At his fence-mending summit with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin last week, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made a multibillion-dollar gesture to help overcome the crisis over Turkey’s downing of a Russian jet in November. The gesture, estimated to be worth no less than $8 billion, concerns the nuclear power plant the Russians are building in Akkuyu, southern Turkey.
Following the Aug. 9 summit in St. Petersburg, Turkish media outlets, especially the pro-government ones, dropped their anti-Russian and anti-Putin rhetoric to celebrate a “great victory” for bilateral ties. Not everyone, however, was euphoric. Hakan Aksay, a veteran Moscow correspondent for the Turkish press, commented that Putin’s trust in Erdogan had been permanently damaged and made the following observation: “In the name of the [Russian] state’s interests, Putin could well start a new 'era of friendship and cooperation' with Erdogan, the man he had accused of 'stabbing him in the back' yesterday. And actually, he did. But he didn’t call Erdogan a 'friend.' Erdogan repeatedly referred to Putin as 'a friend,' 'my dear friend' or 'my dear friend Vladimir' but never got a similar response.”
Both leaders expressed a desire to restore and even elevate the pre-crisis level of bilateral ties. Erdogan reiterated the $100-billion target for bilateral trade. Putin, while making similar statements, spoke of step-by-step efforts over time, said a mid-term plan was to be drawn up for the 2016-19 period and asked for security guarantees for Russian tourists. In other words, Erdogan was saying “Let’s go fast,” to which Putin responded “Hold on, not so fast.”
Erdogan and Turkey have ended up with two big bills to get the normalization process rolling — a material and a moral one. Erdogan’s apology letter to Putin in June was the moral price of making up. In St. Petersburg, Erdogan pledged to pay also a hefty financial price by promising to take the Akkuyu nuclear power plant into the scope of strategic investments, a category that comes with many financial treats. In 2013, when the deal for the plant was signed, the Russians asked for no privileges or special incentives; they only wanted to win the tender. Now, a much weaker Turkey has itself offered privileges on a silver plate to win back Russian hearts.
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