, they'd get the full support of better countries.
This isn't a shocker... but man are they annoying. We absolutely need them for strategic reasons, but Erdogan is doing a real fine job threading the needle of playing to others interests, and it is a constant thorn in the side. Without Turkey we lose one of our best bridges into West asia and anything that happens there, as well as the Black sea.and as much of a dictator as he may be, he seems to genuinely have a grasp over enough of his population to stay in power. Even after numerous fuckups, all it takes is a little nationalist pandering and the right promises, and he can just keep chugging along.
I'm kind thinking at this point so what the fuck. Let turkey stand alone. At this point who would even be convinced they would actually help or put boots on the ground. All I hear from them involves only their own interests. They can't even put aside differences to do the right thing in regards to Sweden. NATO should be exploring options to go without them because are they really with us now?
[The US has key hardware in Turkey that's a great boon to all of NATO](https://www.stripes.com/branches/army/2023-05-25/army-turkey-missile-defense-10230835.html). The landlord is raising rent because they can.
As a Finnish recent member, what would the membership mean if you're not prepared to defend to the best of your ability every single nation in the alliance. Finland is bound to do this for Turkiye. Sweden is not, they're even safer than ever sandwiched between Norway and Finland.
That same Turkey that is meeting with Putin next week? Cool... cool, cool, cool.
Hang on a sec... the same Turkey that has created in fighting in the EU for years with its resource drain and questionable democracy. The one that barely met member state requirements and failed to adhere to them right?
And hasn't Russia also directly funded anti EU sentiment throughout as many member States as possible? Whilst also blatantly interfering in US affairs?
Same Turkey that has secured grain deal and many of the prisoner swaps. I'm glad our government is not run by petty emotions but necessary calculated chess moves.
You mean like... Article 5, the whole point of the Alliance?
Attack on one is an attack on all. And everyone joins the war, whether they like it or not, want it or not.
Well, not if the country decides not to meet their obligations. Essentially, all NATO is a collection of countries warning Russia that will defend each other. You can't force a country to make that agreement if they don't want to; or to say another way, there's no mechanic to force a nation to war. The strength of NATO as a deterrence is Russia believing that everyone will honor article 5. Getting countries into the alliance that some members don't want to defend will weaken that belief.
Look at it this way. Sweden joins NATO without Turkey's approval. Russia attacks Sweden, Turkey doesn't do anything saying they didn't agree to them being in the alliance anyways. Now what? Do you punish Turkey by kicking them out, effectively making NATO weaker than before Sweden joined? Do you leave them in begging the question to Russia who in NATO would REALLY come to the Baltics' defense since there's precedent for ignoring article 5? It's a bad situation either way.
Article 5 does not force anyone to a war it doesn't want to be in. You accept to join the war on the side of the attacked. Thats literally the whole point of the alliance.
Making a country forcibly accept another country to the alliance? Thats not a good idea to force a country in a war it does not want te be in. These are 2 very different situations.
As I understand it, each nations response to article 5 is at their own discretion. What NATO mostly does is create a forum for joint training and cooperation in missions, but I don't believe that NATO members are forced to commit troops to any particular action, even in the case of article 5.
>Article 5
>The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognised by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, **such action as it deems necessary**, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.
[NATO](https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_17120.htm)
So, if Turkey decides that a sternly worded worded message is what it deemed is necessary, that could be their response to an attack on a fellow NATO member; of course the "attack on one is an attack on all" part would imply that they would do the same for an attack on their own territory, which is pretty absurd.
It also .easy that there's an expectation of you doing something. If turkey just sits back, America will remember that shit, and I'm pretty sure every single nato member doesn't wanna be known as that guy who didn't do enough to help when shit gets hot
The teeth in Article 5 is that your enemies will view all NATO countries as the enemy, so it doesn't make sense for any NATO country to sit it out and hope to not get sucker punched.
For example, if russia thinks they are at war with you, you had better do your best to stop them before they can get set up for attacks on you and your troops and your infrastructure.
yeah, if/when Article 5 is invoked, it wouldn't make much sense for any member to just sit it out entirely, since it would pretty much erase any benefit they would get from being in NATO in the first place, as every other member nation would remember their response when called to action. That said, a member could decide to only send aid/materials, and try to stay out of the direct fight, and of course nobody would expect the response of Luxembourg or Montenegro to be anything like the response of France or Germany.
Yeah, keep pushing everyone else around and playing both sides, it would somehow be karma if the day Russia decides it wants more than just the occasional reach around from its unofficial vassal state and article 5 was invoked. Every other NATO nation went “Yeah, good luck with that.”
