Thursday, May 24, 2018

Joschka Fischer: "American President Is destroying American Order"

Interview with Joschka Fischer'The U.S. President Is Destroying the American World Order'

In an interview with DER SPIEGEL, former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer talks about the danger of war against Iran, the deterioration of trans-Atlantic relations under U.S. President Donald Trump and the serious need for Germany to invest massively in the European Union's future.

Interview Conducted By Mathieu von Rohr and Christoph Schult

Maurice Haas / DER SPIEGEL

Former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer

May 22, 2018 04:54 PM

DER SPIEGEL: Mr. Fischer, you were -- together with your French and British colleagues -- among the first to embark on negotiations with Iran on its nuclear program in 2003. The 2015 agreement was to some extent your legacy. How did Donald Trump's withdrawal from the Iran deal affect you?
Fischer: I don't take this personally, but I am very concerned about the disastrous consequences of Trump's decision. They will be much more dramatic than portrayed in most of the comments so far. The aim of the agreement was to prevent a second disaster after the Iraq War, namely a large-scale land war in Iran. After the Iraq War, the Iranians tried in vain to divide Europe and the United States. Donald Trump has now managed to do just that.
DER SPIEGEL: Are you afraid that there will now be a war against Iran?
Fischer: I can't imagine that Trump could want that. One of the reasons Trump came into power was the frustration over these unwinnable, endless wars.

DER SPIEGEL: His national security adviser John Bolton wrote ...
Fischer: Enough with Bolton!
DER SPIEGEL: You remember Bolton from your time as foreign minister.
Fischer: I know him very well. He is one of the people responsible for the Iraq disaster.
DER SPIEGEL: Bolton once wrote: "To stop Iran's bomb, bomb Iran."
Fischer: Bolton has only one answer to everything: bombing. I wouldn't pay too much attention to that. But if Iran starts enriching uranium again, we would certainly be in a very dangerous situation. The confrontation between Iran and Israel has already begun militarily in Syria.
DER SPIEGEL: Back then, before the invasion of Iraq, you famously told the Americans: "I am not convinced." Does the current crisis in trans-Atlantic relations remind you of 2003?
Fischer: The situation is much more dramatic today. The danger of a military clash between Israel and Iran in Syria is exacerbated by the U.S.'s withdrawal from the agreement. It is true that the current crisis is a result of the original sin of the invasion of Iraq. Iran's rise to hegemony would not have been possible without the active help of George W. Bush and the American neocons. And without the collapse of Iraq, the rise of the "Islamic State" in Syria would not have come this far.
DER SPIEGEL: To what extent has Trump damaged the trans-Atlantic relationship?
Fischer: We are experiencing a new era. The trans-Atlantic relationship can no longer be taken for granted. But it would be foolish of us to give it up of our own accord.

DER SPIEGEL: German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that we can no longer truly rely on the U.S.
Fischer: It's even worse than that. The American president is deliberately destroying the American world order. I was used to NATO being attacked by the left wing of the Green Party, but not by the American president! From an economic policy point of view, Trump is challenging Germany's business model, which has been geared toward exports from the very beginning. Many are saying that we shouldn't put up with that. I find this reaction understandable, but also kind of cute. What can we do? Given the current balance of power, sometimes all you can do is gnash your teeth..
DER SPIEGEL: You recently wrote a book in German with the dark title "The Descent of the West." Is the West finished?
Fischer: There is every indication that this will happen. The West was the trans-Atlantic area, and its founding fathers were Britain and the United States. The West cannot survive without them, and certainly not with a weak, divided Europe. This is why Europeans must become stronger, much stronger.
DER SPIEGEL: Is the withdrawal from the Iran Agreement the moment in which Europe must finally decide to develop its own foreign policy?
Fischer: That is easy to say, but somebody has to actually do it. A few countries would have to take the lead. Germany and France play the key role in the EU, and without Germany it would be impossible. If we continue to believe that we must remain in the slipstream of world history, Europeans will not be able to act.
DER SPIEGEL: So, what should Germany do?
Fischer: The Federal Republic of Germany was probably the greatest success of American foreign policy. Since 1949, a stable, flourishing democracy has emerged under the patronage of the U.S. After two world wars, we Germans have recognized that we cannot do world politics. It almost destroyed us as a nation, both politically and morally. America was responsible for our protection, and we got used to it. Driving in this slipstream was comfortable and understandable from a historical point of view, but that is now over.
DER SPIEGEL: So, is Trump right when he asks the Germans to spend more on the military?
Fischer: It isn't about Trump. Hillary Clinton would have been just as critical of this as president. We have to do it for ourselves. We have been investing too little in our security for years. What are the things I've read within the past week? German armed forces pilots are losing their licenses because they cannot fly enough hours due to helicopter deficiencies. Submarines cannot sail because spare parts are missing. We only have four combat-ready Eurofighters. What a shame! If you ask me whether we can defend ourselves, the clear answer is no.
DER SPIEGEL: The majority of Germans do not want to spend more money on the military.
Fischer: That's a problem, but we have to do it. We must have a minimum of defense capacity, otherwise Europe will suffer. Do you think I find it appealing to say that we need to do more for our defense? We are too big and important to skimp on defense.
DER SPIEGEL: Proponents of trans-Atlantic ties have fallen into disrepute in certain circles. Some Germans want closer relations with Russia.
Fischer: That is palpable. The great achievement of Konrad Adenauer (the first postwar German chancellor) was that, against the background of his own biography, including the experience of two world wars, he drew the consequence that Germany had to abandon its position as an eternally shaky stalk in the middle of Europe. He said we belong to the West. This is the secret of Germany's success. If we say goodbye to this, we will be saying goodbye to the greatest achievement made by West Germany after our major national disasters. It is completely incomprehensible to me that a party like the CSU (the Christian Social Union, the Bavaria sister party to Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Party) is now starting to waver. The special relationship with Russia is an old dream of both the German conservatives and the German left, but it has never worked.
DER SPIEGEL: With Germany showing a lack of willingness to spend more money on defense and the United States withdrawing at the same time, some German politicians on the left and on the right are saying our only option is to come to terms with Russia.
Fischer: Submission instead of building a defensive capability? I do not share this view. Yes, we should strive for a good relationship with Russia. But not on our knees. That won't impress anyone in Moscow. The question at the heart of the conflict over Ukraine is whether we are prepared to accept that Russia obtains its status as a superpower through zones of influence. If the nationalists in Europe define zones of influence again, we will end up in a vicious cycle. That would be the end of the European Union.
DER SPIEGEL: Is Trump's withdrawal from the Iran agreement a wake-up call for Europe?
Fischer: My impression is that we are gradually realizing that the "black zero" (Germany's balanced budget strategy) won't save us.
DER SPIEGEL: The black zero presents a danger to Europe?
Fischer: It doesn't endanger Europe, but it is holding up progress. We must transform our financial power into political power in the interest of Europe. It's no use just managing savings accounts, beancounter style. In this respect, my advice is to invest massively in Europe.
DER SPIEGEL: In defense?
Fischer: In all areas, and above all politically. Sure, Germany has its interests, and won't be writing any blank checks. But this notion that "they only want our money" is counterproductive.
DER SPIEGEL: "They only want our money," is the answer Emmanuel Macron has received so far from Germany to his ideas for reforming the EU.
Fischer: Yes, this is the return to the German Michel (the 19th century caricature of the German national character). It's a step forward, compared to the spiked helmet (of the Prussians) and the steel helmet (of the National Socialists), but it's a mistake given the dramatic geopolitical situation.
DER SPIEGEL: What would be the right answer?
Fischer: Big, rich Germany -- together with France -- should pay. Why does the EU even exist? Because ever since Adenauer, all chancellors have made late-night compromises possible by putting money on the table. We must turn our economic strength into power in the interest of Europe.
DER SPIEGEL: Aren't you afraid this will drive voters to the right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party?
Fischer: Emmanuel Macron prevented Marine Le Pen from winning in France with explicitly pro-European political platforms. You can't just keep quiet at such historical watershed moments -- you have to explain them. This doesn't just apply to the chancellor. All parties were silent on Europe in the election campaign for the German parliament -- or did you hear something that I didn't? The only people who talked about it were AfD politicians. That's the problem! In Macron's case, Europe comes from the heart. He knows that if Europe is not involved in shaping the new world order, not only in terms of power politics, but also in terms of technology, then it's over.
DER SPIEGEL: How do you explain that Merkel still hasn't responded to Macron's proposals?
Fischer: She can't do anything about the election result. The great tragedy of the federal election is that Christian Lindner (who allowed negotiations to form a government between Merkel's conservative Christian Democrats, his business-friendly Free Democratic Party and the Green Party to collapse, leading to months of delays in creating a new government) did not understand after the election that this is not just about saving the FDP, but that Germany needs a new constellation like the Jamaica coalition (named for the colors affiliated with the aforementioned parties). In view of his age and potential, Lindner should have pushed this forward. Then we would be in a very different position today. The Grand Coalition (the current government that includes Merkel's Christian Democrats and the center-left Social Democrats) creates the impression that it is already exhausted before it has really even gotten going. They are simply tired of each other.
DER SPIEGEL: This week, the Europeans and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif jointly announced their intention to preserve the Iran deal. How could that work?
Fischer: Probably not at all! I'd like it to happen, but I can't imagine how. They cannot protect German companies in view of their close ties. Many have huge investments in the United States and are dependent on the U.S. market.
DER SPIEGEL: The EU has reactivated a law that could impose penalties on companies that comply with U.S. sanctions against Iran ...
Fischer: A German automobile company that does not deliver to Iran because the U.S. market is too important for it is being punished again. How's that supposed to work?
DER SPIEGEL: That would mean the deal is dead?
Fischer: It's going to be difficult. I'm very skeptical about it.
DER SPIEGEL: In hindsight, was it a mistake to concentrate only on the nuclear program in the negotiations with Iran instead of including Tehran's aggressive role in the Middle East and the missile program?

