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Old Wine in New Bottles: Ankara and Doha rebrand their years-old protectorate pact – PR stunt in Constantinople: “Caliph” Erdogan and Qatar’s Emir sell “brotherly” illusions
With great pomp and circumstance, in Constantinople, “Caliph” Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, signed what they dubbed a “historic mutual defence agreement,” pledging a “unified stance” against any external threat.
Yet anyone who follows even the most basic developments in the Middle East and the Mediterranean can only smile ironically at this carefully staged public-relations spectacle: what exactly does this signature bring to the table?
The answer is simple: absolutely nothing of substance, beyond the formal stamp on a relationship of dependency that has existed for years.
Let us not fool ourselves. The two pillars of political Islam -neo-Ottoman Ankara of the Muslim Brotherhood and the ultra-wealthy emirate of Doha- did not need the 12th session of their Supreme Strategic Committee to discover their “brotherly” solidarity.
Turkey already maintains a permanent military base on Qatari soil (the notorious “Tariq bin Ziyad” base), acting as the Emir’s Praetorian Guard against his Arab neighbours.
Even more tellingly, the two countries long ago signed arrangements allowing the deployment of Qatari fighter jets (even the ultra-modern Rafales that Qatar purchased from France!) on Turkish territory for “joint training” -a clever loophole for Ankara to gain access and know- how regarding Western weapons systems it cannot acquire itself due to sanctions.
When military alignment, troop deployments, and aerial “exchanges” are already an established reality on the ground, this new “mutual defence agreement” looks far more like diplomatic fireworks.
With his economy on the verge of suffocation, inflation eating away at his country, and diplomatic isolation mounting, Erdogan is desperate to sell his domestic audience images of a “regional superpower” signing defence pacts from Mecca to Doha.
On the other hand, tiny yet financially mighty Qatar is buying “security” with hard cash in a region engulfed in flames.
And this is precisely where the crucial, uncomfortable question arises for the two “brotherly” leaders: who is ultimately whose protectorate?
Is Qatar a military protectorate of Turkey, which without Turkish bayonets and Turkish drones would tremble at the thought of a new Gulf crisis?
Or has Erdogan’s bankrupt, debt-ridden Turkey been reduced to the ultimate economic protectorate of Qatar, which keeps the Turkish lira on life support with billions of dollars in swaps, buying up prime assets of the Turkish economy, hotels, banks, media outlets, and defence industries for pennies on the dollar?
The reality is as stark as it is cynical: this is a mercenary-style transaction.
Qatar puts up the petrodollars and natural gas dollars to save Erdogan from economic collapse, and Erdogan offers up the Turkish military as a mercenary force to protect Doha’s throne.
All the rest about “collective defence,” “peace,” and “brotherly ties” is merely the ideological wrapping for a purely utilitarian pact of survival.
