Book Review: Ekavi Athanassopoulou, Turkey—Anglo-American Security Interests, 1945-1952: The First Enlargement of NATO (London: Frank Cass, 1999, 274 pp., £35.00 hbk.)
| DOI | 10.1177/03058298000290030903 |
| Author | Stephen Blackwell |
| Date | 01 December 2000 |
| Published date | 01 December 2000 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Book Reviews
929
Ekavi Athanassopoulou, Turk ey—Anglo-American Se curity Interests, 19 45-1952:
The First Enlarg ement of NATO (London: Frank Cass, 1999, 274 pp., £35.00 hbk.).
Turkey’s rec ent attempts to join the Europe an Union and t he uncertain response of
Brussels have highlighted the Western world’s continued ambivalence about the
political , economic and cultural orientatio n of this country. As one of the most
important member states o f NATO, ho wever, the uniq uely important strate gic role
of Turk ey is taken for granted. Ekavi Athana ssopoulou’s book high lights the
motives behi nd the British and American go vernments’ decision to admit T urkey to
the NATO alliance in 1952.
In a well-rese arched and detailed account Athanassopoul ou demonstrates both
the pragmatism of Turkish policy and the ability of the Ankara govern ment to
manipulate the Anglo-Ame rican alliance to serve its own interests. A leitmotif in
her ana lysis of the forei gn policy of t he Atatürk gover nment during the 1 920s and
1930s, is Turkey’s fear o f the Soviet Union and Moscow’s ambition to o pen a
naval outle t throug h the Bosphorus to the Me diterranean. Ankara saw Briti sh naval
power in the Eastern Medite rranean as a counterba lance against So viet
imperialism. This was a significant imperative behind t he Anglo -French-Turkish
treaty of mutual assistance sig ned in October 1939 . From a strategic p erspective,
Turkey’s Wester n orientation was confirmed thou gh Ankara, to the disappo intment
of the allies, maint ained its strict neutrality until Februar y 1945.
Though the Anglo -Turkish al liance remaine d importa nt, in the imme diate
aftermath of Wo rld War II the Turki sh governme nt was quick to realise that t he
United States had the p otential to be th e domi nant pl ayer in th e Easte rn
Mediterranean and the Middle East. Athanassopoulou provides many fascinating
examples of ‘competitive c o-operation’ wit hin the Anglo-American alliance over
Turkey a nd its place in Western Co ld War strateg y. The Truman Doctrine was t he
most obv ious case of th e British being ab le to persuade the Americans that Turkey
could act as th e ‘stopper in the neck of t he bottle through which Soviet poli tical and
military in fluen ce could most effective ly flow in the ea stern Mediterranean and the
Middle East’ (p. 61). Desp ite the globalist rhetoric of the Doctrine, howeve r,
Washingto n refused to o ffer a secu rity guarantee to Turkey in 1947 .
The reason for this was because though the Truman Doctrine stemmed from
British weakness, Washing ton was still e ager to see London take the main
responsibility for the defence of the Middle East. The author convincingly argues
that Bri tish ambivalence ove r Turkey’s potent ial as a NATO member was d ue less
to strategic facto rs than to London ’s wish to preserve its speci al status and interests
in the region. Of particular interest i s the Foreign Office view, privately expressed
in 19 50, that Turk ey’s membership would d etract from N ATO’s status as a
politico -econ omic communit y based on the same traditions and thus reduce the
alliance’s role to a purely mili tary one. Turki sh membership of the allia nce would
also allo w Ankara to discover that the British could do pra ctically nothing for the m
in the event of a war with the Soviet Union. In 1 950 a Foreign Office official not ed,
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