In the years preceding the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, the White House and State Department were willfully blind to the consequences of Saudi Arabia promoting extremism. No one doubted that the Saudi government as a whole and members of the royal family individually were donating vast sums of money to extremist groups, but the Saudi charm offensive worked. Prince Bandar, the kingdom’s ambassador to the United States from 1983 to 2005, was a personal friend and confidant to a succession of presidents, both Democrat and Republican. His job was to run interference, and he did it well.
Saudi Arabia could also call on many former U.S. ambassadors to the kingdom who had accepted Saudi leaders’ generous golden parachutes. They won plum and well-paid jobs consulting or lobbying for the kingdom and had access to Saudi funding for their retirement think tank perches. Saudi authorities also spent lavishly on colleges and universities. The end result in the years preceding the worst terrorist attack on American soil was a failure to treat the Saudi-fueled extremist threat seriously.
The same pattern also exists in the present with Turkey. Diplomats mastered Turkish and repeatedly sought out postings in the country. Turkey and Turkish culture can be intoxicating, and they drank hard. When they retired, they often worked to further the U.S.-Turkish partnership in think tanks, commercially, or at prominent lobby firms.
That unofficial interest group has long shielded President Recep Tayyip Erdogan from the consequences of his own actions. Never has Congress or the Secretary of State challenged the most vociferous defenders of Turkey on what would be the red line after which Washington walks out of the increasingly dysfunctional relationship.
Once upon a time, that might have been Turkey’s embrace of Hamas. Or al Qaeda. Or the Islamic State. Or betraying NATO to Russia. Or engaging in ethnic cleansing against America’s partners in Syria. But all those ships have sailed.
It may still be useful for members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee or the House Foreign Affairs Committee to question Secretary of State Mike Pompeo or James Jeffrey (his special envoy who has often rationalized Turkey’s behavior no matter how outlandish) about what that red line would be.
Turkey’s push into Libya should raise red flags. Ankara backs Libya’s Government of National Accord for two reasons: The first is Prime Minister Fayez al Sarraj’s Islamist leanings — the same reason why Erdogan supports Hamas and supported Omar al Bashir’s regime in Syria and Mohamed Morsi’s yearlong Muslim Brotherhood rule in Egypt. The second is commercial. Erdogan’s stewardship of the Turkish economy has not lived up to his early plaudits, and debt payments loom. Erdogan’s energy dealing with Sarraj can enrich both personally and provide a much-needed infusion of cash, if not for Turkey as a whole then for those whose support Erdogan believes he must buy. Sarraj’s U.N. recognition may be a convenient excuse for Ankara but is irrelevant in Turkish calculations: After all, Erdogan embraces Hamas over the Palestinian Authority, embraced Bashir after his International Criminal Court indictment on genocide charges, and regularly violates Cypriot sovereignty both by propping up a puppet state in northern Cyprus and by violating the island nation’s exclusive economic zone.
Turkish involvement in Libya’s proxy war matters and should not be ignored by the State Department, the Pentagon, or Congress. Erdogan has greased his push into Libya with many of the same proxy forces that pushed Turkish interests in Syria. A few are reportedly veterans of ISIS. This would be bad enough, but Turkey has offered Sarraj’s forces unmanned aerial vehicles as well. These have been put into play with great affect. In sum, this means that Erdogan has now armed extremists, some of whom previously fought for ISIS or al Qaeda affiliates in Syria.
It has become fashionable to blame the Reagan-era arming of the mujahedeen with subsequent extremism in Afghanistan. This narrative is wrong for two reasons. First, it is anachronistic: Taliban fighters were three or four years old at the time of the Soviet invasion. The CIA makes many mistakes, but it has never armed kindergartners. Second, while the provision of Stinger missiles was well-publicized, less known were the subsequent operations to reclaim them. The real problem was not U.S. efforts to defend Afghanistan against the Soviet onslaught but rather the persistent blind eye that Ronald Reagan (and every president after him up to and including George W. Bush) turned toward Saudi (and Pakistani) support for militancy.
Today, the same pattern has emerged, with Erdogan whispering sweet nothings into the ears of Presidents Barack Obama and Trump. Turkey today, however, is different from the Saudi Arabia of decades past, for Turkey not only fuels and funds militancy more directly than the Saudis ever did but arms it as well. Erdogan may believe he can control his extremist proxies, but history suggests he is wrong. If and when the next major terrorist attack against Americans happens, no official should be surprised to find the fingerprints of Turkish proxies upon it.
Michael Rubin (@Mrubin1971) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a former Pentagon official.
