About airplanes and people

Airplanes have been in the news a lot lately. They have become especially popular amid the Syrian civil war. Syria's air defenses shot down a Turkish fighter jet in late June. Turkey called an emergency NATO council and requested Article 5 of the organization's charter to come into effect, effectively asking for permission to go to war.

Three months later, a plane is in the spotlight again. This time, Turkish fighter jets forced a Syrian passenger plane with Russian citizens on board, flying to Syria. The reason is suspicion that the plane was used to transport Russian weapons to Assad. It turns out there were no weapons, but that doesn't matter. The gesture angered Russia, which continues to sit firmly behind the Syrian government. But wasn't that exactly the goal of the Turkish authorities?

Turkey’s strategy over the past decade has been based on expanding its influence over all of its neighbors. This policy worked well until early 2011, when things seemed to go downhill. Iran backed away from Turkey after its disappointing inaction during the imposition of new sanctions. Then came Egypt, where Turkey failed to intervene in time and reap geopolitical dividends from the Tahrir Revolution. The new moderate Islamist leader, Mohamed Morsi, decided that instead of copying the Turkish model, he could try to elevate Egypt as a leader of the Muslim world.

When the civil war in Syria began, Turkey was already backed into a corner. Will it lose another ally? It's hard to decide to gnash your teeth at someone with whom you had negotiated a free trade zone and declared your most loyal friend until two years ago. But when tens of thousands of Syrian refugees began pouring into border towns, Turkey had no choice but to start rattling weapons. The initial idea was for a 30-kilometer buffer zone inside Syria, in which the refugees would be protected. Then, Turkey, along with Qatar and Saudi Arabia, joined Sunni efforts to supply the rebels with weapons. Nothing helped. The war continues, and the end does not seem close. The victims of the conflict exceeded 25 thousand yesterday, and the refugees in Turkey alone are over 100 thousand.

And so the Anatolian republic stopped joking and became serious. A week ago, it began shelling Syrian positions after a most likely unintentional provocation on the Syrian side, in which a stray shell hit an apartment complex, killing five people. The truth is, however, that Turkey does not intend to start a war. It cannot afford it. The bitter past of the American intervention in Iraq reminds Turkey that no matter how strong you are, a civil war is such a mess that if you intervene, you will most likely still come out the loser of the whole situation. And that is precisely what Ankara fears - another geopolitical defeat.

From this perspective, the landing of the Syrian plane with Russian tourists is more of an act demonstrating that Turkey is ready to take measures to deal with the situation on its own - something that neither the US nor Russia will allow. In its desperate attempt, however, Turkey is making another big mistake, namely antagonizing the big bear in the small Black Sea basin. Until now, they were first friends. Turkey was buying Russia's blue gold, and crowds of Slavic tourists wanted to drink Russian tea on the Bosphorus. The Anatolian Tiger, as investors call it, cannot afford to lose either one or the other. Otherwise, it will continue to sink into the economic hole it has fallen into. And from a regional giant, it may turn into another disappointment. Now the question is whether Turkey can look at itself realistically and answer the doubt, can it be a leader and what will be the price it has to pay. But like other people, state leaders do not like to ask themselves uncomfortable questions. And beating the chest soothes wounded dignity.

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