DPA

Members of the Iranian parliament burn an image of the U.S. flag on paper in protest against President Donald Trump's decision to withdraw from the nuclear deal with Iran.

Fischer: The Iranian regime would never have agreed to that. It was right to concentrate on the nuclear program, because that posed the greatest threat of war, and now it's coming back. We have never been under any illusions about the character and intentions of the Iranian regime. Our aim was to involve Iran peacefully while delaying and controlling the nuclear program.
DER SPIEGEL: Shortly before Trump's decision, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presented alleged evidence from the Mossad that Iran lied about its nuclear program.
Fischer: It didn't tell me anything new. We knew that Iran wanted the nuclear bomb before the deal, which is precisely why we had started negotiations. I had meetings in Israel and the United States at the time. I asked those responsible: What do you want to achieve with a military attack? The answer was: We may not be able to destroy the program, but we can delay it. It is precisely this delay that the agreement had achieved on much better terms.
DER SPIEGEL: But Iran has not given up its nuclear ambitions.
Fischer: And the Iranians are not the only ones. Take Saudi Arabia and Turkey, for example. You can draw a map of the Middle East and indicate which country is pursuing a so-called civilian nuclear program. Of course, they also want to use it to produce electricity, but the real intention is a different one.
DER SPIEGEL: Iran's expansionary role in the region has intensified since the agreement.
Fischer: Of course, Iran's role in the region is highly problematic, but it was already expanding before the nuclear agreement. Do you think Tehran's role in Bahrain, Yemen and Syria would be different without the Iran deal?

The article you are reading originally appeared in German in issue 21/2018 (May 18th, 2018) of DER SPIEGEL.
FAQ: Everything You Need to Know about DER SPIEGEL
Seven Decades of Quality Journalism: The History of DER SPIEGEL
Reprints: How To License SPIEGEL Articles

DER SPIEGEL: Sigmar Gabriel has outlined a scenario. After the end of the Iran agreement, nobody invests in Iran anymore, the nuclear program is restarted -- and the United States and Israel respond with a military attack. Is that realistic?
Fischer: It's not like a version of Iraq 2.0 is building up into a much bigger constellation. But Israel will not accept an Iranian military presence in Syria, regardless of the nuclear issue. In this respect, a hegemonic conflict is threatening to take shape there because of Iran's ambitions, which can very easily be intertwined with the nuclear issue. All this cannot be of no consequence to us Europeans, not least after our experiences with the 2015 refugee crisis.

DER SPIEGEL: It all sounds very gloomy. As a former foreign minister, do you automatically have a pessimistic view of the world?
Fischer: I don't think I have a pessimistic view. It makes me furious when people keep telling you that you are pessimistic when you are just realistic. When there's a storm outside, what can I say? The sun is shining! I'm not about to make a fool of myself. When a thunderstorm threatens, the analyst must say: There is a threat of a thunderstorm, even at the risk of being called a dark prophet. This is an historic moment, and Europe must take a big leap. Either we act now or we do nothing. Then we will be outrun and we will no longer play a role in the world.

Translated from the German By Christopher Sultan

Wednesday, May 23, 2018

ÖN-TÜRK AKADEMİSİ grubunda bir gönderi paylaştı.

9 saat

İlhame Enverqızı

16 saat /23 Mayıs 2018

TARİHTE İLK TÜRK ADI, TÜRK SOYU VE TÜRK DİLİ.

