Dragged into a quagmire in Syria while supporting armed groups and facing a kidnapping crisis in Lebanon, Turkey is by no means a newcomer to adverse winds hitting its post-Ottoman comeback in the Arab street. Turkey’s previous comebacks were mostly on behalf of the West, and therefore the country came to be seen as a Trojan horse. No one would be pleased today to recall the tongue-lashing Turkey received from Egypt when it got involved in British designs over the Suez Canal and the adventures it embarked on as part of the Baghdad Pact to keep the Soviets away from the Middle East. Cartoons in the Rose Al-Yusef magazine in 1951, depicting the Turkish president as the leashed dog of the United States, illustrate how modern Turkey’s first Arab opening hit the wall. The anger toward Turkey stemmed from its involvement in the four-tier leg of the Middle East Command that Britain had established to preserve its presence in the Suez.
I wonder if anyone remembers how Turkey’s plans for a military intervention in Iraq following Gen. Qasim’s coup against King Faisal had backfired in 1958. Also in 1958, Turkey came back from the brink of intervening in Lebanon on the behest of Lebanese President Camille Chamoun. Thankfully, regional and international balances did not allow the move, keeping Turkey away from a beehive that would have plunged it into trouble big time. However, the permission Turkey had granted the United States, a party to the Lebanese civil war, to use the Incirlik Base was already enough to infuriate Muslim quarters in the country.
