In the letter dated Oct.9, and sent after U.S. troops were pulled out of Syria, Trump warns Erdoğan not be a "tough guy,’’ "devil,’’ and "fool,’’ further threatening “to destroy the Turkish economy”.
While it is hard to imagine such language in many letters between presidents, it is a particularly astonishing insult to Erdoğan, "who carefully guards his public image as a strongman,’’ Dündar wrote.
Between 2010 and 2017, 12,893 cases of insulting the president were filed Turkey. Of that total, 12,305 were filed by lawyers representing Erdoğan who assumed office in 2014.
The Erdoğan administration initially pretended not to have received the letter, the Washington Post article said, however, the Turkish president’s camp felt compelled to come to his defence amid increasing outcry over the text.
Dündar recalled another letter sent to Ankara from Washington 55 years ago, which sent left a bad taste in Turkey’s mouth.
U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson, expressing Washington’s frustration over Turkey’s apparent preparations for a military operation in Cyprus in 1964, wrote a letter to then Turkish Prime Minister İsmet İnönü.
The letter stated grave concern about the risk of a Turkish-Greek war in the Mediterranean and the damage it could cause to NATO, was a turning point in Turkey’s relations with the United States, Dündar wrote, underlining that the Turkish leaders had never forgot how a U.S. president had lectured them.
Furthermore public reaction to the Johnson letter sparked an intense spate of mostly left-wing anti-Americanism in Turkey that peaked in 1968, he said.
"Trump’s letter is almost certain to have a comparable effect. America’s popularity among Turks had been on a downward slope well before Trump’s letter, at any rate,’’ Dündar said.
A 2019 survey by Istanbul’s Kadir Has University revealed that when Turks were asked to name the countries that pose the greatest threat to Turkey three years ago, 44 percent of them picked the United States; however, this year the figure reached 81 percent.
The U.S. president’s letter could easily foment anti-American sentiment in Turkey just as Johnson’s letter did more than half a century ago, Dündar said.