Apr 1st, 2011 | By Serkan Bulut<\/p>\n
Myth I: Tur\u00adkey will proof to be a Tro\u00adjan horse !<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/Plaatje-Serkan-Turkey-EU-Torjan-Horse.jpg\" "\\"Plaatje-Serkan-Turkey-EU-Torjan-Horse\\"")
The fam\u00adous story of the Greeks\u2019 cap\u00adture of the city of Troy using the decoy of a wooden horse in which sol\u00addiers were hid\u00adden is a well-known one. It cre\u00adates a power\u00adful his\u00adtor\u00adical image in mind and this is why it is pop\u00adu\u00adlar when it comes to describ\u00ading the Turk\u00adish bid to the EU.<\/p>\n
Tur\u00adkey: Tro\u00adjan horse of the Islam?<\/p>\n
There are two aspects of this myth. On the one side are the people who believe that Tur\u00adkey will be the Tro\u00adjan Horse of the Islam in Europe and that through Turk\u00adish EU mem\u00adber\u00adship, Europe will be Islam\u00adized, mean\u00ading that Europe will become a \u201cMuslim\u201d con\u00adtin\u00adent. This group envi\u00adsions a reli\u00adgious dom\u00adin\u00ada\u00adtion of Europe by Turks; a pro\u00adcess which will turn Europe into Eura\u00adbia. Through con\u00adver\u00adsion and high birthrates this groups believes that Muslims will finally over\u00adrun Europe. Of course this argu\u00adment has its con\u00adnec\u00adtions with argu\u00adments against Muslim immig\u00adrants of dif\u00adfer\u00adent ori\u00adgins, other than Turk\u00adish, as well. Artic\u00adu\u00adlat\u00ading the already \u201chigh\u201d num\u00adber of Muslim immig\u00adrants in Europe, adding the incom\u00ading 70+ mil\u00adlion Turk\u00adish Muslims, this argu\u00adment paints a dooms\u00adday scen\u00adario for sec\u00adu\u00adlar Europe. From this per\u00adspect\u00adive Tur\u00adkey is not or \u201cno longer\u201d a sec\u00adu\u00adlar coun\u00adtry and its \u201cIslamic\u201d nature is the dag\u00adger that aims at the heart of Europe. Just like in any other myth this claim lacks a solid base of evid\u00adence; mere rehash\u00ading of his\u00adtor\u00adical fears and pro\u00adduc\u00adtion of a new gen\u00ader\u00ada\u00adtion of phobias.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not say\u00ading that integ\u00adra\u00adtion of a coun\u00adtry with a large pop\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtion will be a prob\u00adlem free pro\u00adcess but the prob\u00adlems will not be of a reli\u00adgious nature. Turks have always had ambi\u00adtions for the future. Whether real\u00adistic or unreal\u00adistic, rational or irra\u00adtional they have always thought that they are destined to do great things. How\u00adever, a reli\u00adgious dom\u00adin\u00ada\u00adtion of Europe is not part of the Turk\u00adish agenda. This goes espe\u00adcially when it con\u00adcerns the youth.<\/p>\n
Tur\u00adkey: Tro\u00adjan Horse of the U.S.?<\/p>\n
The other aspect of this myth is the one that sees Tur\u00adkey as a Tro\u00adjan horse of the US in the EU. This group is skep\u00adtical of Eng\u00adlish policies as well and tends to see Tur\u00adkey as a second Eng\u00adland in the EU. There are sev\u00aderal assump\u00adtions behind such a the\u00adory that cre\u00adates this myth and as these assump\u00adtions are flawed: the whole the\u00adory is misguided.<\/p>\n
First of all, claim\u00ading that Tur\u00adkey will be an agent of the US within the EU implies that the EU and the US are exper\u00adi\u00aden\u00adcing sig\u00adni\u00adfic\u00adant clashes of interest and that Tur\u00adkey will join Eng\u00adland in under\u00admin\u00ading the EU against the US. When was the last biggest clash of interest\/policy between the EU and the US since the fall of Soviet Union? It was the war in Iraq and there was no sig\u00adni\u00adfic\u00adant dif\u00adfer\u00adence between the Franco-German atti\u00adtude towards the war and Amer\u00adican policies, and the Turk\u00adish. In fact, Turk\u00adish oppos\u00adi\u00adtion to the war severely dam\u00adaged the rela\u00adtions with the US which took years to nor\u00admal\u00adize, while many European states con\u00adtrib\u00aduted to the war efforts.<\/p>\n
Secondly, Eng\u00adlish and Turk\u00adish ideas about integ\u00adra\u00adtion and deep\u00aden\u00ading of the Union are com\u00adpletely dif\u00adfer\u00adent. Bri\u00adtain prefers to limit its integ\u00adra\u00adtion to con\u00adtin\u00adental Europe. Tur\u00adkey, how\u00adever, in fact des\u00adper\u00adately wants to integ\u00adrate itself into Europe and turn itself and the EU as a viable actor in global polit\u00adics and a counter-balance of the US, espe\u00adcially in the Middle East.<\/p>\n
All in all, the argu\u00adment that Tur\u00adkey will be the Tro\u00adjan horse of the US in the EU is prob\u00adlem\u00adatic from the very assump\u00adtions it lays its found\u00ada\u00adtion on. It assumes a ten\u00adsion between the two sides of the Atlantic which is neither inher\u00adent nor char\u00adac\u00adter\u00adistic of this rela\u00adtion\u00adship. And it falls into the trap of com\u00adpar\u00ading Bri\u00adtain which holds a \u201cspe\u00adcial\u201d rela\u00adtion\u00adship with the US to Tur\u00adkey, a coun\u00adtry that strives to find a new refined role in its regional polit\u00adics and sees the EU as an import\u00adant plat\u00adform to real\u00adize that wish.<\/p>\n
via The Myths about Turkey: Part I – European Student Think Tank.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Apr 1st, 2011 | By Serkan Bulut Myth I: Tur\u00adkey will proof to be a Tro\u00adjan horse ! The fam\u00adous story of the Greeks\u2019 cap\u00adture of the city of Troy using the decoy of a wooden horse in which sol\u00addiers were hid\u00adden is a well-known one. It cre\u00adates a power\u00adful his\u00adtor\u00adical image in mind and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":27327,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[5208,7925],"class_list":["post-31787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-eu-members","tag-trojan-horse-of-islam","tag-turkey-eu"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27327"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}