Some find this visit unnecessary -- coming on the heels of a critical November meeting between Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and US President George Bush -- and argue that it was hastily arranged on Washington’s part, as Bush departed for a Middle East tour a few hours after meeting with Gül. Others say that it was important to strengthen Washington’s stance against the PKK and put the strained bilateral relations back on track despite the fact that Bush will soon leave office. Akşam’s İsmail Küçükkaya questions whether Gül’s Washington visit has distinctively differed from that of Erdoğan and explains the share of representational power between the president and prime minister in the Turkish political system. He says the prime minister owns the political leadership in the Turkish system while the presidential post is highly symbolic and represents the state but does not steer foreign policy. He acknowledges that Turkey obtained the fruits of Erdoğan’s visit when Washington, after lengthy inaction, began to lend concrete support to Turkey in its fight against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Yet he thinks that it cannot be said in the end that Gül’s visit was harmful. “It is true that the US administration has focused on the presidential election. Turkey was not a main but only a side issue for the US at the time. Still, there is one thing for sure: No matter whether a Democrat or a Republican makes it to the presidency, the most important agenda item for the US in the coming period will be the Middle East,” he says, pointing to the crucial role to be played by Turkey in the new, post-Bush US policy era.
Hürriyet’s Cüneyt Ülsever does not think that Gül’s visit was an untimely one, recalling in particular the former cold winds blowing between the Bush administration and Gül when Gül welcomed a Hamas delegation to Turkey in 2006, drawing much ire from both Israel and the US at the time as well as the US hesitance to take side with Gül in the aftermath of a military memorandum released against Gül’s presidency last April. “Taking a look at Gül’s visit from this perspective, what Bush could give to Gül after his pledges to Erdoğan on Nov. 5 are only an apology and to side with Gül after raising suspicion about its [the US’s] democratic stance in the wake of the military warning,” contends Ülsever.
Milliyet’s Semih İdiz finds the Gül visit a beneficial one for Turkey toward the improvement of relations with the US, dismissing claims that it will not bring any good since Bush will soon step down. In İdiz’s view regardless of whoever becomes US president in 2009, it is unlikely that the course of Turkish-US relations will change in the new period after the momentum they has gained. “The simplest reason for this is that whether Democrat or Republican, the international facts that the new president will be faced with will not change. It is obvious that this will not be limited to the Iraq issue,” remarks İdiz.
Different than other columnists, Star’s Mustafa Erdoğan specifically dwells on a statement uttered by Bush as he was meeting with Gül, which found much appreciation in Turkey: “I think Turkey sets a fantastic example for nations around the world to see where it’s possible to have a democracy coexist with a great religion like Islam, and that’s important.” Refusing to term this statement “appreciation,” Erdoğan says that it is nothing more than the reflection of an Orientalist prejudice against Islam. He criticizes Bush for meaning to say that although Islam contradicts the sprit of democracy, Turkey had managed to establish a democratic regime despite Islam.
