Turkey Miscalculates Syria
Turkey's policies on Syria over the past two years have reduced Ankara's diplomatic leverage in the region, writes Semih Idiz.
Two years have elapsed in the Syrian conflict, and no apparent end to the bloodshed is in sight, as the warring sides are locked in what looks increasingly like a war of attrition. Ankara's calculations concerning Syria seem to have amounted to nothing over the past few years.
But even more than that, Syria has turned out to be the crisis on which Turkey’s ambitious Middle East policies foundered in ways expected by neither Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan or Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu — the architect of the now-defunct “zero problems with neighbors” policy.
Just over two years ago, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Erdogan met in a friendly atmosphere for the groundbreaking ceremony for the so-called “Friendship Dam,” to be built on the Orontes River which separates the two countries.
Erdogan couldn't have predicted that this friendship would turn sour just a few months down the road.