Bilim dünyasında Türk adının M.S. altıncı yüzyılda Göktürk devletinin kuruluşu ile ortaya çıktığı ve tarihte ku...rulmuş olan ilk Türk devletinin Hun İmparatorluğu olduğu kabul edilmekte idi. Bilim adamlarının yaptığı araştırmalar sonucu Türk adının daha da eskilere dayandığı ve Hunlardan önce de kurulmuş olan Türk devletlerinin varlığı tespit edildiği için artık bu görüşler geçerliliğini yitirmiştir
Günümüzden yaklaşık 4200 yıl önce Anadolu’da kurulmuş olan bir şehir devleti TÜRK adını taşıyordu. Gerçekten Şartamhari metinleri olarak bilinen ve Akad krallarından Naram-Sin’in Anadolu’ya yapmış olduğu bir seferi anlatan KB III, 13 numaralı metinden öğrendiğimize göre, M.Ö. 3. Bin yılın sonlarında (M.Ö.2200) Anadolu’da büyük bir devlet yoktu. Ancak her şehirde küçük bir krallık hüküm sürmekte idi. Aralarında hâkimiyet mücadelesi yaptıklarına şüphe olmayan bu şehir devletleri, dıştan gelen tehlikeler karşısında içlerindeki en güçlü şehir kralının liderliğinde birleşerek tek güç halinde mücadele etmesini de biliyorlardı. İşte söz konusu metinde 17 Anadolu kralının bir araya gelerek bir koalisyon oluşturdukları ve Akad Kralı Naram-Sin’e karşı mücadele ettikleri anlatılır. Bu 17 kraldan biri de metnin 15.satırında geçen Türki kralı İLŞU NAİL’Dİ. Burada geçen Türki kelimesinin Türk olduğuna şüphe olmadığı gibi, İL-ŞU ismi de pek yabancı gelmemektedir.(E.Memiş, N. Köstüklü, Yeni ve Yakın Çağda Türk Dünyası Tarihi, s.12)
Demek ki günümüzden yaklaşık 4200 yıl önce Anadolu’da çeşitli kavimler yaşamakta idi. Bu kavimlerden birisi de Türklerdi.
Prof. Dr. Bahaaddin ÖGEL, Altay dağlarında Pazırık yaylasında yapılan kazılar neticesinde bulunan M.Ö. Üçüncü bine ait Oğuz tipindeki iskeletin milletimizin ilk atası olduğunu ve Türk tarihinin 5000 yıllık olduğunu belirtir. (H. Tanyu s: 18)
Dr. Rıza NUR’a göre Oğuz HAN M.Ö. 4000’ lerde Hz. İbrahim Peygamber zamanında yaşamıştır. (R.Nur, Türk Tarihi cilt:1, s:45)
Kitabı Cihannuma (Neşri Tarihi cilt 1 s:11), Tevarih-i Âli Osman ve büyük İslam alimi Vani Mehmed Efendi’den öğrendiğimize göre Oğuz HAN, Kur’an-ı Kerim’de adı geçen Zülkarneyn’dir ve Hz.İbrahim zamanında yaşamıştır. (İ.Hâmi Danişmend, Türk Irkı Niçin Müslüman Oldu, s:175) Ebu’lgazi Bahadır Han’a göre de Oğuz Han Abbasilerden 5000 yıl önce (4000 lere denk gelir) yaşamıştır.(Türklerin Soy Kütüğü, s: 45) (Hz. İbrahim’in Türklüğüne ve Oğuz Han’ın Zülkarneyn olduğuna ileride genişçe yer verilecektir.)
M.Ö. 3500’lerde Orta-Asya’dan gelerek Önasya’ya yerleşen Sümerlerin de Türk olduğuna dair yeterli bilgiler ve tarihi belgeler mevcuttur. Önasya kadim tarihinin büyük âlimi Fr. Hommel, eserlerinin birinde, Sümerleri tamamıyla bir Türk kavmi saymıştır. O’na göre Türk kavimlerinin en eski cedlerinden bir şube
M.Ö. 5000 senelerinde Orta Asya’daki anayurtlarından ayrılarak Önasya’ya gelmiş ve Sümerleri teşkil etmiştir. Diğer bir eserinde de, Sümerceden 350 Kelimeyi Türkçe ile izah ederek, Sümerce diye kendisinden bir Türkçe cümle bile terkip eylemiştir. (Z.V. Togan, Umumi Türk Tarihine Giriş, s.12)
Çivi yazılarının ilk başarılı çözümünü yapan Sir Henry Creswicke Rawlinson “Sümer dili Turanî bir dildir” demiştir.
Sümerlerin Mezopotamya’nın yerli halklarından ve Sami kökenli olmadıkları, dillerinin Hint-Avrupa ve Sami dillerle akrabalık bağlarının olmadıkları bilinmektedir.
İlk yazıyı M.Ö. 3200 yıllarında Sümerler buldular. İlk yazıları şekiller üzerine kurulu yani her varlık ve olay için bir şekil kullandılar. Sümercenin Hint-Avrupa ve Sami kökenli dillerle akraba olmadığı bilinmektedir. Sümerce bugün yapılan pek çok araştırma Hint-Avrupa Dil Ailesi'nden çok sondan eklemeli yapısı sebebiyle Japonca, Korece, Moğolca ve özellikle Türkçe ile yakın akrabalıkları tahmin edilmektedir. Sümerolog Muazzez İlmiye Çığ, Sümer diliyle Türkçe arasında birçok benzerlikler olduğunu belirtmiş ve Sümerce alım-Türkçe alımlı, bab-baba, dim-dimdik, es-esmek, gim-kim, güleş, güleç, ib-ip, ir-er, kıya-kıyı, ulu-ulu, kusu-koşmak gibi sözleriyle Sümerce-Türkçe arasında bir akrabalık olduğunu ispatlamıştır
