Oktay Eksi: If only we could believe them.....
Güncelleme Tarihi:
I wish we could believe them. But unfortunately, warnings from the government in Ankara that a "red line has been crossed," or that "if necessary, we will enter Iraq and give the PKK the lesson they need to learn," are no longer believable.
For that reason, the US Ambassador to Ankara, Ross Wilson, can defend Israel's turning the Middle East into a full war zone following the capture of a couple of soldiers by Hamas, but when it comes to the PKK, which has blown up 35 thousand of our citizens, he says "an operation that you carry out on your own would be neither smart nor logical."
It is now clear that the current administration has neither the determination nor the guidance to finish off PKK terror. Along these lines, when Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on July 16 that "We have faced this business with patience up until now. We have always wanted to deal with these matters along democratic lines. But our soldiers are dying. These are no longer things that we can swallow. Many things depend on the meeting of the ministers council tomorrow," there was no one who took him seriously. None of these meetings have produced solutions. Neither did the calling in of the ambassadors from Washington, DC and Baghdad, both of whom were given the messages "our patience is running out."
Our patience is running out....
Actually, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said these same words three years ago, to then-US Ambassador Eric Edelman. News of these sharp words was in all the newspaper headlines on July 13, 2003.
In fact, Erdogan has been known to say these words in many places. For example, speaking on CNN Turk on July 13, 2005, he said "When the time is right, we will engage in an over-the-border operation." Then, in speaking to US General Richard Myers, who was visiting Ankara, Erdogan repeated on July 26, 2005 "If necessary, we will enter Iraq without asking permission." Reports of this exchange were covered in the Hurriyet at the time.
There need to be some basic conditions put down before this government can be successful in fighting PKK terror. For example, the head of this administration, who loves to give the advice to other governments that "there can be no double standards in the fight against terror" has announced is support for an Arab businessman that the UN has proclaimed as a supporter of terror. How can anyone then take Ankara's words over "getting rid of double standards on the fight against terror" seriously?
Then there is the fact that while the Prime Minsister in 2003 said that "his patience had run out," in 2005 he said that he was embracing "a democratic effort" in fighting the PKK. And now he is proclaiming that he is switching away from that policy. Well, since even we cannot have faith in which policy this Prime Minister and government are following, how can anyone else have faith?