Biden’s victory, a setback for Turkey’s president

Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had managed to establish a close and personal relationship with President Trump that protected him from a Washington establishment, Republican and Democrat, increasingly critical of Turkey’s aggressive foreign policy and intensifying authoritarianism.

Biden is going to be a very different president, we should not be surprised if Turkish-American relations are subject to some serious and contentious disagreements, especially in issues such as the Turkish intervention in Syria against America’s allies, the Syrian Kurds, who successfully and at great sacrifice fought against ISIS at Washington’s urging. 

Perhaps the most immediate challenge awaiting the Biden administration is a dispute for which there appears to be no immediate solution: Turkey’s decision to purchase the Russian S-400 anti-aircraft system, which it is claimed compromises America’s most modern, multi-purpose fighter aircraft, the F-35. 

It is important to understand this crisis because it is emblematic of the state of current relations between Ankara and Washington. Turkey was repeatedly warned by the US and its allies of severe consequences if it went ahead with the S-400 purchase.

Erdoğan also has been intent on extending Turkish influence throughout the Mediterranean. In Libya, he intervened decisively on behalf of the Tripoli government by deploying his country’s highly effective drones, along with advisors and thousands of Syrian jihadists.

There is also Turkey’s challenge to Greek and Cypriot exclusive economic zones in the Eastern Mediterranean, a development that has shaken the European Union to which both Cyprus and Greece belong. 

Turkey’s leadership and its supporters have made clear their dislike of Biden. His past statements suggesting that he would engage with the opposition have been repeatedly disseminated by government allies to insinuate that he would support “an overthrow” of the government. 

Biden was US vice-president during the 2016 attempted coup that the Erdoğan administration has consistently blamed on Washington.