Sümer Türklerinin kullandığı “ Çivi Yazısı “ nı icat eden ve kullanan halkın en doğru adlandırmasını Jules OPPERT yapmıştır:
“Julies Oppert 17 Ocak 1969’ da Fransa Numismatik ve Arkeoloji Derneği’nin etnegrofya ve tarih bölümünde bir konferans vererek, bu halkın ve dilinin Sümer (ce) olarak adlandırılması gerektiğini bildirdi... Hatta Oppert bu konferansta daha ileri giderek, Sümer dilinin bir çözümlemesinin, onu, bu dilin Türkçe, Fince ve Macarca ile yakın akrabalığı olduğu sonucuna ulaştığını söyledi.” (M.Kılıç, s.88, S.N. Kramer, Sümerler, Kabalcı Yayınevi, Birinci basım Eylül 2002, s.34-35-36’dan nakil )
Bilim adamlarından Benno Landsberger’in Sümer dili konusundaki tesbit ve görüşleri ise şöyle:
“Sümerlerin dilinde bir nizam prensibi hâkimdir. Bu bakımdan Sümercenin saydam bir dil olduğu söylenebilir. Mesela konuşma ile ilgili bütün kelimeler ağız kelimesiyle bağ kuran kelimeler olduğu gibi, görme olayına değin fiiller de göz sözcüğü ile birleşim yoluyla oluşmuş niteliğindedir. Diğer bir özellik, cümlenin daha ifade edilmeden zihinde ana çizgileriyle toparlanıp, tasarlanması gerekmektedir. Türk dillerinin genel bir vasfını teşkil den bu nitelik başka dillerde pek görülmeyen bir husustur... Cümleleri meydana getiren tümcelerin (ibarelerin) birer gramer ekiyle birbirlerine bağlanmaları da Sümercenin ortak bir özelliği durumundadır.” (M.Kılıç, 89, Benno Landsberger, “Sümerler“, Dil ve Tarih Coğrafya Fakültesi Dergisi, cilt 1, sayı 5, 1942, s.93-95, Selahi Diker, Türk Dilinin Beş Bin Yılı, İlk baskı Mart 2000, s. 226’dan naklen
Rus arkeolosijinin atası arkeolog Nikolsky şunları iddia etmiştir: “Sümerlerin ana vatanı AŞKABAT kentinin yakınındadır. Bu ülkenin kurganlarından arkeologlar taş, gümüş ve kilden yapılmış eşyaları bulmuşlardır ki bunlar, Mezepotamya’nın güneyindeki Sümer kurganlarındakilere çok benzemektedirler. Bütün bunlar şu düşünceyi getirir ki, Sümerler büyük bir ihtimalle bu günkü Türkmenistan’dan Mezopotamya’ya göç etmişlerdir. Bu iki uygarlığın son analizi onların arasındaki birçok ortaklıkları göstermektedir. (Matveev & Sazonov, Zemlya Derevnogo Dvureçie, Moskova, 1986, s. 38) Begmyrat Gerey, 5000 Yıllık Sümer-Türkmen Bağları, 1. Basım, İst.: IQ Kültür Sanat Yayıncılık, 2004, Arka kapak)
Sümer adıyla tanıdığımız bu devletin asıl adı AT OY BİL idi. (BİR OY BİL devletinin güney ilhanlığı olduğu da sanılmaktadır).Bir şehir devletleri koalisyonu oldukları için kendilerine KENGİ derlerdi. Divanü Lügat-it Türk’te “Kengi- Kengeş“ sözü Hakanın tekliflerini milletin tasvibine sunması, milletle elgili konuların görüşüldüğü meclis anlamında kullanılmıştır (İ.Kafesoğlu Türk Dünyası El Kitabı s: 201) Kengi sözcüğü bugün Türkçede 'MECLİS’ anlamında halen kullanılır.
Prof. Dr. Mümin KÖKSOY Hoca'nın “Nuh Tufanı ve Sümerlerin Kökeni “ adlı kitabında verdiği bilgilere göre, Sümer halkına Âdem'den sonra da peygamberler gönderildi. Bunlardan en ünlüsü, Peygamber Âdem'in 10. nesilden torunu olan ve MÖ 2900'lü yıllarda yaşamış olan Nuh Peygamber'dir. Nuh'un tufandan sonraki hayatıyla İbrahim'e kadar olan çocukları ve torunları, Yukarı Mezopotamya'da yaşamışlardır. Nuh, Sümer ülkesinin Şuruppak şehrinde doğmuştur. Best'a (1999) göre Nuh, Sümer şehir devletlerinden birisi olan Şuruppak'ın kralıdır. Hz. Nuh'un torunları Hz. İbrahim'in önderliğinde âdeta göçe zorlanmışlardır. Hz. İbrahim ve yakınları bir süre Harran'da kaldıktan sonra, Filistin'e göç etmiş ve orada İbrahim'in (İbrahimoğullarının) atası durumuna gelmiştir. Bu yönüyle Hz. İbrahim, dünyanın en etkin kültür taşıyıcısı sıfatıyla anılmaktadır.
Sümerce konusunda araştırma yapan her ülkedeki bilim adamının birleşmiş oldukları en önemli husus, Sümerce'nin Ural-Altay Dil Grubu'na ait olduğu ve özellikle Türkçe ile çok yakın akrabalık ilişkisinin bulunduğudur.

