Foreign

Home page

Foreign

Elin Suleymanov: Resolution of US Congress will cause a long term negative consequences for the war in Iraq and for US policy in the region

16 October 2007 10:11 (UTC +04:00)

- The resolution of the Foreign Affairs Committee of House of Representatives created emotional feeling among Turkish people and their allies. But if we would look without emotion, what kind of lessons we should make after mentioned step of FAC of HR in first place?
- The decision by the House Committee was certainly a very unfortunate move. Especially, as it comes during the Ramazan Eid in Turkey, In fact, it is very detrimental to the American interests in the greater Middle East region. Once again, in congressional politics, special interest group with narrow agenda have been able to overcome the American national interest. I am not sure that the resolution will pass the full House vote, but it is already clear that some significant negativism has been caused by the Committeeâ€™s decision. Importantly, for the Azerbaijani side, this decision, just the unfortunate Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act earlier, raises certain questions about how objective is the United States in its capacity of a mediator between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The vote in the Committee clearly has more to do with US domestic politics than with international relations, a point, which is well-noted by many US commentators. Democratic majority has adopted policy of confronting the Bush Administration on many issues and, it seems, even if the Democratic leadership cannot succeed in substantive issues like the Iraq war discussion, they move to symbolic issues like revision of history of Ottoman Empire.
I am not sure who benefits from this, certainly, neither US, nor Turkey. Actually, this doesnâ€™t seem to help Armenia either. After all, such a resolution would only further isolate Armenia in the region. Only leaders of Armenian diaspora organizations benefit. In fact, those Armenians, whose relatives died in the confrontation of 1915, should also be saddened by such a use of their family tragedy for gaining political gains today. There are, of course, a number of lessons that should be learned from these recent events: Working with US public opinion and Congress is not a short-term, last-minute campaign, but a long-term, continuous effort. Moreover, Armenians have been successful in both having a lobby in Washington and grass-roots community organization in different states. This combination is very important. For both Azerbaijanis and Turks, it is important to have such community groups in different states working actively with local political institutions. Therefore, we are talking about a combination of lobby in Washington and Diaspora throughout the United States. We often think of these two as the same, but it is not always the case.
The above is important, because in promoting a cause one cannot rely on third forces. For instance, even though friendly relations exist between the Jewish and Turkish communities, the main responsibility for grass-roots mobilization is with the greater Turkish community. Overall, there may be as many Turkish-Americans as Armenian-Americans in U.S. The challenge is organizing the community. This is should be a lesson for Azerbaijani-Americans, who, along with our Turkish friends, need to organize and become politically more active. Moreover, it is fundamental that the community members focus their effort on key priorities and do not allow political and other differences undermine their unity.
- What was obvious in the speeches of many democrats, particularly Tom Lantos that those people believe that so called Armenian genocide took place but concern over national security issue is main impendent for adopting mentioned resolution. Donâ€™t you think that strategy of the Turkish lobby must change now and more work need to be done to prove that so called genocide issue never occurred instead of underlining strategic importance of Turkey?
- More effort is needed to educate public on the situation in Anatolia in 1915-16. Of course, this doesnâ€™t mean that one should simply dismiss that Armenians in Anatolia suffered. What is needed is a balanced, objective analysis of history. Importantly, legislating history according to political expediency is a dangerous trend, which undermines the very basis of historic accuracy. Many members of Congress argued against the resolution not because it was historically incorrect but because of national security arguments. The national security argument is valid, but what is more important that this resolution has a questionable historic basis. Moreover, the events of 1915 do not fall under the international definition of â€˜genocide.â€ Also, many members of Congress like to quote the supposed quote by Hitler about the Armenians- a strong argument for the Jewish community. Interestingly, there does not appear to be a direct evidence of the quote attributed to Hitler to be genuine. Turkish community should be more pro-active in explaining that rather than rely on the governments to make a political-military argument. For that more outreach should done to scholars and universities. Finally, the members of the Turkish community should be comprehensively educated on the issue to be able to present their case.
Turkeyâ€™s economic embargo and the absence of diplomatic relations with Armenia have often been raised. Yet, the fact that these happened as a result of Armeniaâ€™s occupation of Azerbaijanâ€™s internationally-recognized territory has not been widely discussed. Armeniaâ€™s destructive role in the region, its gross violation of human rights and aggressive policy should be made known. For this, members of Azerbaijani and Turkish communities everywhere should and can be more active in speaking out. Again, speaking out is not a one-time event, but a continuous campaign.
One can see that, while the Turkish government has been successful in convincing the US Administration, the communities need to be more active and vocal outside Washington. This is an important lesson for Azerbaijanis as well.
- Generally, as a person familiar with the American political system, do you think what the most important priority is for the U.S. Congress members? Is it national security issue or support of their constituencies?
- This is an interesting question. In the case of the vote in the House Committee, clearly courting one narrow, special interest group- not the entire constituency, by the way- prevailed over the national interest. Again, in the pre-election year, domestic political consideration may seem more important to politicians in US than either historic accuracy or national security. This is another lesson for Azerbaijanis that argument of reality and even of US national security may not be sufficient for members of Congress without a strong presence of the Azerbaijani-American community organizations in various electoral districts.
- The vote over the Resolution 106 ended up with 27-21 result. What we witnessed during discussion of the resolution, that almost all members of FAC from California passionately supported mentioned resolution. Another fact is that the strongest supporter of Armenians and co-sponsor of 106 Resolution is Adam Schiff from CA. Donâ€™t you think that this single fact requires more attention to be paid this region?
- Certainly, the importance of the Western States, especially of California, is rapidly increasing. This reflects, among other things, the economic significance of the state. It is, therefore, important that, as you said, â€˜more attention,â€ is paid to the region. Azerbaijanâ€™s leadership understands this and moved to open the Consulate General in Los Angeles in 2006. At the same time, California is home to a numerous Azerbaijani and Turkish communities. I specially would like to mention the American Azerbaijan Council with the head office in Irvine, South California and American North Azerbaijanis Cultural Center with office in San Francisco. I hope to see these two communities become more active and vocal. There seems to be a great potential for growth here.
- One of the strong arguments of supporters of 106 resolution is that after the France parliament adopted recent law criminalizing â€œArmenian genocide â€ denouncement, turnover between two countries increased three times. Why then the American congressmen should worry about adoption of the same resolution? Is it right to compare those two situations?
- Well, of course, if the French resolution was flawed in terms of historic evidence, then US shouldnâ€™t follow the pattern simply because of that. Yet, Turkey is a very important ally of the United States, so the ramifications can be very different from the French case. For instance, France is an EU member, so we are talking about already a relationship with the entire Union, while the relationship with US is more of a strategic nature, including major military cooperation projects. By the way, if I am not mistaken, French military aircraft have not been able to use Turkish airspace after that. More importantly though, the Turkish leadership faces a complicated decision to balance a very important strategic relationship with the United States with massive public outcry among the Turkish public and the defamation of Turkeyâ€™s image. Ankara has made some strong statements and it is likely to follow through with them. Simply because if they donâ€™t, then the same argument that has been used in the French case would be used much wider.
Interestingly, this problem comes just as the Turkish-American relationship seems to be recovering from the damage of disagreements at the outset of the Iraq war. Sadly, members of the Committee have acted to alienate Americaâ€™s strongest Muslim ally and to undermine pro-American forces in the region. Regardless of the immediate reaction of Ankara, this will cause, unfortunately, a long term negative consequences for the war in Iraq and for US policy in the region. Whoever comes to the White House on January 20, 2009 will have to deal with these implications for some time. /APA/