TURKEY SHIFTING FROM WEST

The Western media and establishment are raising the question whether Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is giving up on the West. The Turkish prime minister adopted a tougher stance on Israel recently. The AOS incident is fresh in the Western memory. Further similar situation has emerged as a result Israel’s removal from a NATO drill in the Central Anatolian province of Konya by the Turkish government. The United States retaliated and withdrew from it too. Turkey, as a NATO member country allows Americans to have nuclear warheads at Ýncirlik Air Force Base in the southern Turkish province of Adana. Erdogan questions why the United States possesses nuclear weapons, some of which are deployed in Turkey. Such attitude in Turkish foreign policy may seriously affect Western perceptions of the AKP in the long run.