Ayrıca bilim adamları, Sümerce ile Türkçe arasında bugüne kadar 1000 kadar ortak kelime tespit etmişlerdir. Her geçen gün elde edilen yeni veriler, Sümerler'in ve Türkler'in ilk Türkler (Proto Türkler) diyebileceğimiz ortak bir kökten gelmiş olabileceklerine dair yaygın görüşü destekler niteliktedir.
Kazım Mirşan, tarihte kurulmuş olan ilk Türk devletinin BİR OY BİL adlı Türk devleti olduğunu belirmektedir.
Bazı antropologlar; yaptıkları incelemelerde Önasya’da elde ettikleri buluntulardan, Sümer, Kut, Elamve Hurri toplulukların Ural-Altay kavimlerinden özellikle atlı göçebe Türk unsurlar olabileceği kanaatine varmıştır. Eski Önasya Tarihi uzmanı Hemmel, Sümerleri tamamıyla Türk kavmi olarak kabul etmektedir. Orta Asya’dan 4500-5000 yıllarında gelen Türklerin Sümerleri oluşturduğunu ileri sürer. Sümerce’deki 350 kelimenin Türkçe olduğu savunur. . (Z.V. Togan, Umumi Türk Tarihine Giriş, s.12) Prof. Dr. Osman Nedim Tuna da ''Sümer ve Türk Dillerinin Tarihi İlgisi ile Türk Dilinin Yaşı Meselesi'' adlı eserinde 165 adet Sümerce sözün Türkçe denklerini anlamlarıyla beraber göstermiştir.
Bilim adamlarının yapmış olduğu çalışmalarla Sümerce ile Türkçe arasındaki ortak sözcüklerin sayısı şimdilik kaydı ile 900’e yaklaşmıştır.
Bu bilgiler Sümerlerin Türklüğü konusunda yeterli bir fikir vermektedir.
Ayrıca şunu da belirtelim ki, M.Ö. 3. Ve 2. Binyıllarda Doğu ve Güneydoğu Anadolu bölgelerinde oturan Hurriler’in, M.Ö. 9-6. Yüzyıllar arasında Van gölü ile Urmiye gölü arasındaki topraklara hâkim olan Urartular’ın, M.Ö. 8. Yüzyılın sonlarına doğru Kafkaslar üzerinden Anadolu’ya girerek bu ülke tarihinde önemli roller oynayan Kimmerler’in ve İskitler’inde Türk oldukları, bugün artık bilinmektedir. ( E.Memiş, N. Köstklü / 12 )
Yine Çin’de faaliyette bulunan ve M.Ö. 1116-247 senelerinde ( Hunlardan önce ) Çin’i idare eden Çu (Chou) ların bir Türk kavmi olduğu, daha geçen asında kabul edilmeğe başlayan bir fikirdir. (Z.V.Togan/13 )
Türk adının bugünkü şekli ile tek heceli olarak “Türk“ şeklinde kullanılması ise Göktürklerle birlikte başlamıştır. Çin yıllığı “Çou-Şu”dan öğrendiğimize göre M.S. 542 yılında Batı Wei imparatoru T’ai Tsu Göktürk hakanı Bumin’e bir elçi göndermiştir. Bu olayın Çin yıllığına kaydı sırasında Türk adı da kayıtlara geçmiştir.
Göktürk Hakanları, tâbiiyetlerinde bulunan ve zaman zaman isyanlarından dolayı savaşmak zorunda kaldıkları Oğuz, Türkeş, Kırgız uluslarını da de Türk adı ile anıyor ve bunları kendi budunlarından-milletinden olduklarını ifade ediyorlardı. Buradan Türk adının, çeşitli boyları ve birbirine akraba ulusları içine alacak şekilde çok geniş bir manada kullanıldığı görülmektedir.
Demek ki Türkler Sosyolojinin kabul ettiği millet anlayışına sekizinci yüzyılda sahip idiler. Bu gerçeği Göktürk yazıtlarından öğrenmekteyiz. Göktürk Hakanlarının Oğuz, Kırgız, Türkeş gibi Türk boylarını Türk ve kendi budunları olarak görmesi çok ileri derecede bir millet anlayışıdır.
Türkçedeki “BUDUN” (MİLLET) kelimesinin karşılığı sayılan “NATİON” kelimesi Avrupa’da 19. Asrın başlarında görülmüştür. Fransızcadaki “Nationolite” kelimesinin Akademi lügatine ilk defa girmesi de 1835 tarihindedir. Bu kelime daha sonraları biraz değişerek Almancaya da geçmiştir. (İ.Hami Danişmend, Türklük Meseleleri, 13)
Türk adının bu kadar geniş manada kullanılmış olması, Göktürklerden önce de mevcut olduğunu ve kullanıldığını gösterir. Nitekim Kazım MİRŞAN’ da aynı kanaatte olup Türkçenin 16 binyıllık bir dil olduğunu söylüyor. Eski İran ve Arap kaynaklarında “AKHUNLAR” Türk adı altında gösterilmiştir. Turan isminin de Türk’ten geldiği anlaşılmıştır. ( Turan kelimesi Farsça olarak, Türk adının çoğulu olan Tur (k)an’dan gelmektedir. I. Yüzyıl Latin müellifi Pompenius Ural ve İtil nehirleri arasında bir “Turkee” kavminin yaşadığını kaydeder. De Groot ise Hunlardan önce Çin’in kuzeyinde “TİK” adlı bir kavmin bulunduğunu ve bu adın da Türk adı ile ilgili olduğunu ileri sürmüştür. ( O.Turan, Türk Cihan Hâkimiyeti Mefkûresi cilt 1, s:22 ) Yine Çin kaynaklarına göre, Altay dağlarının güneyinde Avarlara tâbi olarak yaşayan Göktürkler onlara demirden silahlar yapıyorlardı. Yakınlarında bulunan dağlardan biri tulgaya (miğfere) benzediği ve Türkçe buna “TU_KİU” denildiği için Türklere Tu_kiu da denilmiştir.
Geçen asırdan beri birçok bilgin tarafından ileri sürülen görüşlere göre, Heredotos’un doğu kavimleri arasında zikrettiği Targitalar veya “İskit” topraklarında oturdukları söylenen “ Tyrkae “ (Yurkae) veya Tevrat’ta adı geçen Togharmalar veya eski Hint kaynaklarında tesadüf edilen Turukha (veya Turuşka) lar vb. bizzat “ Türk” adını taşıyan (İ.Kafesoğlu/106) Türk kavimleridir.
Türk adı yalnız bütün Türk kavimlerini değil zamanla komşu ve akraba kavimleri de içine alıyordu. Altıncı yüzyılda İslâm ve Hıristiyan tarihçileri doğuda bulunan Araplar da Amu ve Sir (Ceyhun, Seyhun) ötesinde yaşayan bütün kavimleri ve Moğolları Türk saymışlardır. Hz. Peygamberimizin hadislerinde de Moğollar Türklük camiası içerisinde yer almışlardır. Aynı kaynaklar Hz. NUH’ un oğlu YÂFES’i Türklerin atası olarak göstermiştir. Kaynaklara göre Yâfes’in sekiz oğlundan birinin adı “TÜRK” tür ve Türk adı buradan gelmektedir.
Fransız Prof. Joseph DEGUİGNES 1756-1758 yılları arasında yayınladığı “ Hunların, Türklerin, Moğolların ve Tatarların Umumi Tarihi “ adlı eserinde, “ Hz. Nuh’un oğlu olan Yâfes’in “ TÜRK “ adında bir oğlu olduğunu ve Türk’ün gayet yüksek bir düşünceye sahip olduğunu belirtir. (H.Tanyu, Türklerin Dini Tarihçesi/18 )
Ebu’l Gazi Bahadır Han’ın “Şecere-i Terakime” (Türklerin soy kütüğü) de Yâfes Türklerin atası olarak gösterilir. (s:22)

