Winning Turkey: How America Europe and Turkey Can Revive a Fading Partnership

Turkey has always been a crossroads: the point where East meets West, Europe meets Asia, and Christianity meets Islam. Turkey has also been a close and important American ally, but a series of converging political and strategic factors have now endangered its longstanding Western and democratic orientation. In Winning Turkey, two leading analysts explain this worrisome situation and present a plan for improving it. The stakes are clear. Turkey is the most advanced democracy in the Islamic world, bordering a number of the world's hotspots, including Iraq, Iran, and the Caucasus. It occupies the corridor between Western markets and Caspian Sea energy reserves. A stable, Western-oriented Turkey moving toward EU membership would provide a growing market for exports, a source of needed labor, a positive influence on the Middle East, and an ally in the war on terror. The picture has darkened, however, as rising anti-Americanism, deflated hopes for EU accession, civil-military tensions, and terrorist threats have destabilized an already volatile Turkish political system. Wi nning Turkey designs a plan to ease tensions in this critical part of the world. In addition to proposing a ""grand bargain"" between Turkey and the Kurds, it advocates greater support for increased liberalism and democracy, a renewed commitment by both Europe and Turkey to promote EU membership, a historic compromise with Armenia, and greater Western engagement with Turkish Cypriots.

Philip H. Gordon is the Mary and David Boies senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy at the Council on Foreign Relations. He served as Special Assistant to President Barack Obama and White House Coordinator for the Middle East from 2013-15 and as Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs from 2009-13. The author or co-author of several previous books (including Allies at War and Winning the Right War), his articles have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Foreign Affairs, The Atlantic, Politico, and Foreign Policy. He lives in Washington, D.C.