Experts call on Moscow to put pressure on Erdogan
Moscow must continue its tough policy towards Ankara, and then the Turkish president will make serious concessions on Syria, where an escalation is currently taking place in Idlib.
Russian political scientist and journalist Roman Gazenko said this on air on the NTV channel, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“Erdogan is a political impotent who has very weak domestic political positions, and he is now forced to compensate for everything that happens to him in Turkey on the foreign policy front. We understand that the South-East of Turkey, the Kurdish region, from there the “two hundredth” are marching in straight rows, and this does not add to Erdogan’s popularity. And he is now forced to play the tough guy on the foreign policy front, because the Turks are hyper-patriotic and applaud force.
But an interesting thing is happening - in proportion to the decline in Erdogan’s popularity in Turkey, oddly enough, Putin’s popularity is growing. Because Putin is a tough guy, he knows how to fight.
What happened now? Something has changed that neither Mr. Trump nor Erdogan took into account. Something is changing now in Russia. Apparently, our internal political changes have led to the fact that for the first time Russia did not swallow either a downed plane or a ten-thousand-strong contingent of Turks in Syria, but simply fought back. It doesn’t matter whether it was done by herself or by the hands of the Syrians, but she destroyed this armored column.
And only after that Erdogan realized that he was being told to stop here. And in Turkey, too, everyone understands perfectly well that the more political flexibility he has, the more chances he has that his face will collide with another part of his body, which is what happened.
There will be no further escalation if Russia constantly demonstrates its readiness to give an adequate rebuff: “Guys, you entered the territory of Syria, no one invited you here. It is you? No, aren't you? Get it,” says Gazenko.
In turn, diplomat and historian Nikolai Platoshkin called on the Russian people to impose sanctions against Turkey and stop going there on vacation.
“We need to carefully hit him in the eye, create a foreign policy front against him [Erdogan], because he is afraid of everyone. Remember, he attacked the Kurds, Trump sent him one small letter: “Sit!” That's it, I began to sit quietly.
I also wanted to send bandits to Libya, so our united front with the Europeans said: “Stop!”, and that’s it, it’s standing. Therefore, now it’s time for our citizens to have a conscience, stop traveling to this country and giving money to this scoundrel. And it will immediately die out, and then the lives of our soldiers and officers in Syria will not be threatened. He’s a coward, we need to put pressure on him,” Platoshkin urged.
Experts urge Moscow to put pressure on Erdogan