Turkey: How Erdoğan's Migrant Blackmail Failed
by Burak Bekdil • July 10, 2020 at 5:00 am
On February 27, Erdoğan's government was on the threshold of executing its threat to flood Europe with millions of (mostly Syrian) migrants ... Hundreds of thousands of migrants began flocking to the border. By the next day, Greece was not only operating 52 Navy ships to guard its islands close to Turkey; it had also mobilized additional troops on land. Its security forces were able to block 10,000 migrants from entering Greece by way of the Turkish land border.
The new blackmail will not work for a number of reasons. First, because many migrants in Turkey have learned from experience that the Turkish-Greek border can no longer easily be crossed. And second, because the Greek security forces are now better equipped and better prepared to confront a new wave of migrants.
Greece has finally done the right thing and deprived Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of his perpetual threats to blackmail the European Union.
On February 27, Erdoğan's government was on the threshold of executing its threat to flood Europe with millions of (mostly Syrian) migrants and opening its northwestern borders with Greece and Bulgaria. Hundreds of thousands of migrants began flocking to the border. In a few days, by the beginning of March, they would be in EU territory, to be followed by hundreds of thousands of others. Things, however, did not go as planned by Ankara.
