Turkey's Strategic Environment After the Cold War: Risks and Opportunities.

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to analyze regional issues effecting Turkey's strategic environment, and to identify their impact on Turkey's future relations with the West and its status as a NATO member. Turkey's strategic environment has greatly changed since the end of the Cold War. NATO no longer looks to Turkey for protection against the Soviet Union. As a result, Western attention to Turkey has gradually declined. At the same time, however, Turkey finds itself virtually surrounded by unfriendly and unstable states, rife with armed conflicts that risk spillover across its borders. Internally, Turkey is challenged by religious fundamentalism, human rights abuses, and a violent Kurdish independence movement. The results of this analysis portray Turkey as a troubled yet growing regional power and continued key member of NATO, providing a check against Iran, a possible resurgent Russia, and a gateway to the Middle East and Caspian Sea for trade and the region's strategic oil reserves.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Apr 18, 1998
Accession Number
ADA343356

Entities

People

  • Michael J. Gaffney

Organizations

  • United States Army War College

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Autonomy
  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Human Systems
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Azerbaijan
  • Bulgaria
  • Caspian Sea
  • Cis
  • Cold War
  • Eastern Europe
  • Environment
  • Europe
  • Geography
  • Governments
  • Human Rights
  • Middle East
  • National Security
  • Terrorists
  • United States
  • Ussr
  • War Colleges

Fields of Study

  • Political science

Readers

  • East Asian Political and Security Studies within the Soviet Union
  • Strategic Security Studies