Sometimes dogs bark and bite
We knew from the start that the calm interlude in Greek-Turkish relations would not last forever. It was a careful but temporary agreement that will expire after the elections are completed in Greece and Turkey. Now, we see Ankara slowly returning to an aggressive rhetoric. Recep Tayyip Erdogan, if re-elected president, which is quite likely, will find himself in an extremely difficult economic situation, with a gap separating him from the West and closer ties with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. But he will also find himself tied to the nationalists and the Turkish deep state.
Opinions of what he will do in this environment vary greatly. The optimists predict that under pressure from the markets he will seek to reach some kind of understanding with the Greek premier. They will both be powerful, with a fresh mandate. The pessimists fear that the more Erdogan is pressured domestically, the more extreme and nationalist he will become. They are worried that the internal pressure will be exported – either toward Cyprus or Greece.
In my eyes, the re-election of Erdogan can benefit Greece because tolerance of any Turkish provocations or extreme actions will be zero on the part of the US and Europe. But we need to be careful. Foreign analysts reading this argument may misread it. They may think that we are not worried about Erdogan and that we have come to the conclusion that his bark is worse than his bite. But that is not true. Remember what happened in the eastern Aegean in August 2020 and how close we came to a military confrontation. If the commander of the Greek frigate Limnos had not shown exceptional composure, the outcome of the well-known incident, where the frigate collided with the Turkish naval vessel Kemalreis, would have been different. The “dog,” in this case, barks and bites, and this is a good thing for us and all those who misunderstand the phrase “better the devil you know” to remember.
The most likely scenario is that Erdogan will publicly invite Greece to “sit at the table to discuss everything.” At least initially. This tactic has many pitfalls as few outside of Greece realize how unbalanced the agenda set by Turkey really is.
During the pre-election period, we did not talk at all about Turkey or foreign policy. That doesn’t mean it won’t come up as a major issue over the summer or a little later. There is certainly no need to be alarmist because we risk becoming the protagonist of Aesop’s fable about the boy who cried wolf. But neither should we be complacent, because there might be many dogs that bark but don’t bite, but there are also those that, when they bark a lot, are warning you that at some point they might bite.
