Turkey’s cultural and religious affinities with the Afghans give its troops a unique advantage over the other ISAF contingents from 37 nations. Given the projected Taliban spring offensive, Turkish sensitivities to local cultural and religious sentiments in Afghanistan’s capital may well give them an influence that far exceeds the other 36 nations’ troops.
Turkish presence in the capital has deep historic roots dating back to the time of Kemal Ataturk, founder of the Turkish Republic, who during the 1920s and 1930s sent doctors, educators and support personnel during the reign of King Amanullah Khan despite Turkey’s own problems in establishing its independence.
The country is drawing upon five years’ experience in again commanding ISAF forces in the capital and building upon success from their first year of the ISAF’s deployment.
Wait a minute. The Turkish Advantage? Couple things are off here:
- Turkey has far more obvious cultural and linguistic ties to the other ‘Stans, yet has seen negligible influence there compared to Russia or even the U.S.
- Turkey was one part of many during the successful first two years of the Western occupation. It did nothing the other countries did not, and its history of involvement is not beyond the scope of even the United States (which used to enjoy a strong and positive presence in Lashkar Gah as little as four decades ago).
- “The projected Taliban spring offensive?” It’s May (April 30 for that article, but still). Not only has 1/3 of the spring come and gone, but the supposed offensive began last September and continued through the winter with little noticeable pickup.
That ISN article reads more like an advertisement for Turkey than any kind of useful analysis. Now, I’m not opposed to Turkey—I rather like the place, and would love to spend time exploring it—but Turkey doesn’t really bring any special advantages to Afghanistan. In particular among the Pashtuns, the country has little pull.
Also, on a purely stylistic note, I have come to quite deeply loathe the term “coming spring offensive” and its variants. Spring is here already, it will be over soon, and nothing changed. I think it, much like putting Kazakhstan in “the broader Middle East” (hats off to you, Mr. Biden), is a big red flag indicating laziness on the part of the author.
This post was written by...
Joshua Foust – author of 1771 posts on Registan.net.
Joshua Foust is a Fellow at the American Security Project and the author of Afghanistan Journal: Selections from Registan.net. His research focuses primarily on Central and South Asia. Joshua is a correspondent for The Atlantic and a columnist for PBS Need to Know. Joshua appears regularly on the BBC World News, Aljazeera, and international public radio. Joshua is also a regular contributor to Foreign Policy’s AfPak Channel, and his writing has appeared in the New York Times, Reuters, and the Christian Science Monitor. Follow him on twitter: @joshuafoust
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I agree that the potential of Turkey in Afghanistan is over-stated. And the comparison to Central Asia is right-on. There was much optimism in the early 1990s that Turkey could be the anti-Russian model for Central Asia. This lasted until it was clear that Turkey was a far away country with little aid to supply. And the pan-Turkic crazies in Turkish parliament at the time caused much in the way of Central Asian eye-rolling.
For Afghanistan, Turkey can’t offer much foreign aid and it sure can’t deliver stability, what with all its troops deployed to the Iraqi border. But if they hang out in Kabul and sip chai while offering up culturally appropriate greetings then you can be assured that someone will see them as some sort of solution to various problems.
PS: Turkey is also known as a long-time supporter of Dostum. Every single person in Afghanistan likes him, right?
Turkey is the SOLE Muslim nation to spend the last three generations attempting to come to grips with democracy and Mr. Foust also fails to note that they’ve been engaged in Afghanistan since the 1920s. Re spring offensive, just take a look at the rising ISAF causalities (including a Dane last week.) If the author is guilty of “laziness” then Mr. Foust doesn’t understand military operations and seems to feel that if the Taliban don’t do a “surge”, then they’re not on the move.
Aren’t most members of the Turkish military imbued with the Kemalist doctrine of secularism, and decidedly hostile to Islamism and even headscarfs, not to mention burkas? Are they not also the most nationalistic members of NATO? Why are Turks assumed to have some particular advantage among Afghans? Just because Turkey is the only majority-Muslim state in NATO? I doubt that will cut much ice with the Shiite Hazaras, either.