Its durability Recep Tayyip Erdogan elevates him to a kind of Turkish political pantheon and confirms why all those who did not take into account his sudden dismissal were either blinded by their anti-Erdogan passion, or simply did not understand the tectonic changes that changed the political and social DNA of the people. potential demographics.

Regardless of what will need a second round of presidential elections elections On May 28, the scenario of the triumphal victory of a kind of coalition of the Six with the presidential candidate is absolutely accurate. Kemal Kilicdaroglu now it’s in the trash.

The possible dominance of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan beyond its historicity, at a time of enormous social problems resulting from Turkey’s deepest economic crisis, as well as the devastating February 6 earthquake, also suggests that idiosyncratic Turkish Islamism is not a modern force, but a permanent feature of political life in Turkey. neighboring country.

Moreover, as the results show, Turkish nationalism remains the backbone of the political system of the neighboring country, since the two main parties expressing it (MIR D. Bahceli and IGU Meral Aksener), although in a different coalition, collect more than 20%, him the percentage of the third presidential candidate Sinan Ogan.

This situation brings to mind three central questions that need to be answered:

First of all, what will this mean for Greek-Turkish relations?

Quite emphatically, in the previous period, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, as well as National Security Advisor Thanos Dokos, in an interview he gave to K tis Kyriaki, briefly and exhaustively explained that no serious observer of Turkish foreign policy expects any changes in strategies, whatever the name of the person who will celebrate his ascension to the presidency. Recep Tayyip Erdogan believes that in recent years he has responded to Turkey’s long-standing foreign policy call for dominance in the region of the Eastern Mediterranean, the Balkans, the Middle East and North Africa and for a seat at every table that “counts” around the world. For Turkey’s foreign policy, as expressed through the “Blue Homeland”, Greece should be limited to the role of a state with limited influence in maritime zones in the Aegean and, of course, zero influence in the Eastern Mediterranean. This stance leads to strategically inevitable tensions between Athens and Ankara, with little hope of any honest solution, mediated by third parties or not.

There is a strong belief in important circles in Athens that Erdoğan, in what appears to be his last term in office, will not want to take things to the extreme and may wish to leave behind a last-ditch survival effort. regarded as a peacekeeper in a region with significant problems. This assessment has again been refuted, but the international environment is favorable to the start of some negotiations, even if they do not turn out to be particularly easy.

Various Greek-Turkish channels will be opened, attempts will be made to agree on certain issues, but the essence of Ankara’s perception of Turkey’s position in the Aegean Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean will not change.

What will happen to relations between Turkey and the West?

The Turkish Republic, the successor of the Ottoman Empire, which in turn was founded on the foundations of the Eastern Roman Empire, was built by its founders with a deep historical knowledge of the dual nature of this geographical area, which is a natural “bridge”. between East and West, between North and South. No one, not even a more pro-Western leader, would sacrifice Turkey’s ability to negotiate so easily with Washington, Moscow, regional powers such as Tehran and Riyadh, and negotiate at length with Beijing or New Delhi. As some analysts rightly predicted, Ankara needs Western investments for reconstruction, but without exchanging them for breaking off relations with other partners. The difficulties of US-Turkish relations as they developed in the previous period of time are a good example of how relations between Ankara and the West may develop in the next period of time. Turkey, which will have nothing but formal relations with Russia, is a chimera that exists only in the minds – less and less – of bureaucrats in Washington, London, Berlin or Brussels.

How are things in Turkey?

About half of Turkish voters approve of the personality of Recep Tayyip Erdogan and slightly less voted against him. They voted for “anti-Erdogan” and not for someone who opposed the incumbent Turkish president. Erdogan’s eventual final victory would naturally lead to an (initially imperceptible to the general public) debate the next day in the AKP. Erdogan will be able to start his succession until 2028. The difficulty for Erdogan lies in managing the economy: can he give Turkey back the IMF, a man who prides himself on kicking him out? Probably no. Let’s not forget that the IMF is an institution created by the current system of international order. Now he may try to move in a slightly different direction, although at this stage international conditions do not seem to favor such a solution.

Even if next week, with some electoral leap, Kılıçdaroğlu achieves his election, the conditions in which he is called upon to act have already been undermined by twenty years, when the new establishment is no longer the old Kemalism, but conservative Islamism, “married”. to aggressive nationalism abroad.