Turkey no longer confines its neo-Ottoman ambitions to the Middle East or North Africa. Yıldırım Holding’s Yilport recently secured a $1.62 billion deal to modernize and jointly operate El Salvador’s Acajutla and La Union ports under a 50-year concession. The agreement ranks as the largest private investment in Salvadoran history, and it aims to triple Acajutla’s capacity while resurrecting the long-dormant La Union facility.
But El Salvador is not an isolated venture. Turkey’s Yilport maritime footprint already extends to terminals at Ecuador’s Puerto Bolivar, Peru’s Paita, and Guatemala’s Puerto Quetzal. At the same time, Global Ports Holding manages five strategic Caribbean facilities, including the San Juan Cruise Port in the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico.
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These acquisitions are the physical infrastructure of Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s expanding regional ambitions. Turkish firms hold a $1.3 billion investment stock across Latin America, while Turkish contractors have completed $1.6 billion in regional projects. Bilateral trade between Turkey and Latin America has exploded from roughly $1 billion in the early 2000s to more than $14 billion today, with Turkish exports rising sharply in vehicles, steel, and industrial goods. More importantly, Turkish capital increasingly sits astride Pacific and Caribbean logistics nodes feeding North American supply chains.
Ports are only one component of Ankara’s advance. Karpowership floating power plants deliver a quarter of Cuba’s electricity, manufacturing dependency inside a rogue regime hostile to American interests. Turkish defense companies have opened regional offices, signed aerospace agreements, and marketed armored vehicles throughout the hemisphere. Twenty Turkish embassies now operate across Latin America, providing the diplomatic architecture to reinforce Ankara’s growing commercial and strategic presence.
Aspiring Sultan Erdogan also possesses a less obvious instrument of influence. Between 1860 and 1920, hundreds of thousands of Ottoman subjects, largely Arab Christians fleeing Turkish oppression in Syria, Lebanon, and the Land of Israel, arrived in Latin America carrying Ottoman passports. Locals labeled these immigrants as “Los Turcos.” Their descendants number in the millions today and include Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, former Paraguayan President Mario Abdo Benítez, Dominican President Luis Abinader, and cultural icons such as Shakira. Turkey’s Directorate of Turks Abroad and Related Communities now conducts official research into these communities and incorporates them into Ankara’s conception of an extended global family.
The convergence matters. Erdogan is layering soft power atop hard infrastructure. Historical connections and diplomatic outreach reinforce Turkish ports, power projects, defense relationships, and commercial investments. Bukele’s government approved the Yilport agreement after years of direct Turkish courtship. Viewed separately, each initiative resembles ordinary trade, investment, or cultural diplomacy. Viewed together, they reveal Ankara’s accumulating strategic access across America’s immediate neighborhood.
From an intelligence perspective, Turkish-operated ports on southern maritime approaches create acute U.S. vulnerabilities. Ankara gains legitimate access to shipping manifests and container data bound for American shores. Concurrently, Turkish power contracts in Cuba establish a hostile physical presence near vital U.S. undersea cables, while diaspora cultivation expands regional political leverage.
ERDOGAN’S IRAQ PLAY: A BIGGER GAME THAN OIL
To counter Ankara’s expanding reach, Washington must animate its strategy with a modern Monroe Doctrine. First, the Coast Guard should deny port entry to vessels utilizing Turkish-operated Latin American terminals. Second, Congress must mandate secondary sanctions on maritime syndicates underwriting Yilport assets. Finally, the State Department should revoke visas for officials backing Ankara’s “Los Turcos” mapping initiatives.
American complacency has handed Erdogan uncontested ground. Allowing these commercial beachheads to solidify gives Turkey a dangerous launchpad to export its state-sponsored Muslim Brotherhood ideology. Erdogan’s Islamist networks actively subvert regional institutions, transforming commercial access into a permanent intelligence architecture on America’s doorstep. Washington must dismantle these adversarial outposts before this threat becomes permanent.
Jose Lev Alvarez is an American Israeli scholar specializing in international security policy. A multilingual veteran of the Israeli special forces and the U.S. Army, he holds three master’s degrees and is completing a doctorate in intelligence and global security in the Washington area.