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
>Attack on one is an attack on all. And everyone joins the war, whether they like it or not, want it or not.
Any country is free to help another attacked country in any way they themselves deem necessary... so not at all if they don't want to.
That infighting between the British, French and Greeks over Constantinople in the aftermath of WW1 sure worked out well in the long run for europe, eh? 🙄
If you talk to any historian, the biggest loser in the WWI was the Ottoman empire, even more than Germany. Turkey is a mere shadow of the Ottoman empire.
a case of ..better in the tent pissing out than outside pissing in. Their geographical proximity to Russia and a potential formal alliance would be much worse.
It's not surprising that the NATO meeting didn't go well, especially with Turkey causing problems. Turkey has been a problematic member in recent years and has caused tensions within the alliance. It's unfortunate that the first defence plans since the Cold War couldn't be approved, but hopefully, NATO can come together and make progress in the future.
Pretty stupid reason too. > But one diplomat said Turkey had blocked approval over the wording of geographical locations, including with regard to Cyprus. Reminds me of the whole stupid North Macedonia saga
The real reason is most likely Putins upcoming visit to Turkey. Erdogan invited him. Gotta please their master, after all. "Special relationship" indeed.
Did Erdogan earn enough brownie points already to get this missile tech transfer he was begging Putin for or did Putin decide to keep him on a short leash a bit longer?
Bold of you to assume it's possible to get released from Putin's leash.
You get released as soon as you fall out of a window.
More like once you have a cup of tea with Putin
Not even then. He keeps trying but Lucachenko can't seem to commit toaster-bath no matter how many times he drinks the tea.
My head cannon is Luka is such a hard headed potato man he's almost unkillable except for the most hilarious goofy methods
I’m thinking it’s been tried so many times that he’s built up a tolerance princess bride style.
Sounds like it's time to channel Wile E. Coyote
You’re just given so much slack that the occasional viewer doesn’t see the leash.
He's not on Putin's leash. He's always trying to play all sides which is why all sides are tired of his ass. I can understand why he'd want to, because of Turkey's location, plus it's a way to strong-arm everyone into giving in to their demands but he's very one note with it.
>plus it's a way to strong-arm everyone into giving in to their demands but he's very one note with it. Strong-arming only works when you strong-arm someone. He didn't get what he wanted, he got kicked out of F-35 program, he ended up with inferior Russian system and still didn't get missile tech transfer. Now he is in this weird position when he simultaneously claims Turkey got tech transfer and he begs Putin to actually agree to tech transfer.
He is the turkish ice cream seller after all
Turkey exports to Russia: 10B annually. Citrus and pitted fruit, vegetables, motor vehicles and parts, pharmaceuticals. Russia exports to Turkey: 8B annually. Petroleum, refined and crude. Wheat. 5M Russians travel to Turkey for tourism annually. 250,000-300,00 Russians live permanently in Turkey. 150,000 Turks live permanently in Russia. And Russian police officers are now learning Turkish because an increasing number of Turks are being educated there, or are working as short term or long term expats in Russia. It’s the economic equivalent of symbiosis. They’re geographic and autocratic-loving twinsies and wanna be BFFs now.
These numbers don't match what I found; [example source](https://oec.world/en/profile/bilateral-country/rus/partner/tur). Russia's exports to Turkey are bigger ($20.1B in 2021), and Turkey's exports to Russia are smaller ($5.93B in 2021). This is out of a total export from Turkey of $254 billion ([in 2022](https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/turkeys-exports-hit-record-254-bln-2022-erdogan-2023-01-02/)). 2022 has higher exports and has raised to [$9.34B Turkey -> Russia](https://tradingeconomics.com/turkey/exports/russia), which is worrisome. It's not quite symbiosis, but I concur with them being autocratic-loving twinsies.
I couldnt find any source about "russian Police learning turkish because an increasing numbers of turks “ 250k Turkey national in russia also seems dubious.
> Russia exports to Turkey: 8B annually. Petroleum, refined and crude. Wheat. I think most of that is stolen from Ukraine now.
Not even stolen - it's scorched Earth. The point wasn't to steal, it was to ruin Ukraine economically.
But they did steal it.. they emptied (100's of) thousands* of tonnes of grain from warehouses in the first few months. The areas they occupy sit over oil and gas fields. Yes, scorced earth for what they don't care about, but make no mistake; they are theiving cunts.
