Erdogan’s neo-Ottoman foreign policy

Türkiye, a long-standing Cold War ally of the West, has significantly expanded its presence and influence across West Asia and the Caucasus in recent years. Under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Ankara has pursued an Islamist-leaning foreign policy aimed at building stronger ties with Muslim-majority countries and repositioning Türkiye as a regional power — all while maintaining its alliance with the Western bloc. The rise to power of the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) in Syria has helped Ankara expand its reach close to the Israeli border. Türkiye already maintains a military presence in Qatar, the rich Sunni Gulf kingdom, underscoring its growing strategic footprint in the region.

During the recent flare-up between India and Pakistan, Türkiye stood by Islamabad. Is this blend of Islamism with a pro-Western tint helping Türkiye remake itself in a volatile world?

Erdogan’s era

When the Republic of Turkey was established in 1923 on the remains of the Ottoman Empire, the country’s new rulers adopted sweeping reforms aimed at democratising polity, secularising society and conciliating foreign policy. Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of modern Türkiye, adopted a ‘peace at home, peace in the world’ foreign policy. After the Second World War, Türkiye joined the western bloc. Its geographical location as a Black Sea basin country with access to West Asia, the Mediterranean and the Caucasus made Türkiye a strategically important ally for NATO. All Turkish leaders, both military dictators and elected leaders, followed this establishment consensus on foreign policy — until the rise of the Islamists.

Mr. Erdogan’s AK Party (Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi) that came to power in 2002 also followed this path in the initial years. The AKP came to power after years of political and economic instability, and Mr. Erdogan’s immediate focus was to stabilise the economy. Mr. Erdogan, then Prime Minister, sought close cooperation with the U.S. and integration with the European Union. In the immediate aftermath of the U.S.’s illegal invasion of Iraq in March 2003, Mr. Erdogan wrote in The Wall Street Journal that “My country is your faithful ally and friend”.

Türkiye would take a more ambitious foreign policy turn in the early 2010s — with the onset of the Arab Spring protests to be precise.

Ideological and historical roots

Ittihad-i Islam (Unity of Islam) was a declared foreign policy doctrine of theOttoman Sultan Hamid IIwho reigned from 1876-1909. During this period, Constantinople sought Muslim unity against enemies in the West. The Islamists in Kemal’s Türkiye, who were more or less politically marginalised until the rise of the AKP, had always advocated for stronger ties with Muslim nations. Before Mr. Erdogan’s rise, perhaps the most influential Islamist voice in Türkiye’s politics was that of Necmettin Erbakan (1926-2011). Erbakan, who had served as Prime Minister briefly in 1996-97 and was later banned from politics by the Constitutional Court for violating the country’s secular laws, argued that Türkiye should protect its religious values, build closer relations with Muslim countries and combat western imperialism. For him, the European Union was “a Christian club”. Erbakan formed different political parties (of which the Welfare Party was the most prominent one) but never managed to break through Türkiye’s political and foreign policy consensus.

When the Welfare Party was banned, Islamist politicians formed the Virtue Party in 1997. One of the leaders of the Virtue Party was Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The AKP was formed in 2001 after the Virtue Party was found unconstitutional. In the 2002 election, Mr. Erdogan did what Erbakan couldn’t — he brought the Islamists to power. It was only a matter of time before the AKP turned to Erbakan’s foreign policy doctrine.

From theory to practice

“The people’s calls and their most humane demands” must be paid attention to, Mr. Erdogan said in February 2011 amid a mass uprising in Egypt against the rule of Hosni Mubarak. By openly backing the protesters, Mr. Erdogan risked unsettling Türkiye’s relationship with Arab countries. But when the Mubarak regime fell, Türkiye suddenly found strategic depth in its new approach, and it started seeing street protests in Arab countries as a vehicle for ittihad-i Islam. Then Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu put this policy tilt in a historical perspective in March 2011, saying the mass protests could break “the template drawn by Sykes-Picot” (the Sykes-Picot Agreement was a treaty between the U.K. and France in 1916 where it was decided to divide the territories of the Ottoman Empire following World War I) and bring power to the parties “that truly represent the people” of the region. Türkiye started backing these parties, hoping that their revolutionary ascent could open corridors of influence for Ankara in a region which was ruled by the Ottomans for hundreds of years.

