On promises of improving social conditions, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) won 60 percent of the parliamentary seats. AKP leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a former mayor of Istanbul who is banned from running for office because of an earlier conviction for "inciting religious hatred," won support for his attacks on "corruption," for which he blamed the traditional parties.

Turkey, a nation of 67 million inhabitants, is saddled with a foreign debt that is expected to reach $126 billion by the end of the year--equaling more than one-quarter of its annual gross domestic product. Interest payments to imperialist creditors have drained the country’s finances. Last year they accounted for more than half the national government’s spending.

The Turkish currency was floated last year, losing 40 percent of its value. Today almost 17 percent of workers are unemployed or underemployed, according to official figures.

Bülent Ecevit, Turkey’s social-democratic prime minister until the November elections, had announced plans in August to sell off huge state banks, the Tupras oil refinery, and state-owned tobacco and alcohol companies in exchange for a $16 billion loan package from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). When the government initiated similar policies in the winter of 2000–01, workers and farmers mounted massive protests to demand jobs and relief from rampant inflation.

Workers demonstrated their rejection of Ecevit’s austerity measures in a December 2000 general strike, and with marches of tens of thousands in Ankara, the capital, and across the country. A hunger strike by 250 political prisoners helped to expose widespread political repression as well.

During the election campaign, Erdogan appealed to voters as an alternative to the traditional parties. At the same time, however, he worked hard to appear respectable to imperialist governments that Turkey is dependent on. He distanced his party from charges that it was "Islamist," backed the IMF’s austerity program, and--in a shift from his previous position--promised to support a bid for Turkey to join the European Union.

Imperialist government officials offered cautious praise for the AKP’s electoral win. British prime minister Anthony Blair said he was "very encouraged" by the new government’s conciliatory statements after the elections. A U.S. State Department official said, "[We] look forward to working with the new Turkish government." A German government spokesperson urged the new government to adhere to "cooperation with the International Monetary Fund."  
 
Costly alliance with imperialism
Washington has been playing close attention to Turkey, which is a key part of its plans for an assault on neighboring Iraq.

In October Gen. Thomas Franks, head of the U.S. Central Command, and Gen. Joseph Ralston, supreme allied commander in Europe, met with top Turkish military commanders to enlist their support in Washington’s coming war on Iraq. The U.S. military officials sought to firm up their agreement to maintain the use of the Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey as a launching pad for U.S. and British warplanes carrying out bombing raids in the "no-fly" zones over a large part of Iraq’s north.

Turkey has the largest standing army of the European NATO powers. Its government reaffirmed its worth to imperialism by agreeing to take command of the 5,000-troop occupation force in Kabul soon after the U.S.-organized invasion of Afghanistan.

The Turkish ruling class backed Washing-ton’s assault on Iraq in the 1990–91 Gulf War, with the goal of winning trade favors, military aid and hardware, and a measure of stability. The results were catastrophic, however. Nearly 1 million Kurdish refugees--victims of both the imperialist invaders and the Iraqi government--pounded at the borders with the end of the war. Turkish officials complain today that Operation Desert Storm cost tens of billions of dollars in military expenses, lost trade with Iraq--including honoring the blockade that shut off the oil pipeline with Iraq--and lost revenue from tourism. Estimates of the cost to Turkey’s fragile economy of another war on Iraq range from $9 billion to $150 billion.

Hoping to mitigate the impact of the coming war, the Turkish government is seeking a financial package from Washington worth $5 billion. Earlier requests for help, however, have left the Turkish capitalists with little to show for their efforts. In April U.S. vice president Richard Cheney promised Turkey $228 million in exchange for taking command of the occupation force in Kabul, but it later turned out that only $28 million was in direct aid, with $200 million to go toward debt relief. In January Prime Minister Ecevit traveled to the United States to urge Washington to open its markets to Turkish steel and textile imports. This request too fell on deaf ears, the Wall Street Journal reported, noting that "despite its importance as a potential ally against Iraq, Turkey joined a lengthening list of anti-terror allies that have come away empty-handed trying to win trade concessions from the U.S."

Besides their economic woes, Turkey’s rulers fear that another war will spark a renewed upsurge in the Kurdish people’s fight for self-determination. Ankara has waged a brutal 15-year war against Kurdish forces fighting for independence in southeast Turkey, which has left more than 30,000 dead. Some 20 million to 30 million Kurds are divided among southeastern Turkey, northern Iraq, Syria, Iran, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.

Turkey already has 5,000 troops in Iraq battling Kurdish fighters. Defense Minister Sabahattin Cakmakoglu recently stated that "Turkey considers northern Iraq to be under its direct care." In response, Kurdish Democratic Party leader Massoud Barzani vowed that northern Iraq would become a "graveyard" for invading Turkish soldiers.

Turkey also finds itself at the center of imperialist conflict in its bid for membership in the European Union. "Hardly a week goes by without Washington telling the European Commission" to open the door to Turkey joining the EU, the Financial Times reported. Thomas Weston, U.S. special envoy to Cyprus, told the London daily, "We have made our views very strongly, very forcefully with our friends and allies."  
 
Divisions over European Union
On October 24, in a rebuff to Washington, the 15-member body voted to exclude Turkey from its plan to take in 10 new countries by 2004. Turkey is the EU’s sixth-largest market, and trade relations with the European bloc account for half of Turkey’s exports and imports.

European capitalist spokespeople claim they won’t admit the Turkish government, a fellow member of NATO, into EU membership until it gains EU approval for its human rights record. In response to Washington’s pressure for Turkish membership, Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen of Denmark, which currently holds the presidency of the European Union, declared, "The United States must understand that putting Turkey into the European Union is not like putting Mexico into a free trade agreement. We treat Turkey far better than you treat Mexico."

A related conflict revolved around Cyprus. The Greek Cypriot government, which rules two-thirds of this Mediterranean island nation of 750,000 people, has been granted the status of full candidate for EU membership since 1997. Outgoing Turkish prime minister Bülent Ecevit stated that if Cyprus is admitted, the Ankara government will move ahead and annex the portion of the island occupied by Turkish troops.  
 
 
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