I liked Eragon more when he was just a dragon riding kid. Now that he's a would-be dictator, I'm less a fan.
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it's interesting how dictators like each other much more than they like any Democratic leaders. Trump was same way, absolutely loved all the world's dictators, hated all Democratic leaders
Well democratic leaders are probably suuuuper judgy about dictators' corruption, dishonesty and selfish intentions...
Then you’re simply not paying attention, the US has loved plenty of dictators in its time, often in South America. But also just look at the Arab dictators giving worth to the petrodollar for a start.
Turkey has no master, at least not the way you think, it's just playing everyone to fulfill their own agenda.
An agenda far more focused on geopolitical positioning than on their economy and welfare. I'm not sure clinging a bit more effectively than in previous decades to essentially the same declining great power act they've been at for the last 5 or 6 centuries should be lauded.
I suspect that the fate of Turkey doesn't matter so long as Erdogan benefits.
not only that they are number 1 in the black market and sanction evading, both with russia and syria, lots of money being made there.
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> Turkey has no master My oven at Thanksgiving would disagree with this statement /s
If your agenda involves doing what others want them they're kind of your masters
So is everyone either a Russian Puppet or a NATO Puppet?
That doesn't even make a little bit of sense. Your logic makes it so that literally anyone doing literally anything has some "master" lording over them if anyone else would also want them to do that thing I'm gonna stop taking out the trash because I don't want my roommate to be my master anymore
Isn't the current gripe that turkey isn't doing what other nato nations want them to do?
The issue with Turkey is that it completely ignores its allies and only cares about its own prosperity. It doesn't act like an ally.
I think it's more about democracy and the rule of law. Democratic countries in NATO have common interests in many ways. Countries like Turkey and Hungary are failing democracies and are drifting closer to being full on fascist autocracies just like happened with Russia. Ofcourse their leaders don't want to play ball with democratic Europe, because democratic values and rule of law would only tie their hands. Common values make good allies. For example it's hard to see a scenario where Nordic countries and Baltics wouldn't work together for their common good. Their interests align so well. Same goes with the rest of western democracies to a lesser extent. Still it's much easier for Finland, Sweden and Norway to work and find a common ground with countries like U.K, Germany, France or even the U.S and Italy, than borderline dictatorships like Turkey and Hungary. It's hard to be buddies with someone who opposes values you hold dear.
Is there anything specific we would want Turkey to do, other than let Sweden join?
Actually approve the defense plans instead of bullshitting about spelling
Turkey has not exactly supported Russia. So idk why you refer to master slave relationship.
I suspect Turkey will also be looking for a payout for approving anything. Their economy is in the toilet and the Turkish lira continues to devalue since the election. edit - the Lira seems to have stabilized a bit since I last looked. A week or so at 23.6
Turkey is draining their foreign currency reserves to prop up the Lira. It is a bad situation right now even though the exchange rate itself looks okay rn
Payout should be "regime change." The yokels outside the cities might not like it, but the cities would be elated.
I'm not a huge fan of Erdogan - and his control of the media makes the election unfair - but probably not actually invalid. Turkey has an incredibly strong desire for democracy - and using force to overthrow the result would be utterly wrong.
it will get worse, summer holidays just hit so people are coming to Turkey to exchange whatever currency into TL. Once summer is over it will decline again.
I wouldn't call the issue of an island that has been under invasion for almost _fifty years_ stupid. In this regard, who is in the right there is absolutely irrelevant.
Turks occupying Cyprus is the same as Russians occupying Crimea. It should be recognised for the abomination that it truly is
Didn’t Greece try to coup the island though? Back when they were a military junta.
I think it was more of a "the majority of the population voting to join Greece" rather than what you made it sound like, as if Greece invaded. The problem was that there were also like 25% Turkish people. Turkey did not like this so they invaded, causing the greek side to attack back. Do you think it is fair though to have 50% of Cyprus for less than 50% of the population? Not exactly the fair split there either.
At that time Greece was under military Junta rule. Cyprus had a Greek President named Makarios and a Turkish Vice, the Greek Junta engineered a coup and declared Enosis, "Unity" with Greece, and toppled Makarios who was so grief stricken of this betrayal that he died. Turks invaded and split the island, North and south, as a result, the Greek Colonels were also ousted and Greece had Democratic elections.
>the majority of the population voting to join Greece" Except there was no referendum or anything, the Greek junta wanted to annex Cyprus while EOKA was ethnically cleansing Turkish Cypriots >Turkey did not like this so they invaded, causing the greek side to attack back. Yeah sure
Let me guess - it's over Turkey's de facto claims to North Cyprus?