When the Muslim Brotherhood, another Islamist party with which the AKP shares ideological and political similarities, came to power in Egypt, Mr. Erdogan’s doctrine was put to practice. When protests broke out in Syria in 2011 against the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, Türkiye backed anti-Assad groups — first the Free Syrian Army and then different Islamist outfits. In Libya, which was divided between two governments — one based in Tripoli in the west and the other in Tobruk in the east — Türkiye supported the Tripoli government dominated by Islamist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood, after the Gaddaffi regime was toppled by a NATO invasion in 2011.

Assertive yet pragmatic

Mr. Erdogan did not blindly follow ittihad-i Islam. He mixed his Islamist ideology with pragmatism. He was aware of Türkiye’s limitations.

It is no longer the Caliphate and doesn’t enjoy any politico-religious command over the Muslim world. Geographically, it is only a fraction of what used to be the Ottoman Empire. It is also a treaty ally of NATO. It hosts several Western military bases, including U.S. nuclear weapons at Incirlik. While Mr. Erdogan was ready to risk some friction in Türkiye’s ties with the West, he was cautious not to lead those frictions to a break. At the same time, he saw Türkiye’s support for Islamist groups as an opportunity to rebuild the country’s influence in the Islamic world.

Syria is a case in point. When Mr. Assad, backed by Russia and Iran, started turning the tide of the civil war in 2016, Türkiye offered protection to the HTS, the anti-Assad Islamist group that had taken over Idlib. HTS was formerly Syria’s al-Qaeda branch. But Türkiye strongly opposed any military action against HTS. It entered into an agreement with Russia to maintain order on the Turkish-Syrian border. It carved territories on the border, creating a buffer between the Turkish Kurdish regions and the Syrian Kurdish province. And in November 2024, when the Syrian regime was reeling under repeated Israeli strikes, HTS launched an offensive and captured Damascus within 12 days. This further raised Türkiye’s profile in West Asia.

Azerbaijan is yet another example. When Armenia and Azerbaijan went to war in 2023, Türkiye backed Azerbaijan against Armenia, a Russian treaty ally. When Russia, preoccupied with its own war in Ukraine, was unable to help Armenia, Azerbaijan, with Turkish support and Turkish-made drones, made quick gains. Türkiye supplied drones to Ukraine, but refused to enforce sanctions on Russia. Its decision to buy Russia’s S400 missile defence system had irked Washington. But Mr. Erdogan managed to reset ties and extract concessions from the U.S. when he supported the accession of Sweden and Finland into NATO.

Mr. Erdogan has thus been playing a tricky game — balancing between the West and its rivals through traditional diplomacy, while at the same time reasserting itself in the Muslim world using Islamist foreign policy.

Formidable challenges

While Türkiye’s geographical location, its membership in NATO and its Islamist foreign policy allow the country to portray itself as a major force, its Achilles heel is the economy. Mr. Erdogan, who delivered on the economic front in the first decade of his rule, has ever since struggled to keep the ship afloat. Türkiye has experienced a prolonged period of hyperinflation, and the Turkish lira has depreciated significantly in recent years. Amid high inflation and high unemployment, social unrest has spread, frequently leading to violent crackdowns. Mr. Erdogan, who changed the Constitution turning Türkiye’s political system into an executive presidency from parliamentary democracy, has amassed huge powers in his own hands. He has suppressed political opponents, independent media, and other voices of dissent. Earlier this year, Turkish authorities arrested Ekrem Imamoglu, the popular Mayor of Istanbul, who is the opposition’s candidate for the 2028 presidential election, which Mr. Erdogan can’t contest under the current Constitution.

While on the foreign policy front, Mr. Erdogan’s bets have paid tactical results as of now, it is to be seen how Türkiye is going to build on these gains for long-term strategic dividends. True, the regime change in Syria is a huge advantage for Ankara, but Syria is far from being stable. So is Libya, where violence resurfaces frequently. In the Gulf, Qatar is Türkiye’s powerhouse partner. While Ankara has improved ties with Saudi Arabia and the UAE in recent years, old mistrust still lingers. And in the Caucasus and the Black Sea, Türkiye will have to take Western and Russian sensitives into consideration in its foreign policy decisions. Its support for Pakistan provides Ankara some legroom in South Asia, but Türkiye remains an insignificant player in the subcontinent.

While Türkiye seeks to expand its strategic footprint in different directions, with a neo-Ottoman tilt and within the framework of the western security umbrella, it also risks turning itself into an authoritarian Islamist regime with a weak economy and political instability.