Korea’s Two “Impossibles”

May 23, 2018John Feffer Leave a Comment

Kim Jong Un and Moon Jae-in (DPRK media)

by John Feffer

When, in early March, Donald Trump agreed to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, the Washington foreign policy elite nearly suffered a collective heart attack.
For one thing, the announcement came as a complete surprise. Trump had telegraphed his other foreign policy bombshells well in advance: leaving the Paris climate accord, ripping up the Iran nuclear deal, reversing détente with Cuba. North Korea was another matter. Trump had repeatedly insulted Kim Jong-un in his trademark style, calling him “Little Rocket Man” on Twitter and threatening at the U.N. in September 2017 to “totally destroy North Korea.” Official Washington was braced for war, not peace.
You’d think, then, that an announcement of jaw-jaw, not war-war, would have met with universal acclaim in the nation’s capital. Instead, observers across the ideological spectrum found fault with Trump and his attempt to denuclearize North Korea through negotiations. They criticized his timing, his impulsiveness, even the fact that the announcement came from South Korean representatives visiting Washington and not the president himself.
Experts on Korea promptly decried the president’s move because he hadn’t demanded any North Korean concessions first. “We’d expect such a highly symbolic meeting to happen after some concrete deliverables were in hand, not before,” tweeted New America Foundation fellow Suzanne DiMaggio. (In fact, the North Koreans had declared a moratorium on further testing of their nukes and missiles, but that apparently didn’t count.)
Worse yet, the North Koreans were getting the summit of their dreams for nothing. “Kim will accomplish the dream of his father and grandfather by making North Korea a nuclear state,” tweeted Abraham Denmark, head of Asia programs at the Wilson Center, “and gain tremendous prestige and legitimacy by meeting with an American president as an equal. All without giving up a single warhead or missile.”
Although some foreign policy professionals did express cautious optimism that something good could still come from the first summit between an American president and a North Korean leader — now officially scheduled for June 12th in Singapore — the overall verdict was one of barely concealed dismay. “The U.S. has been getting played and outmaneuvered the past three months… and it’s happening again, right now,” tweeted former Pentagon official Van Jackson.
Skepticism is, of course, the default position of the foreign policy community. Bad things happen all the time in geopolitics; peace is an extraordinarily difficult feat to pull off; and most diplomatic outcomes are, at best, glass-half-full affairs. So, for pundits eager to maintain their gigs on network TV and a steady stream of interview requests from print journalists, it was a far better bet to put their chips on double zero.
And it’s true, the history of U.S.-North Korean relations has been a graveyard of defunct initiatives: the Agreed Framework of 1994, the Six Party Talks from 2003 to 2007, the Leap Day Agreement of 2012. If North Korea were to cancel the summit because of U.S.-South Korean military exercises or the inflammatory statements of John Bolton, it would become just another headstone. Far more competent negotiators than Donald Trump tried their hands at preventing the North from going nuclear and suffered epic fails. More troubling still, Trump was preparing for negotiations without even an ambassador in South Korea, lacking a special representative for North Korean policy, and with a new secretary of state barely confirmed by the Senate. In other words, at that key moment, “understaffed” would have been an understatement when it came to the U.S. diplomatic corps and the Koreas.
Finally, both Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump have posted some of the highest negatives since Attila the Hun. The notion that two such wrongs could make a right certainly tests the credulity of the most dispassionate observer. You wouldn’t normally want to buy a used car, much less a complex diplomatic deal, from either of them.
And yet, don’t fool yourself (even if most of Washington does): the upcoming Trump-Kim summit, if it happens, will represent an extraordinarily important step forward, whether it actually produces an agreement of substance or not. It may not end the longest ongoing conflict in U.S. history, but that’s really not the point. The summit’s importance lies largely in its symbolic encouragement of another process entirely, one already underway between the two Koreas. U.S. observers remain focused on nuclear weapons, but nukes aren’t actually the key issue here. In fact, for all the talk about Donald Trump getting a Nobel Prize, to put events in perspective you need to remember that the American president is, at best, a third wheel in what’s developing.
The leaders of the two Koreas have effectively manipulated him into supporting a genuinely hopeful, potentially history-changing process of reconciliation on their peninsula. It’s been a brilliant tactic and if U.S. observers of Korea could put aside their kneejerk skepticism, as well as their America First biases, they would be applauding the best chance in decades for Koreans themselves to defuse the most dangerous situation in Asia.

Playing the President
In keeping with his particular brand of narcissism, Donald Trump is convinced that he alone is responsible for bringing about change on the Korean peninsula. He believes that his threats against the North, his push for tougher sanctions, and his pressure on China to tighten the screws on its erstwhile ally were the key factors in Kim Jong-un’s decision at the beginning of 2018 to reach out to his southern neighbor and extend an olive branch to Washington.
In truth, the initial impetus for the changes in Korea had little to do with President Trump.
After his country conducted its sixth nuclear test in September 2017 and its first ICBM test that November, the North Korean leader must have come to believe that his nuclear weapons program was the sufficiently solid deterrent and valuable bargaining chip he had been seeking. By then, too, he had consolidated his political control in Pyongyang by purging the party, the military, and even his own family, leaving him confident that he could negotiate agreements outside the country without worrying about a palace coup back home. Finally, the North Korean economy was actually managing modest growth, despite the fierce American sanctions campaign against it. This was in part because so many countries were willing to look the other way in the face of widespread violations of the global sanctions regime.
Undoubtedly, Kim was aware of warning signs as well: a dangerous economic dependence on China, a lack of capital for investment, and a declining growth rate. When it came to all three, the logical place to turn was South Korea. Since taking office in March 2017, South Korean President Moon Jae-in had pushed hard for a new engagement policy with the North.
For many months, Pyongyang did not respond, so Moon mended fences where he could. He launched a “New Northern Policy,” focusing on fostering further cooperation with Russia. That November, he reached a compromise with China, promising not to expand a new U.S. missile defense system placed in South Korea earlier in the year in exchange for Beijing lifting restrictions on trade and investment.
In a New Year’s speech in January 2018, however, Kim Jong-un suddenly and very publicly reversed his position. Moon was already well primed — some might say desperate — to take advantage of such a gesture. As a result, in the full glare of international media attention, the two Koreas suddenly launched a policy of cooperation at the 2018 Winter Olympics being held at the time in the south. Then, at the end of April, Kim and Moon actually met in the first inter-Korean summit to take place on South Korean soil.
This was, admittedly, not the first time the two Koreas had attempted a détente, but previous efforts had been stymied, at least in part, by American opposition. Congressional hostility toward North Korea during the latter years of the Clinton era and George W. Bush’s inclusion of North Korea in his ominous “axis of evil” in 2002 put a distinct damper on the possibility of inter-Korean cooperation.
This time, however, the two leaders adopted a new strategy for roping the United States into the process. Instead of appealing to the Korea policy community in Washington — an unimaginative gaggle of Cassandras — each of them decided to “turn” the U.S. president.