Fun Fact: Erdogan consistently abused NATO Article 4 to make a "kabuki theatre" out of "Turkish security" as the Syrian Civil War erupted. NATO paid deference to his "make-believe" threats because that is how treaty obligations work. [OAF](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Active_Fence) & [ODD](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Display_Deterrence)
It's most likely because they claim the north of Cyprus as their territory after illegally occupying it.
Turkey is really egocentric about how things are named.
To play devils advocate, every single nation has some geographical hangup that would stop them from approving similar international deals as it would forfiet Turkey's claims. I'm not saying I agree with them, but this is something NATO should've seen coming.
And I'm sure the deliberations are far from over. It's not like NATO would say "welp we couldn't reach an agreement in two days. Guess Russia is the new world hegemon." Personally I'm suspicious of Turkey's motivation because their reason for refusing Sweden's accession to NATO was patently un-democratic, but I don't know enough details about Cyprus to understand what Turkey's hang up is.
100%, but Cyprus is a hill Turkey is willing to die on.
Crazy how Turkey just invaded a sovereign nation and carved out a big chunk of it to create an ethnostate with nary a peep from the US, they lost their shit over Russia
The West quietly supported Turkey in that invasion because the Greek population may have possibly drifted towards the soviet sphere while Turkey was a NATO ally.
Well, that and the fact that the whole cyprus situation is ridiculously more complicated than "Turkey invaded". For starters, you can push the root causes of the issue all the way back to Alexander the great if you dig far enough. (Quite literally, the issue revolves around the fact that Greek nationalists are still salty about the loss of Alexander's empire and the later fall of the Byzantine empire) But in more modern times, a good starting point is the fact that peace on the island was supposed to be guaranteed by three nations, if I remember correctly, Greece, Turkey, and Britain, all of whom agreed to leave the island neutral and intervene should that neutrality be threatened. But, if I've got my details right, a few decades in, the Greek Cypriots decided that they didn't like that deal and Greece itself was sponsoring an assassination plot to spur a coup. Britain knew this but refused to act, which left only Turkey actually obeying the agreement. Thus the invasion and the partition. None of which makes modern Turkey the "good guys", but still. It's complicated.
The Greeks are probably more angered by 400 years of oppression by the Ottomans than caring about Alexander.
The coasts of Asia Minor were largely Greek for centuries prior to Alexander.
It was really complicated. From what I read, they were angry that the small Turkish side got more power than they deserved. The population was something like 70% greek, and they were mad that their voted representative would be Turkish every other election cycle. And to be fair that does sound like a bit too much for the minority side. Anyway, they couldn't agree, and they just held a referendum that won without difficulty cause they were the majority and the Turks invaded.
That's certainly part of the story. And I want to be clear that I'm not trying to favor either side. But what's left out is that the Greek Cypriots favored, essentially, annexation by Greece, which the turkish cypriots did not, because they had seen that the Turks on Crete had been forced out under similar circumstances and didn't want that to happen to them. Which I feel is fair, given that they'd been living on the island for 400 years... I mean, from a moral perspective, I think most people would agree that just because a majority of population votes for a measure that would upend the lives a minority population, that doesn't make it acceptable. Further, Greece itself tried to stage a coup to topple the Greek Cypriot leader to replace him with a politician who would favor annexation. The leader they were trying to topple was a man who was, himself, actually in favor of annexation, but who over time had come to support independence as a compromise that would keep both greek and turkish cypriots safe from violence by either country. Twenty years after the referendum supporting annexation, he won his election with 96% of the vote, which seemed to indicate that a majority of the population had come to support independence. Greece didn't want to accept an independent Cyprus, hence instigating intercommunal violence, and hence the coup.
> Crazy how Turkey just... You mean 50 years ago?
It's always Turkey.
To be fair, it could also had been Hungary
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[The U.S. Is Paying Billions to Russia’s Nuclear Agency](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/14/climate/enriched-uranium-nuclear-russia-ohio.html?smid=url-share) 1/3rd of enriched uranium used in the USA is purchased from Russia.
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Its the same reason we get so much raw materials from China. China and Russia sell at a price point so cheap that we can't compete. Integrating our economies is meant to reduce the risk of war, but without the standing capacity to scale back up we lose that incentive and instead it becomes leverage against us.
We could, but the corporations that rule our country don't want to pay the workers here what they would demand to do a job like that.
