Carl Senna's List: Turkey

Turkey Grants U.S. Military Limited Concession on Using Its Territory
By SEBNEM ARSU
Published: September 3, 2010
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ISTANBUL — Turkey, which in 2003 damaged relations with the United States by refusing to allow Americans troops to invade Iraq via its southeast border, has agreed in principle to allow the United States to move only technical and logistical military equipment through the country as part of the withdrawal from Iraq.

The decision was announced in a Foreign Ministry statement a few hours ahead of a visit by Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

A spokesman for the ministry, Selcuk Unal, said the agreement did not at this point include troops or combat equipment. He said that talks on the issue were still under way. The United States has been moving vast amounts of equipment out of Iraq since 2008, mostly through Kuwait. Some is being redeployed to Afghanistan.

Although a United States Embassy statement specified only that Admiral Mullen would meet with Gen. Isik Kosaner, his new counterpart, local news outlets suggested that the United States would also demand Turkey’s response on whether it would allow the construction of an antimissile radar station on its territory as part of a regional defense system.

Resurgent Turkey Flexes Its Muscles Around Iraq

Ayman Oghanna for The New York Times
Iraqis in Erbil waited for visas to visit Turkey outside the consulate, which issues as many as 300 a day. More Photos »
By ANTHONY SHADID
Published: January 4, 2011
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ZAKHO, Iraq — A Turkey as resurgent as at any time since its Ottoman glory is projecting influence through a turbulent Iraq, from the boomtowns of the north to the oil fields near southernmost Basra, in a show of power that illustrates its growing heft across an Arab world long suspicious of it.
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Turkey’s Soft Power in Iraq
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Ayman Oghanna for The New York Times
Construction at Basra’s Sport City in Iraq. Turkish diplomats say that businesspeople from their country face little competition there. More Photos »

The New York Times
Turkey’s influence runs from one end of Iraq to the other. More Photos »

Its ascent here, in an arena contested by the United States and Iran, may prove its greatest success so far, as it emerges from the shadow of its alliance with the West to chart an often assertive and independent foreign policy.

Turkey’s influence is greater in northern Iraq and broader, though not deeper, than Iran’s in the rest of the country. While the United States invaded and occupied Iraq, losing more than 4,400 troops there, Turkey now exerts what may prove a more lasting legacy — so-called soft power, the assertion of influence through culture, education and business.

“This is the trick — we are very much welcome here,” said Ali Riza Ozcoskun, who heads Turkey’s consulate in Basra, one of four diplomatic posts it has in Iraq.

Turkey’s newfound influence here has played out along an axis that runs roughly from Zakho in the north to Basra, by way of the capital, Baghdad. For a country that once deemed the Kurdish region in northern Iraq an existential threat, Turkey has emba