Well, I don’t know whether to laugh or cry after watching the joint statement of Greek PM Mitsotakis and Turkey’s Islamist president Erdogan after the conclusion of a 5-hour visit of the latter in Athens today. Last time Erdogan traveled to Greece was in 2017—and, since then, relations between Greece and Turkey tumbled.
In his 20 years as the neo “padishah” lording over approximately 82 million people, Erdogan has pushed and shoved and pushed some more to register Türkiye as a “great power” near equivalent to the established members of the most exclusive club in the world.
He demolished the Kemalist secularist social model and pushed the country back to virulent conservative Mussulmanism.
He dropped the Kemalist model of neutrality and sent his troops hither and thither—and, especially, in Syria— to raise havoc, seek to destroy the Kurdish liberation effort, interfere in disintegrated Libya, and declare almost the whole of the Greek Aegean Sea as Turkey’s Mavi Vatan, the Blue Sea that rightfully belongs to the successors of the Ottoman Sultan.
In the process, he engaged Greece in a relentless war of words and illegal incursions into Greek air space—coupled with dangerous naval maneuvers deliberately challenging Greek territorial seas and putting the Hellenic Navy on war footing.
Erdogan’s Islamism, coupled with unabashed militarism, steadily pushed relations with Greece into the red zone. He threatened Hellas with ballistic missile attacks on Athens, and publicly told the Greeks to get ready because “we [the Turks] will come instantly one night [when we choose]” apparently to reclaim (!) once Ottoman territories which “rightfully” belong to Turkiye.
These territories include almost all large Greek Aegean islands proximate to the Asia Minor coast, not to mention the island of Crete located quite far away from the Turkish mainland or, as the crow flies, approximately 160 km, or 99 nautical miles, from the Turkish coastal city of Antalya.
Erdogan’s imperial plans aimed at Hellas, however, stalled when Tzar Putin invaded Ukraine sending the whole world into a spin toward an imminent global war in 2022.
Erdogan pivoted quickly to insert himself as a “neutral” in the Russian-Ukrainian catfight despite Turkey being a NATO member, and continues to maneuver in a “peace-making” (imaginary) role.
The padishah is keenly aware that his suspect NATO peace-making ballet waned quickly and wasn’t believed by any of his Western “allies.” And he’s also worried because of increasing US dissatisfaction with all these Turkish acrobatics that have already blocked vital weapon transfers to Turkiye.
But the decisive coup de grass upon Erdogan’s aggressive maneuvering arrived when Hamas invaded Israel, out of nowhere, killing and maiming and abducting Israeli hostages. Erdogan, the global padishah,
immediately sided with Hamas,
blasted Israel with raw hostility and announced Israel will soon be destroyed since she is a terror state,
declared Hamas (an obedient adoptee of the Iranian mullahs) is under Turkey’s protection,
and warned Israel, in unusually threatening language, not to attempt sending her forces into Turkey to hunt the Palestinian butchers because she will “pay a very heavy price” (Hamas has a permanent presence in Constantinople).
With all Western gates now all but shut firmly, the padishah is trapped and in need of demonstrating his false allegiance to a Cristian West he instinctively deplores because, among others, Turkey’s economy is nosediving thanks to “Moslem economics” that makes millions of Turks struggle to make ends meet.
And with his great power juggling derailed, he has suddenly rediscovered his “friendship” with the Greeks. Earlier today, he landed at the Athens airport with transportation and a retinue that puts to shame even the US Senile-in-Chief ‘s official travels.
Three intercontinental jets conveyed the padishah and his battalion-sized escort, plus three heavy-duty bulletproof limousines, for a five-hour round of meetings with the Mitsotakis government.
Erdogan was rushed to the presidential palace in Athens to meet the dwarfish caricature who plays “president” of Hellas and, later, met with Mitsotakis and his ministers.
In a brief televised joint appearance with the Greek PM, the padishah was unusually “friendly” and called for “fraternal” (!) negotiations over bilateral issues and problems.
And with that, the heir of Ottoman sultans collected his retinue and departed for the airport.
Now we begin to wait.