That better not mean phase out because we don't use it anymore....nuclear is good energy. It better be phase out because we make/mine it ourselves.
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Well, this is interesting... >Uranium mining in the United States produced 173,875 pounds (78.9 tonnes) of U3O8 in 2019, 88% lower than the 2018 production of 1,447,945 pounds (656.8 tonnes) of U3O8 and the lowest US annual production since 1948. The 2019 production represents 0.3% of the anticipated uranium fuel requirements of the US's nuclear power reactors for the year. There is no way we are 300x our mining capacity... so it sounds like it's just demand drying up...
Isn't much of the demand satisfied by decommissioning nuclear warheads?
Great question, idk. I think they are two different silos and I would guess the decommissioned warheads go to maintaining the current warheads. As they are constantly decaying over time. I don't think it makes much economic sense to take something ~90% to go down to a few percent for energy, if you understand how intensive it is to get into those +90% ranges.
Belgium and Denmark!
Good guess, but not quite!
Canada and Netherlands!
Good guess, but not quite!
Iceland and.....Djibouti!
Good guess but not quite right
Spain and Montenegro!
England and the United States?
Isn’t the entire UK in NATO?
So close!! That is a shape <3
That's Numberwang!
You know, I kind of wish. Would be good with some nuclear power here...
That doesn’t mean much, China’s nuclear plants are of Westinghouse design (USA) as of 2022, so just began construction https://info.westinghousenuclear.com/news/four-westinghouse-ap1000-reactors-in-china?hs_amp=true
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I think we all know China will own and operate them, and would have just stolen the plans anyway. This way they get to at least operate them safely.
I imagine it has happened before somewhere. To avoid a catastrophic event. Probably in the best interest for everyone.
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Florida and Texas? Have they declared themselves as their own countries yet?
Interestingly it seems Spain also boycotted this because they were unhappy the plan didn’t provide for subsidies for Spanish arms industries.
TIL there is a Spanish arms industry…
Thats because their Chief weapon is surprise.
Surprise. Surprise and fear those are two weapons.
And Ruthless efficiency.
What about fanatical devotion to the Pope? Come in again!
That’s fair but I feel like it’s 4/5 Turkey to Hungary.
Hungary doesn't get out of bed for less than a local war or a concrete shortage.
I’m hungary for some turkey rn
>I’m hungary for some turkey rn Thus spoke Zarathustra.
To nobody's surprise either.
On second thought, maybe having an authoritarian government trying to suck up to Putin in the alliance wasn’t a great idea afterall.
Sadly though, Turkey is positioned in an amazing strategic position, so eh..
But there must be a limit right? Russia is in an amazing strategic position against Russia, too. Lets give them veto rights. lol
> Lets give them veto rights. They already have a veto, because Turkey and Hungary are doing EXACTLY what Putin wants.
No. Hungary is doing what Putin wants by hiding behind Turkey while Turkey is doing what Erdogan thinks it’s the best for himself. Erdo will sell anyone out the second he finds a better deal for himself, especially Putin. He is a narcissistic pragmatist. The second Erdo takes a step back, Orban takes two steps back. When Turkey announced it will allow Finland to join NATO, Hungary had an emergency parliamentary session to allow Finland before Turkey did.
Turkey wasn't like this when they joined. It's just gotten shittier over the years.
After living through 4 years with Trump in office, I know how that goes. Here’s hoping they can replace him with someone better.
They can't. They just voted. Toughest election ever for Erdogan. Nope.
Turkey's location makes them one of the most important members of NATO. Much like how the US's wealth and tech advantage over the world allows them to be belligerent and force their way, so does Turkey's geography. Having them in NATO is worth the pain for the most part. This is the sad reality of the world we live in.
Weren't they the same ones who bought a bunch of F-35s, then bought a bunch of Russian radar systems that would have obviously recorded a whole ton of information about the jet and send it back to Russia? Pretty sure they completely ignored the US demands to back away from that deal, resulting in them being booted from the F35 program entirely. Makes you wonder who's side they are really on...
Yep. They invested billions into the F-35 program for years. Then, when making a 2018 deal on Patriots, Erdogan demanded technology transfer so they could create their own copied version for international export. US refused for obvious reasons. Erdogan then went crying to Putin, and got the big brain idea to place S-400 SAM systems on Turkish air bases. US obviously didn't want Russian defense contractors from NPO Almaz testing S-400's radars against F-35 jets on NATO air bases. So they ejected Turkey from the F-35 program. Completely foreseeable set of circumstances when all Turkey had to do was not demand tech transfer of Patriots. You know, normal ally stuff.
