Erdoğan Needs New Enemies
by Burak Bekdil • August 22, 2020 at 5:00 am
All those Turkish-Greek tensions in the Aegean and Mediterranean seas bolster a century-long Turkish nostalgia to take back some of the Greek islands. Yeni Safak, a fiercely pro-Erdoğan newspaper, suggested that the Turkish military should invade 16 Greek islands.
"Discussion of wars and invading Greek islands is... a tactic used by the regime of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to distract the Turkish population from the woeful economic situation." — Greek City Times.
Erdoğan needs epic stories of military might against real or fabricated foreign enemies to tell an increasing number of grudging voters in the face of an ailing economy. That is bad news for the entire region.
Fearing a sharp decline in his approval rating, especially in view of a looming economic crisis, Turkey's Islamist strongman, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, appears to be chasing new wars with real or imaginary enemies.
Election data and research show that Turks have a tendency to unite behind their leader in times of crises or confrontation with foreign enemies. According to the Turkish pollster Metropoll, for example, Erdoğan's approval rating peaked to 71.1% in December 2013, when he portrayed a slew of corruption allegations about him and his family as "a coup attempt." In parliamentary elections in 2015, Erdoğan's nationwide vote fell to 37.5% and his Justice and Development Party lost its parliamentary majority for the first time since it came to power in 2002.