Initially, both were undoubtedly as bemused by Donald Trump’s erratic foreign policy tweets as the rest of the world. Still, Kim and his officials reached out to Republican-linked analysts in Washington and soon grasped that the new president valued personal relationships, discounted the advice of policy professionals, dismissed the importance of human rights, and measured his successes largely by the failures of his predecessors, especially Barack Obama.
Keep in mind as well that, for all the hostility Trump had directed toward Pyongyang during the 2016 presidential campaign, he had also signaled — though at the time it was treated as a throwaway line — that he’d be pleased to meet Kim Jong-un and serve him “a hamburger on a conference table.” As president, in May 2017, months before he started threatening to deliver “fire and fury like the world has never seen” to the North, he even called Kim a “smart cookie” and reiterated his willingness to sit down with him. In both instances, he received mockery, not support, from America’s Korea watchers who considered him “naïve” (which was true but beside the point).
Most critically, the North Koreans evidently realized that they could appeal to Trump’s desire to destroy the legacy of Barack Obama. The president had fervently promised to unravel anything and everything his predecessor had ever done, from health care to climate change. But on the Korean peninsula, Obama had never achieved a thing. His policy of “strategic patience” had amounted to little more than eight years of hoping that North Korea would relocate to another planet. In such a situation, the North’s appalling human rights record, its spotty negotiating history, and its very real nuclear weapons program mattered little in Trump’s quest to once again one-up Obama.
South Korea faced a similar set of challenges. In the fall of 2017, Trump accused Moon Jae-in of the “appeasement” of North Korea, though he provided no specifics. Normally, such a charge would have been poison in Washington. Moon could certainly have upped the ante by retaliating in kind. Instead, he cannily held his tongue — and when the tone suddenly shifted in inter-Korean relations in early 2018, the South Korean president pursued a psychologically even smarter tactic: he began heaping compliments on President Trump for making it all happen.
True, Moon’s over-the-top praise flew in the face of what really lay behind the transformation in relations, but he, too, had been well briefed on the president’s personality and predilections. He, too, grasped that the American narcissist-in-chief would incline toward praise like a plant toward the sun. When asked if he should get a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts, Moon immediately insisted that it was Trump, and Trump alone, who deserved such an honor. (Only later did Trump’s base begin chanting “Nobel! Nobel! Nobel!”)
The leaders of both Koreas grasped a reality that eluded Washington’s pundits: that Donald Trump was their best chance of disarming a skeptical American foreign policy elite. In gaining Trump’s support, the two Koreas have indeed, however paradoxically, neutralized the United States as an actor in the drama of inter-Korean relations.

Confronting the Impossible
Think of the story of the two Koreas as a parable of two “impossibles.”
The first impossible is denuclearization. Now that North Korea has a nuclear weapons program, it’s difficult to imagine that it will surrender such weaponry. After all, given the relative decline of its conventional forces, nukes provide a genuine insurance policy against any outside effort at regime change. They’re also the main reason the United States pays any attention to the country. Without nuclear weapons, North Korea would become as vulnerable as Iraq was in 2003 and as irrelevant as Laos after 1975. Nuclear weapons are Pyongyang’s ticket to international respect. Why on Earth would Kim Jong-un give them up in exchange for a non-aggression “guarantee” from the United States, a pledge that a subsequent administration might simply tear up (just as Trump recently shredded Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran)?
The second impossible is reunification. The Koreas are about as far apart as two countries coexisting in the same century could be, as economically disparate as Germany and Ghana, as politically different as Athens and Sparta. One country is thoroughly connected to the world community; the other maintains an isolation policy comparable to eighteenth-century Japan’s. Like matter and anti-matter, the two Koreas risk catastrophe if suddenly brought together.
There are three imaginable ways of dealing with these two impossibles. The first, of course, is the regime-change approach of National Security Advisor John Bolton and his fan club. The idea would be to accelerate the demise of Kim’s regime either indirectly through covert means or even directly through war. In the wake of a North Korean collapse, according to this crackpot scenario, the U.S. Army would sweep into that country, gathering up the loose nukes, while South Korea absorbed the north just as West Germany swallowed East Germany in 1990. No one with an ounce of sense, from academics to Pentagon officials, considers this a viable approach, given the heightened risk of a war with mass casualties, possibly tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands dead and wounded, and the potential use of some of the North’s nukes in South Korea and beyond. And that’s not even taking into consideration the South’s unwillingness to contemplate the immense costs of an overnight reunification.
Despite Trump’s embrace of a summit with Kim Jong-un, Bolton hasn’t given up on this regime-change approach. He initially sought to load the summit agenda with enough non-nuclear issues (missiles, abductions of Japanese and South Koreans) to make it unwieldy and bound to fail. More critically, he insisted that the “Libya” model would serve as the example the United States would follow with North Korea — an ominous signal, given that the regime of Muammar Gaddafi collapsed under the pressure of a U.S.-NATO intervention several years after it gave up its nuclear program. In explaining why North Korea might cancel the summit with Trump, a government spokesman singled out Bolton and his Libya references. And in truth, the North Korean reaction was not a “tantrum,” as the Washington Post editorialized, but a reasonable objection to Bolton’s tactics.
The second approach, the default position for several decades, has been to wait for North Korea to “come to its senses” and beg for an agreement with the United States. Tighter sanctions and an inflexible negotiating position, the adherents of this theory believe, will eventually inflict so much pain on the North that, sooner or later, even the autocratic leadership of Pyongyang will realize its people can’t eat nukes and trade them in for a ticket to the global economy. However attractive this strategy may look, it obviously hasn’t worked over many years. Here, Trump’s critique of the Obama administration has for once been accurate.
The third approach, slow-motion reunification, finally seems to be emerging as the plan of choice for both Koreas. It treats each of the impossibles as resolvable over time.
Moon Jae-in adopted this approach to reunificationfrom his mentor, former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung. Cooperative economic projects are to be designed to gradually bridge the income gap between the two countries. Negotiations over a rail link and fishing rights in adjoining waters are meant to begin the process of harmonizing the political approaches of the two countries. According to a plan Moon delivered to Kim via USB drive at the April summit, South Korea would help its northern neighbor enter the global community by degrees so that, like a diver surfacing from a great depth, it wouldn’tsuffer the bends.
Denuclearization is equally tricky. But a slow-motion process might also square the circle. If North Korea and the United States agree to a staged reduction of the North’s nuclear weapons in exchange for a gradually increasing set of incentives, Kim Jong-un could potentially have his nukes (for a while) and give them up as well (eventually).
Although the elimination of nuclear weapons may be the ultimate goal — for North Korea as well as all other nuclear states — denuclearization as such could prove a distraction in the medium term. After all, Kim Jong-un could decide to reverse such a commitment or continue to pursue the objective secretly. So the goal should really be to ensure that North Korea doesn’t want to use those weapons — or any other weapons — because to do so would jeopardize its newfound position in the global economy. That was the U.S. strategy toward China in the 1970s after it, too, had become a nuclear power and it worked without either denuclearization or regime change.
In other words, the worst position Trump could take in Singapore would be to demand that North Korea completely and immediately abandon its nuclear weaponry before it receives any benefits from a reduction in global economic sanctions. By contrast, a more gradual timeline for denuclearization could well dovetail with slow-motion reunification. What many Korea watchers insist is a fatal flaw in the Trump-Kim summit — a completely different understanding of what denuclearization entails — might turn out to be a blessing in disguise. Such strategic ambiguity could allow both sides to make interim compromises and embrace an interim reduction in tensions even though they were incapable of really agreeing on the end game.
Which brings us back to all the skepticism surrounding the upcoming summit. Sure, it might end up more show than substance, but that would be fine. What the two Koreas really need is the equivalent of a papal benediction from Trump. Let the American president claim the credit, all of it, for processes of denuclearization and reunification meant to intersect at some distant horizon. Let him preen about his contributions to world peace (while he ratchets up war tensions against Iran). Let his fans chant and his Republican backers in Congress nominate him for a Nobel Prize. Let him cling to his misconceptions about North Korea, nukes, and the nature of geopolitics.
And then let him get out of the way so that the Koreans can do the real work, the historic work, the breakthrough work, of knitting the peninsula back together.
Reprinted, with permission, from TomDispatch.