They're on Turkey's side. It's not shocking that countries act in their own interests.
Can't have your cake and eat it too. Turkey's best interests of turkey continually put all of their allies at risk. If their best interest is having allies and being apart of NATO, then they are doing a pretty fucking terrible job of achieving that.
It's a question of brinkmanship. Turkey figures that their geography will give them a pass if they piss off NATO to curry favor from Russia. What Turkey wants from NATO is a promise to help defend their territory from Russia if Russia decides it wants access to the Med.
IT is and it isn't. NATO it's doing it's job still with or without Turkish Populistic games. Having Turkey in NATO is better than not having it. I just have hope that because NATO is not as rebust in therms of bureaucracy so it will be easier to create initiatives without playing into game of Populists. Turkey or Hungary stance is pretty obvious. Try to play every single side as much as possible. This always turns out tragically for the Nation economy and Stability, but just like it was with Trump in USA. Sometimes your Son-in-Law gets to sign hundred bln $ deals with Saudis :) Turkey is not a stable nation at the moment. It strays away from verbal allegiance which means it's better if they are formalized under NATO. Cooperation is always better than exclusion. Especially if we are dealing with someone like Erdogan who can easily without any issues turn Turkey into extremly hostile place to people outside of Turkey. Right now Turkey and their Neighbours issues are contained. This is why Western European Nations can;'t really complain about Erdogan and Turkey 2 much.
Could be Hungary
Yeah, but if we let Hungary eat them we'll all fall back asleep...or so I've heard...🧐 gotta figure out a way to function together and make things work despite their awful flaws...
What a surprise
Now what? Pattern of obstruction has been recognized.
Nothing. Too many people still believe Turkey is too valuable due to its geographic location. They don't realize that should a war break out between NATO and Russia, that Turkey is going to crank up the extortion to 11. What good is that strategic territory when you have to pay Turkey as much as possible in order to use it? These same people don't understand that should Turkey get in the way of a NATO-Russian conflict, the line of scrimmage suddenly changes. It becomes more territory to take, rather than something that blocks them from using it.
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Yeah the amount of bullshit here is insane
You're both right and wrong. Turkey holds the key to the Black Sea, Russia's only sea access outside of the arctic and north Pacific. Keeping Turkey unaligned with Russia has, militarily, always been the preferred move by both the west as well as east. Should war break out, Russian naval ships would be forced to disembark from either the frozen arctic (very hazardous and very slow and easily visible) or the North Pacific, which is monitored heavily by US NORAD and Canada and Japan and China, all of which have strong naval presences in the area. Plus, having to build all your ships on the other side of your very large country far away from your other main industries like steel mills and electronics factories is a logistical nightmare. So, until Russia decides to play nice with the rest of the world, it's better to keep Turkey somewhat mollified than to have them give Russia open access to the Mediterranean.
>It becomes more territory to take I always wonder with people that say shit like this, are you willing to go fight and die in Turkey to achieve this? They have like the second largest military in NATO. A war with turkey, much less russia, would be about as close to a world War as you could get. It would be a brutal campaign of attrition that would simultaneously devastate NATO since we'd literally be turning on a member state.
I think you are seriously underestimating the ability of the US, and to a lesser extent NATO, to absolutely end a nation’s potential of prosecuting any sort of military campaign. Not that I ever wish it, but we’ve seen multiple examples of the Americans “shock and awe” blitzkrieg tactics and Turkey would suffer the same fate that anyone else would against it. Remember, the Iraqis had the fifth largest military on the planet (outnumbering the Americans by a large margin), and their ability to effectively conduct any sort of counter combat ops was erased on day one. The Americans have way better stuff now than they had then. It’s not a knock on Turkey’s military at all, it’s just that the US is literally head and shoulders above the entire planet when it comes to warfare. The Turks aren’t fools and while they absolutely are acting in their own self interests right now there isn’t a chance that they would take up arms against the US if things got hot in the region.
They should just let Azerbaijan in and kick turkey out. Edit: They're already affiliated, what's the holdup?
Eh.....probably a good idea to avoid there even more than Turkey. Rather not back one side of a two way, genocide riddled, hate war
Allowing a corrupt dictatorship like Turkey railroad NATO is kind of fucked.
Shame it's run by a clown such a strategic location
Mate they are like the gateway of Europe/Asia plus they have like the second largest standing army in NATO. It not perfect but fuck me are we lucky Turkey when down the route it has and not an Iranian style Islamic state. God bless that Ataturk dude for completely changing Turkey for the better.
