Erdogan’s Imperial Dream
Article by Anna Karamanou
Published on the website in social, October 2023.
On October 29, Turkey celebrates its national independence and the founding of the Turkish Republic, established on October 29, 1923. This day marks the expulsion of the Greek army from the Anatolian coasts and the signing of the Treaty of Lausanne, which abolished the Treaty of Sèvres. It was a defeat for Greece and a victory for Turkey.
When I traveled to Istanbul in June 2011 to observe the campaign for the national elections for my doctoral research, I saw giant posters everywhere in the streets featuring Erdoğan’s photo next to a massive “2023!” Having followed his trajectory since his time as the mayor of Istanbul, I didn’t find it difficult to think of the obvious: As a young ruler, he wishes to associate his name with something very significant, something grand, perhaps even more important than the founding of the Turkish Republic. His desire to be present and dominant in 2023 is evident. Perhaps it is not so much to honor the 100th anniversary and the founder Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, but rather to link his own hegemony with revisionism and the strategy of restoring the Ottoman Empire, which Atatürk had accepted to dissolve.
All of Erdoğan’s moves in recent years, aided by his far-right nationalist ally Bahçeli, indicate that his goal for the 100th anniversary of the Turkish Republic is to portray Kemal as a sort of traitor for signing treaties that erased the Ottoman Empire from the map in order to establish a nation-state in its place.
Erdoğan’s revisionism is expressed through the concepts of the “Blue Homeland,” the “borders of our heart,” the map claiming half of the Aegean, daily threats against Greece (such as “We will come one night…”), and new alliances in the Middle East with figures like Putin and Iran. He has also engaged in various diplomatic and mediatory initiatives concerning energy, grain, and the war in Ukraine, all aimed at bolstering his international role. As a new Sultan, he dreams of restoring the Ottoman Empire with the borders of the 17th century, which extended from the Arabian Peninsula and the waterfalls of the Nile in the south to Basra near the Persian Gulf and the Iranian plateau in the east, reaching almost to Gibraltar in the west, covering the Balkans, the Ukrainian steppes, and the walls of Vienna in the north.
Erdoğan’s strategy for expanding his influence and fostering a sense of grandeur across all political domains is also reflected in his ambitious, “pharaonic” projects: his personal palace, the “White Palace,” which spans 300,000 square meters (30 times the size of the White House), the world’s largest airport, the underwater Eurasia Tunnel in the Bosphorus, and the Osman Gazi Bridge, the third suspension bridge across the Bosphorus, along with highways, bridges, hospitals, and significant projects in occupied Cyprus. Essentially, Erdoğan explicitly and implicitly expresses his ambition to displace Kemal from the consciousness of the Turkish people and to position himself as a great reformer and the father of a Turkey that matches the grandeur of the Ottoman Empire at its peak. Will the West continue to watch awkwardly as former empires engage in revisionism, pursue expansionist ambitions, and seek a redistribution of power and wealth in the evolving great alliance of the East against the West?
Anna Karamanou
PhD in Political Science, EKPA
Former PASOK Member of the European Parliament