Why NATO Member Turkey Plans to Host Putin While War Rages

Starting in the 1940s, Turkey, wary of Moscow, positioned itself as an ally of the US and soon after joined NATO, the military alliance founded to protect Europe against Soviet attack during the Cold War. Since coming to power in 2003, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has gradually reinvented Turkey as a power in its own right that’s free to make new friends even if it upsets the old ones. Since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Turkey has taken a balanced approach, supporting Ukraine while cultivating ties with Russia. With the conflict dragging on, Turkey has become the first NATO country since the war began to invite Russian President Vladimir Putin for a visit, which is likely to take place after local elections in Turkey at the end of March.

During much of the Cold War, Russia was the hostile neighbor that forced Turkey to seek powerful allies to help defend its territory. In the past decade, it’s been courting a number of US adversaries — China, Iran and Russia — as distrust of the US propelled its search for new partnerships. The idea is to win leverage with historical NATO allies by showing Turkey has alternative partners. Erdogan, who seeks a major role in world affairs, has vowed to make Turkey the first NATO member to join the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a China-led international security group that originally focused on Central Asia but is now expanding toward the Middle East. Turkey and Iran seek to increase cooperation in transportation, tourism and energy even as they support opposing camps in conflicts in Syria and Iraq.