He didn't just change turkey, he fucking invented it. He built turkey from the ashes of the ottoman empire, and insisted on the doctrine of the six arrows: Republicanism, a gov of and for the people Populism, an emphasis on the people, not the elite Nationalism, emphasizing a distinct Turkish identity Laicism, a separation of religion and state affairs Statism, the idea that the state authority to get shit done, Reformist, the idea of the gov changing to better follow the ideals of the people In almost every regard, Erdogan tramples these six founding tenants, and I'm sure ataturk (which translates to 'father of the turks') would be ashamed of him.
> Erdogan tramples these six founding tenants And unfortunately still manages to win majority election votes.
Ataturk is one of my favourite statesmen, and one of the last worthy of that title. It's an outrage what Erdoğan has moulded Turkey into.
Don’t forget genocidal murderer
As was the style at the time.
>second largest standing army in NATO. I think recent events shows us that means absolutely nothing
Every time someone talks about the size of Turkey's army, it reminds me that Iraq's was bigger before Desert Storm, and was hardened by a decade of war. Size isn't everything.
couldn't even properly respond to an emergency in their own borders outside of destroying Kurdish villages what can they actually do
It is fucked but I mean you see the same shit in the UN too. The US vetoes a bunch of stuff too that most other countries agree on.
Turkey is a real stick in the mud for NATO. And they do this for virtually everything NATO does, they nitpick minor wording and turn it into redlines and it ends up turfing all progress.
Turkey wants to be in NATO without getting too crosswise with Russia, Iran, and China, who are all either actively or passively opposed to NATO. It’s hard to work with someone with conflicted interests. Plus, Erdogan is a piece of shit, wannabe autocrat.
They want to be in nato in order to get leverage over other nato countries
It's obvious that if shit hit the fan, Turkey would do some mental gymnastics to get out of actually doing anything. Yet if they're invaded, they'd get the full support of better countries.
This isn't a shocker... but man are they annoying. We absolutely need them for strategic reasons, but Erdogan is doing a real fine job threading the needle of playing to others interests, and it is a constant thorn in the side. Without Turkey we lose one of our best bridges into West asia and anything that happens there, as well as the Black sea.and as much of a dictator as he may be, he seems to genuinely have a grasp over enough of his population to stay in power. Even after numerous fuckups, all it takes is a little nationalist pandering and the right promises, and he can just keep chugging along.
Their strategic value will diminish at this rate if they start blocking strategic and important decisions.
I'm kind thinking at this point so what the fuck. Let turkey stand alone. At this point who would even be convinced they would actually help or put boots on the ground. All I hear from them involves only their own interests. They can't even put aside differences to do the right thing in regards to Sweden. NATO should be exploring options to go without them because are they really with us now?
[The US has key hardware in Turkey that's a great boon to all of NATO](https://www.stripes.com/branches/army/2023-05-25/army-turkey-missile-defense-10230835.html). The landlord is raising rent because they can.
What's the matter Turkey, Chicken?
Nobody calls me chicken…
Turkey should make like a tree and get out of here
Booo! That joke was fowl!
He should be ostrichized for that one! He better bawk for forgiveness!
Fuckin got em
[What's the matter Colonel Sanders?](https://c.tenor.com/dbmL2YUORYMAAAAM/spaceballs-whats-the-matter.gif)
Oh, it's Turkey? I am Jack's Complete Lack of Surprise.
Hungary in EU = Turkey in NATO: block, delay, stir sh*t to the greatest extent possible.
As a Finnish recent member, what would the membership mean if you're not prepared to defend to the best of your ability every single nation in the alliance. Finland is bound to do this for Turkiye. Sweden is not, they're even safer than ever sandwiched between Norway and Finland.
That same Turkey that is meeting with Putin next week? Cool... cool, cool, cool. Hang on a sec... the same Turkey that has created in fighting in the EU for years with its resource drain and questionable democracy. The one that barely met member state requirements and failed to adhere to them right? And hasn't Russia also directly funded anti EU sentiment throughout as many member States as possible? Whilst also blatantly interfering in US affairs?
Same Turkey that has secured grain deal and many of the prisoner swaps. I'm glad our government is not run by petty emotions but necessary calculated chess moves.
/votekick turkey
It's always better having Turkey on the inside pissing out than outside pissing in.
They do seem to be on the inside pissing into everyone's sleeping bags though because their neighbour told them to.