John Feffer

John Feffer is the the editor of LobeLog and the director of Foreign Policy In Focus at the Institute for Policy Studies. He is also the author, most recently, of the dystopian novel Splinterlands (Dispatch Books). He is a former Open Society fellow, PanTech fellow, and Scoville fellow, and his articles have appeared in The New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Review of Books, Salon, and many other publications.

Trump, Iran, Europe

Trump, Iran, Europe: A Rebellion of the Lambs?

May 22, 2018François Nicoullaud 9 Comments

European Commission (by Sebastien Bertrand via Flickr)

by François Nicoullaud

Donald Trump’s decision to pull his country out of the nuclear deal with Iran arrived with a brutality that took Europeans by surprise. Of course, in the previous days, they had lost whatever illusions they still entertained. But there was still hope for a grace period that would allow them to obtain some gestures from Iran, or sanctions eased in return for their efforts. “One more minute, Mr. Executioner,” they pleaded. But the blade of the guillotine fell nonetheless.
The US sanctions suspended by the agreement of July 2015 have now been restored in all their effects. Those who are already in business with Iran have, depending on the case, three or six months to wind down. Americans were already not permitted to trade with Iran, except in a few cases. Now, everyone is prohibited from buying, selling, or investing in Iran. But Germany has more than 100 companies established in Iran, and 10,000 which trade with it. The Italians are very present; the French have Peugeot, Renault, Total. And the European Union buys 40% of the oil exported by Iran. Airbus had just sold more than 100 planes. All of this will have to stop.
The first European reaction was to declare this reintroduction of sanctions “unacceptable.” The second has been to explore how to counter such a decision. Two examples came to the fore. In Reagan’s day, the nine European member states successfully resisted an American attempt to prevent the construction of a gas pipeline from Siberia to Europe. In Bill Clinton’s time, the 15 member states obtained waivers from a law preventing any investment in the Iranian oil industry. In order to extract this concession, the Europeans had adopted a regulation blocking the application of this law on their territory, and the European Commission went to the World Trade Organization.
But since then, things have become more complex. The Europeans are no longer nine, or fifteen, but 28 member countries. Globalization has made immense progress. Any sizable European company has interests in the United States and is therefore subject to US law. Any even modestly complex product is likely to incorporate American parts. When those parts make up 10% or more of the total, the product falls under U.S. law. This is the case, for example, for Airbus aircraft. Moreover, at least 80% of international trade uses the dollar as currency, oil contracts in particular, which makes it also subject to US law. This is why the main European banks, hit by heavy fines, have refused, even when permitted to resume their business with Iran.

What To Do? What To Do?
To meet these challenges, several ideas, which can be combined, are circulating among the Europeans. The first is to update the 1996 regulation blocking the effect of some US laws on European territory. The principle has just been adopted at the European meeting in Sofia. It’s a welcome signal of resistance. But it won’t settle the case of companies holding interests in the United States, which will be caught in contradictory obligations. In addition, the US laws punish not only corporations, but also individuals. What business executives will take such a risk if, when setting foot in the United States, they are immediately handcuffed and presented to a judge for allegedly supporting terrorist activities?
The second idea would be to set up financial circuits that operate without the dollar. But this will take time, so ingrained are existing customs. A third would be to adopt retaliatory measures against American companies in Europe. But it would be difficult for Europeans to unanimously endorse such a principle, fraught as it is with consequences. Another idea would be to bypass the recalcitrant European banks by creating channels of public financing for business with Iran. But its realization will inevitably be complex, if it ever succeeds.
A possible silver bullet: the European Commission could sue the United States at the World Trade Organization. Unfortunately, a final decision would take a long time. In the short term, European companies have no other choice than to apply to Washington for as many waivers as possible allowing them, on a case-by-case basis, to maintain ties to Iran.
But, even supported by their governments, they are likely to be rejected. Indeed, Donald Trump is convinced that Obama wrongfully negotiated too soon with Iran, so that the wave of sanctions adopted by the United States and Europe between 2010 and 2012 had not produced its full impact. Tehran could still stand up. Reinstating the sanctions in all their harshness, Donald Trump expects to bring the Iranians to their knees in two or three years, and get everything that was denied to Obama. But the reasoning is only valid if the multiplication of waivers does not create a bounty of loopholes for the Iranians. The positions, therefore, seem irreconcilable.

Pulling Iran to the Right Side
Europeans have almost always been timid and divided in dealing with America. Now that they have a bad shepherd, will the sheep revolt? Nothing suggests so. Since the European Union has expanded to Central and Eastern Europe, its new members, having experienced the Soviet yoke, yearn above all for American protection. And they are not the only ones. Some states— Germany, France, Britain, Italy—remain sufficiently committed to the relationship with Iran to tiptoe on a tightrope between Donald Trump’s America and Hassan Rouhani’s Iran, hoping to salvage the nuclear agreement.
There is still, however, a strong initiative within reach of the Europeans to pull Iran to the right side.
Europe could offer to launch, without delay and on an equal footing, an ambitious, multifaceted partnership to fight against air pollution, protect water resources, advance agriculture and the food industry, as well as enhance and improve urban management, medicine and public health, and also academic excellence. These are all matters critical for Tehran’s sustainable development and outside the scope of US sanctions. If the initial results of such a program aroused the interest of other countries in the region, why not invite them to follow the same path?

François Nicoullaud

François Nicoullaud's diplomatic career (1964 to 2005) brought him to New York, Chile, Berlin, Bombay, and finally to Budapest and Tehran as French ambassador. In the French Foreign Ministry he was in charge of cultural development as well as non-proliferation issues. He has also served in the Ministry of Interior as a diplomatic advisor and in the Ministry of Defense as First Assistant to the Minister. Since 2005, he has been active as a political analyst in international affairs, concentrating on Iran and the Middle East. He has also authored a book based on his experience entitled, “The Turban and the Rose” (Ramsey, Paris, 2006).