Turkey’s & Russia’s Kitchen
World geopolitics can be resembled to a large communal apartment.
A typical «communal» which is a usual huge apartment divided into let’s say ten rooms, each room for family, with the commonplaces of use as public utilities such as hall way, toilet & finally the kitchen.
When you live in certain place you cannot choose your neighbors that are living in the other rooms, so you have to deal with them in daily bases & trying somehow to get along and live peacefully with them all as much as possible, especially in order to enjoy the common benefits of civilization: heat, water, sewage etc…
At the same time, no one has the ability to repealed the personal interests of use for the toilet or the kitchen, stove.
Therefore conflicts occurs between the neighbors in these communal apartment, a fight between them in order to win in some sort of way but actually never happened because no one can win such fights & no one between them will full control any of the commonplaces of use as public utilities.
So the range of relationships ranging from sympathy to the implacable hostility «battles» for living space & the other utilities.
It been shown & known through all history of the whole world in all history of its states, Empires, Kingdoms etc… shows that conflicts & ups & downs in relationships is always between the neighbor nations, its logical to see wars between the neighboring nations through all history for the claim of lands or settle case that is related to some political or economical conflict between them.
On the other hand, in the relatively peaceful years with these neighboring nations it is usually became very close and intimate contacts, economic, trade, cultural, purely human.
In general by one way or another it has to be a way to settle conflicts between neighbor nations with whom are a common border, these conflicts must be settled in manner, because you’ll have to deal with fact of the necessity of finding ways to set things up neighbors otherwise one must end the other for good which go to war & one destroy the other & take his entire land & what it have from people & creatures & resources.
Sure is the price for the winner side will not be cheap, because in these king of devastating wars casualties will be big for the victorious too, And if it’s not war & no good relationship you cannot run away somewhere in Antarctica or Australia, Willy-nilly, or any isolated island.
That’s why it’s crucial for you & your need to take care of friendship and mutually beneficial cooperation.
Between Turkey & Russia centuries-old relations with geopolitical rivalry for dominance in Eurasia.
Let’s start with the fact that the current Istanbul — a former (Constantinople), the place that Russia in its ancient Rus’ inherited their church – Orthodox Christianity and the state model.
After the fall of Constantinople under the blows of the Ottoman Turks by the Sultan Mehmed II (the Conqueror) in 1453 & the collapse of the eastern Roman Empire, aka The Byzantine Empire.
A messianic formula was born which is «Moscow as the Third Rome, by known that it’ll not be a fourth one». For many generations of Russian monarchs the dream of the return of Constantinople under the rule of «white Tsar».
In total, from 1676 till 1918, Russia was at war with Turkey 13 times (What a Number !!!) for land and resources in the Caucasus, Ukraine and the Crimea.
In some points during 1829 war the Russian troops where few miles away to capture Constantinople for fact.
At the same time, trade and diplomatic relations between Turkey and Russia estimated five centuries: the official diplomacy began with the letters of the Moscow Prince Ivan III (incidentally, the grandfather of Ivan the Terrible), the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid II on maritime trade.
In other words, in modern Russia and now Turkey — general geopolitical destiny. Both countries — last powerful empire, forming around him extensive sphere of influence; one in the north, the other in the south of the continent, both countries retain their own political claim to the post-imperial era, considering the interests of their sovereign right, bestowed centuries of history and geography.
Sometimes the two countries claim to geopolitical legacy stumble upon each other, first of all — in the Caucasus (since the XIX century) and Syria (after World War II).
We should not forget that Turkey and Russia have similar problems with mental identity: the Turks, and Russian have been living in a state that I am not afraid of this expression — the existential choice between East and West, and in Turkey, and Russia as a strong pro-Western sentiment, and belief in its special, distinctive way.
Both Russia and Turkey in where in attempts especially at the last decade of twentieth century tried to join in the European Union, during that time Russia & Turkey both where under huge economical problems, so both where looking for ways to stand still, but, again, the two countries is a commitment to the objective obstacles encountered.
For Turkey there is the Kurdish issue with not forgetting the Armenian case which also put them with Russia on hot plate due to logical religious support that orthodox Russia support Armenia.
For Russia’s legitimate interests in the post-Soviet space.
As a result, the Europeans have put very strict conditions for the integration, which today seems rather wishful thinking and a pipe dream than a real possibility.
On the contrary, after the collapse of the Iron Curtain and the end of the Cold War, has been a quarter century, despite all the objective contradictions, the positions of Russia and Turkey always approached, and relations have developed rapidly, both economically and culturally, helped and the rapid destruction of yesterday’s human stereotypes: millions of Russians every year rested on the Turkish resorts. NATO member Turkey has been viewed as the closest to Russia and reliable partner with whom it is possible and necessary to find compromises and «point to further growth».
It is no doubt that the incident that took place on 24 November 2015 (Turkey shooting down the Russian Su-24 bomber on the border with Syria) was «knife to the heart» literally for the majority of the inhabitants of the two countries, the so-called «Turkmens» in violation of all international conventions, shot in the air and get down to catapult the pilot.
The Russian President Vladimir Putin took a demarche of Turkey is extremely painful, called «stab in the back» and imposed tough sanctions against Turkey.
Six month ago many international affairs experts predicted that the situation between the two countries will not be solved & there is a chance to escalate & get more hostile for long.
however indeed: Ankara’s apology was enough to have the summer of 2016 good time to restore the relations to a qualitatively new level.
In politics it is impossible to do without subjective human factor, but the objective interests always win in the end, and the objective in the current extremely complex international configuration of Russia and Turkey are much more profitable to be friends, rather than quarrel.
For example in Economy the value of the trade exchange between Russia & turkey Exceeds 30 Billion USD annually & seemingly subjected to improve more with multiple agreements in many domains.
Obviously in Countries relations are alike the people relations, you can anticipate the devil himself to get involve always to blow things between ant two sides trying to get along.
Our devil in world politics is none other than the one & only main player among global players — the United States of America, yes indeed the US of A that inherited with fully aptitude the same roll that Great Britain used to play during their time back in 19th century & before.
The United States in their fully believing in the triumph of a unipolar world, that is, in his own unconditional hegemony, conducts a very clumsy foreign policy, ignoring the subtle regional aspects.
The multilayered conflict around Syria and the Islamic State, the US Department of State made a blatant bid for the Kurds, it could not enter into sharp conflict with the national interests of Turkey.
The United States in recent years, were clearly unhappy with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in his independent (Erdoganizm) policy pursued by him & his government.
The culmination of this latent conflict became a failed coup by senior officers of the Turkish Army (which many consider seriously as an underground «fifth column» of the USA) on 15-16 July 2016, Erdogan was still alive and his regime survived, but the attempt of a military coup have not been in vain.
The reluctance of the US to give Erdogan and his main enemy, is believed to be the mastermind of the conspiracy Gulen was actually & literally pushed Turkey back to Russia stronger & more made them close than any time before.
A very vague position of the White House on the issue of Karabakh forces Baku to actively pursue a dialogue with Moscow, and for all what mentioned, It is no secret also that the normalization of Russian-Turkish relations is Azerbaijan contributed much.
If we use that same analogy with communal apartment, the neighbors must & should have to look for common & solid ground.
In Russia, all the interpersonal differences have long been made to find out in the kitchen When the neighbors understand that swear no more sense, they prefer to gather around one table and solve all the accumulated problems & usually these sit-downs take place at the kitchen.
Why Not it’s for their own Good.