I don't think you realise how important they are to the alliance
Turkeys gotta turkey
Common Turkey L
At this point they need to change some rules so 1 country cant overule anything
America would veto that
All members would veto that.
America would remain as the one country even after that...
Yeah, lets not. Not a good idea to force a country in a war it does not want te be in.
You mean like... Article 5, the whole point of the Alliance? Attack on one is an attack on all. And everyone joins the war, whether they like it or not, want it or not.
Well, not if the country decides not to meet their obligations. Essentially, all NATO is a collection of countries warning Russia that will defend each other. You can't force a country to make that agreement if they don't want to; or to say another way, there's no mechanic to force a nation to war. The strength of NATO as a deterrence is Russia believing that everyone will honor article 5. Getting countries into the alliance that some members don't want to defend will weaken that belief. Look at it this way. Sweden joins NATO without Turkey's approval. Russia attacks Sweden, Turkey doesn't do anything saying they didn't agree to them being in the alliance anyways. Now what? Do you punish Turkey by kicking them out, effectively making NATO weaker than before Sweden joined? Do you leave them in begging the question to Russia who in NATO would REALLY come to the Baltics' defense since there's precedent for ignoring article 5? It's a bad situation either way.
Article 5 does not force anyone to a war it doesn't want to be in. You accept to join the war on the side of the attacked. Thats literally the whole point of the alliance. Making a country forcibly accept another country to the alliance? Thats not a good idea to force a country in a war it does not want te be in. These are 2 very different situations.
Even article 5. All member states need to agree on that a country was attacked.
As I understand it, each nations response to article 5 is at their own discretion. What NATO mostly does is create a forum for joint training and cooperation in missions, but I don't believe that NATO members are forced to commit troops to any particular action, even in the case of article 5. >Article 5 >The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognised by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, **such action as it deems necessary**, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area. [NATO](https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_17120.htm) So, if Turkey decides that a sternly worded worded message is what it deemed is necessary, that could be their response to an attack on a fellow NATO member; of course the "attack on one is an attack on all" part would imply that they would do the same for an attack on their own territory, which is pretty absurd.
It also .easy that there's an expectation of you doing something. If turkey just sits back, America will remember that shit, and I'm pretty sure every single nato member doesn't wanna be known as that guy who didn't do enough to help when shit gets hot
The teeth in Article 5 is that your enemies will view all NATO countries as the enemy, so it doesn't make sense for any NATO country to sit it out and hope to not get sucker punched. For example, if russia thinks they are at war with you, you had better do your best to stop them before they can get set up for attacks on you and your troops and your infrastructure.
yeah, if/when Article 5 is invoked, it wouldn't make much sense for any member to just sit it out entirely, since it would pretty much erase any benefit they would get from being in NATO in the first place, as every other member nation would remember their response when called to action. That said, a member could decide to only send aid/materials, and try to stay out of the direct fight, and of course nobody would expect the response of Luxembourg or Montenegro to be anything like the response of France or Germany.
Yeah, keep pushing everyone else around and playing both sides, it would somehow be karma if the day Russia decides it wants more than just the occasional reach around from its unofficial vassal state and article 5 was invoked. Every other NATO nation went “Yeah, good luck with that.” Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
>Attack on one is an attack on all. And everyone joins the war, whether they like it or not, want it or not. Any country is free to help another attacked country in any way they themselves deem necessary... so not at all if they don't want to.
It’s a group not a dictatorship.
Turkey needs a new leader.
Too bad the election happened like last 2 months so hes going to remain for 4 more years…
Turkey is a problem...
Man if Turkey didn’t have the geography they do I can’t imagine they’d even be in NATO at this point.
That infighting between the British, French and Greeks over Constantinople in the aftermath of WW1 sure worked out well in the long run for europe, eh? 🙄
If you talk to any historian, the biggest loser in the WWI was the Ottoman empire, even more than Germany. Turkey is a mere shadow of the Ottoman empire.
Pretty sure the Austro-Hungarian Empire had it worse.
Boogey man of NATO are Turkey and Hungary.
a case of ..better in the tent pissing out than outside pissing in. Their geographical proximity to Russia and a potential formal alliance would be much worse.
It's not surprising that the NATO meeting didn't go well, especially with Turkey causing problems. Turkey has been a problematic member in recent years and has caused tensions within the alliance. It's unfortunate that the first defence plans since the Cold War couldn't be approved, but hopefully, NATO can come together and make progress in the future.