Is U.S. Military Assistance Subsidizing Turkey’s Occupation of Cyprus, Syria, and Iraq?

Despite a last ditch effort by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), the Senate failed to block the Biden administration sale of F-16 and F-16 avionics upgrades to Turkey. The White House envisions the sale both as a consolation prize after Turkey lost its participation in the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program and as a reward for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan lifting his veto on Sweden’s NATO accession.

Augmenting Turkey’s air force, however, remains bad policy for three reasons:

First, despite U.S. assurances to the contrary, the F-16s do little to enhance Turkey’s role in NATO collective defense. Quite the contrary, Turkey’s repeated threats toward Greece and its denial of Greek sovereignty over the Aegean Sea raise the specter that the F-16s could spark an intra-NATO war.

Second, Turkey openly seeks to build its own military industry. Providing advanced jets and upgrades simply catalyzes that goal at the expense of American industry and regional security.

Finally, giving into Erdogan’s blackmail only encourages future extortion.

Biden will have blood on his hands for the F-16 deal, as Erdogan is much more likely to use the warplanes against Yezidis and Kurds in Syria and Iraq, or against Armenians should Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev make good on his threats to eradicate Armenia in its entirety.

Congress, however, is not without recourse. As Congress begins to debate appropriations, it is reasonable for appropriators to ask questions about U.S. aid and military transfers to Turkey. Such questions fall within the purview of appropriators, but do not cross the line into legislating through appropriations.

For example, Congress might demand the Defense Department report publicly on Turkey’s indigenous defense industry to establish the degree to which Turkey incorporates U.S. software or other products into its military platforms. The Pentagon might assign a financial value to intellectual property rights violations in order to deduct that amount from future assistance to Turkey, NATO partner or not. It might also deduct future Turkish arms sales to third countries from the amount of assistance the United States gives Turkey.

Likewise, as money is fungible, Congressional appropriators might demand the Pentagon or State Department calculate the cost of Turkey’s nearly half century occupation of Cyprus, especially now that Turkey doubles down on seized Cypriot civilian infrastructure in order to build a drone base to threaten Israel and shipping in the Eastern Mediterranean. Turkey stations several thousand troops on the island. Financial analysts might assign the expense this represents as well as the transfer costs of several hundred thousand Turkish settlers, and then both deduct this amount from any assistance to Turkey and divert the same amount to the Cypriot government to distribute to the owners of illicitly seized properties.

The same logic holds true with regard to Kurdish districts in northern Syria that Turkey has occupied and ethnically cleansed, as well as the oil refineries and other civilian infrastructure that Turkey has bombed inside Kurdish-controlled sectors of Syria, especially as the Israel-Hamas war distracts the region. Reversing Turkey’s occupation of these zones is crucial given Ankara’s aim to demand a referendum for them to join Turkey, much like occurred in 1939 with the Syrian district of Hatay.

Turkey also maintains several dozen forward operating bases in Iraqi Kurdistan many of which monitor and terrorize the local Iraqi Kurdish population. The expense of these should be determined and publicized, both to deduct from U.S. and NATO assistance and so the public know the cost of Turkey’s imperial project.

Finally, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev imprisoned economist and democracy activist Gubad Ibadoghlu after he publicized the corrupt contracts Erdogan and his allies won for building projects in Nagorno-Karabakh following the ethnic cleansing of the region’s indigenous Armenian population. Appropriators should demand the State Department report such contracts so that Congress can deduct Erdogan’s personal profit from American assistance.

Over the last decade, the United States has provided Turkey with more than $100 million annually in aid, not including military assistance that is far higher. Biden may say Erdogan is an ally, but this is simply putting lipstick on a pig. Congress need not go along, especially when the civilian and military assistance the United States provides Turkey worsens rather than enhances regional stability.