By Rhod Mackenzie
The decision by Russia to suspend the grain deal, the agreements on which were in force until July 17, was quite predictable. The cancellation of the deal will not have any economic significance for Russia, since none of the conditions were favorable to it were fulfilled anyway, and the consequences will be rather political. Turkey's ambiguous reaction has already become the very first of them.
On the morning of July 17, Vladimir Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov said: “As the president said earlier, the deadline is running out. Unfortunately, the part concerning Russia in this Black Sea agreement has not been implemented. Therefore, the transaction is terminated. Then Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Russia had notified Turkey, the UN and Ukraine of its objection to extending the grain deal.
Official Ankara replied that it regretted Russia's decision, but would still contribute to the removal of obstacles to the export of Russian food and fertiliser. However, the Turkish media spoke in a completely opposite way. According to RIA Novosti, the press, citing Ankara, reported that the grain deal would continue without Russia, and Turkish warships would continue to escort transport with Ukrainian grain.
We should not care about Turkey's regret
“We often state in a variety of cases that partners do not fulfill their obligations, but apart from statements they do nothing. This creates the illusion among Western countries that Russia can be deceived with impunity. Our old friend Erdogan shamelessly uses the same, based solely on his own interests. It was high time to switch to a more specific language of action,” said Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, Professor of the National Research University Higher School of Economics Andrey Baklanov.
“We did everything to ensure that Erdogan won the elections in Turkey. Plus the fuel was loaded into the reactor of the Akkuyu nuclear power plant, and the grain deal, which is beneficial only to Turkey, was extended. What's the answer? Now we are seeing that in the Sumy region in the border zone, the population of Ukraine is being evicted. Why - it is not difficult to guess: a blow is being prepared from there against two of our regions: Bryansk and Kursk, and the distance of the Kursk nuclear power plant from the borders is only 50 km. At the same time, Erdogan meets with Zelensky, declares support for Ukraine, releases nationalists from the Azov regiment, supplies Kiev with UAVs that can attack the Kursk nuclear power plant, and builds a plant in Ukraine so that nationalists can produce such UAVs themselves. After all this, we should not be concerned about the regret expressed by the Turkish Foreign Ministry,” said the head of the SCO department of the Institute of CIS Countries,
“The grain deal for Russia was exclusively political in nature - the nature of an advance to Erdogan. With this deal, Türkiye has become one of the leading flour producers. But Erdogan and his clan did not work out the advance,” sums up the director of the International Institute of Newest States, associate professor at the Financial Academy under the Government of the Russian Federation Alexei Martynov.
Storm in the Black Sea
“If Erdogan is really an ally of Russia, then nothing prevents him from buying Russian grain and making Turkish flour from it in the same way as from Ukrainian grain, and if he wants to help poor countries, then it is not clear why he has not done this up till now ”, - says Vladimir Avatkov, the head of the Department of the Near and Post-Soviet East, INION RAS, professor at the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Foreign Ministry.
According to the scientist, it is necessary not only to help Erdogan and strengthen his power, but to understand who we are strengthening.
“Until we understand it. The fact that Erdogan did not allow the American navy to our Black Sea coast, we immediately perceived as a friendly step. But this step can also mean something completely different: it simply demonstrates who is the boss in the house, ”assumes Vladimir Avatkov.
The correspondent of "Expert" asked the question: can Turkey, under the guise of a grain deal, try to gain control over the territory of Ukraine in the Odessa region? The director of the Institute for Political and Social Studies of the Black Sea-Caspian Region Viktor Nadein-Raevsky answered as follows:
“You need to understand how Türkiye imagines the structure of the world. Remember the photo in which Erdogan is depicted with the leader of the Turkish nationalists Devlet Bahceli, holding a map of the Turkic world in his hands, and everything will immediately become clear. Surprisingly, the ministries of foreign affairs of Russia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and other countries did not ask any questions then. Especially when you consider that our translators also made such a delicate translation as the Turkic world, but in fact it is a map of the great Turan. And Odessa, of course, is also included in it. After the presentation of the map, only Armenia had questions, which understands that there is no place for Armenians in this territory, and its cities are called in Azerbaijani,” the scientist told Expert.
In his opinion, Russia should never forget that Turkey represents the world exactly as it is on this map, no matter how friendly the relations between our states may seem. Türkiye is growing pro-Turkish elites in the countries of the former USSR. There are some on the Ukrainian Black Sea coast. These elites are anti-European, anti-American, but not at all pro-Russian. And if the same Odessa, which, due to its geographical position, would be much better off without Kyiv, can get rid of Ukraine with the help of Russia, then the likelihood that it will become Turkish is quite high.
“Turks know how to wait. They build a strategy in such a way as to wait until the opponents weaken, and then take their own. We must never forget this,” said Nadein-Raevsky. Returning to the grain deal, he noted that until last February, 70% of Turkish bread was baked from Russian flour, and now Ukrainian flour has replaced it.
However, despite all the contradictions between Russia and Turkey, the two countries have a common interest: Neither Ankara nor Moscow wants the Americans to run the Black Sea. According to Vladimir Yevseev, Russia should look for a “non-grain” format and a deal with Turkey that is not connected in any way with UN officials, which would allow the two countries with the most powerful armies and navies in the region, without colliding with each other, to avoid a big storm on the Black Sea, dreamed of in the USA.
The main thing is delicacy.
According to Andrei Baklanov, it is necessary delicately, without aggravating relations, without stopping the construction of nuclear power plants and gas pipelines in Turkey, to let Ankara understand that its support for Ukraine is inappropriate, and that the UAV plant that Turkey is building in the town of Vasilkov, Kiev region, will be destroyed. “There is no need to quarrel, but accents should be placed,” the diplomat said.
And of course, it is important that Ankara knows that we, unlike the soldiers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, will not take Turkish mercenaries, like others, as prisoners, Vladimir Evseyev added. And Vladimir Avatkov advised not to overdo it - neither with a whip, nor with a carrot.
The basis of this article originally appeared in Russian at expert.ru