Scholz’s Türkiye visit: Germany needs a new narrative

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is in Türkiye on October 19 for a one-day working visit to meet with President Tayyip Erdoğan. Despite all the ups and downs, among the G7 countries, Germany has the most high-level contact with Turkey. They had met just a month ago at the Turkish House within the framework of the United Nations General Assembly. This shows that there are important issues that the two leaders will discuss face-to-face and decide upon.

Indeed, there are.

Ankara is currently -seemingly- preoccupied with two main issues. One is Germany’s permission for the sale of Eurofighter Typhoon aircraft to Turkey, and the other is the Schengen visa difficulties for Turkish citizens.

Berlin also has -apparently- two main issues. The first is immigrants. This has two sub-topics. Preventing non-Turkish citizen refugees, which has been on the agenda since the Syrian civil war broke out in 2011, and the return of thousands of Turkish citizens whose political asylum applications to Germany have been rejected. The second is Ukraine.

But when you dig a little below the surface, other issues emerge.

Why is Scholz’s visit important?

Since the Gaza Crisis, Scholz’s support for Israel despite the massacre in Palestine -and now the occupation of Lebanon- touches Turkey’s nerve, while Erdoğan’s reminder to Germany of the Nazi-era Jewish genocide holocaust because of this touches Germany’s nerve.

Although this doesn’t prevent both countries from working towards the release of hostages held by Hamas and Israel and delivering humanitarian aid to Palestinians. But the fact that Scholz and Erdoğan are meeting for the second time in a month, despite this sharp political and ideological clash, is important in itself.

According to Mehmet Ali Yalçındağ, the Chairman of the Turkey-Germany Business Council, one reason for this is that both countries are “in search of a new story.” Yalçındağ said in our YouTube interview that he also believes in the necessity of this. Not just because of the millions of Turkish citizens living in Germany and the annual trade volume of 55 billion dollars. He believes that the two countries should develop their historical ties with a joint strategy of at least ten years.

German sources I spoke to think that a joint success story would be good for the public opinion in both countries.

Eurofighter, Ukraine, Middle East

After the US removed Turkey from the F-35 program for buying S-400 from Russia, Turkey wanted to diversify the resulting air defense risk with Eurofighter Typhoon aircraft, in addition to the F-16 agreement reached with the US -but still not implemented. Eurofighter has four producers. There’s no problem for the UK, Italy, and Spain, in fact, the UK is working as Turkey’s lobbyist with Germany.

The objections seen in the German parliament due to the balances in the Middle East (including the blows to the PKK in Syria and Iraq) have been replaced by the need to strengthen NATO with the intensification of the Russia-Ukraine war. This might be the effect of the Erdoğan-Scholz meeting at the UN. This applies not only to Eurofighter but also to some military equipment needed by the Navy, for example.

Scholz seems likely to give Erdoğan positive news on this issue -even if it doesn’t happen immediately.

New story, investments, and rule of law

In terms of new investments, Germany and Turkey’s relations have more potential for development towards third countries. One reason for this is that large-scale German investments have reached a saturation point. The other is that with judicial independence and rule of law practices in Turkey, the Germans believe that companies of a size that can be cooperated with act not with commercial but with the government’s political concerns.

The issue keeps coming back to the rule of law, whether we like it or not.

There are two more issues.

First, the return of 13,500 Turkish citizens whose political asylum applications were rejected (the rejection rate is around 95 percent) but who are being kept in Germany may begin in the coming weeks. The Ministries of Interior are discussing the form. Germany wants to make this a big deal for its public opinion, while Turkey wants to downplay it for the same reason.

Second, an issue that Yalçındağ drew attention to: He said, “In the next 5 years, about 6 million people working in qualified jobs in Germany will retire.” “The Germans tried various countries to fill their places, but the workforce most suitable for these qualifications and familiar with German society over so many years is in Turkey.”

The search for a new story seems real. Let’s see if the Erdoğan-Scholz meeting will open the door to this or if it will result in another clash.