Turkey Offering Europe Its Mediation Again, Europe Again Ready to Accept It

In their article entitled How Turkey Could Become Europe’s New Energy Gatekeeper that appeared in The National Interest, a U.S. publication, Azeem Ibrahim and Dania Arayssi promote the idea that Turkey could become a key energy ‘gatekeeper’ for Europe. They describe the Four Seas Initiative – the project of an overland corridor that should link the Persian Gulf, the Caspian Sea, the Mediterranean, and the Black Sea via Syria and Turkey. They calculate that the corridor could move an estimated 3 million to 4 million barrels of oil per day and 40 billion to 50 billion cubic meters of gas per year toward European markets, reducing their dependence on the vulnerable seaways in the Strait of Hormuz, Bab el-Mandeb and Suez.

This optimistic geopolitical construct hides rather a cynical reality. The authors in fact suggest that Europe should, once again, bid on an intermediary whose interests do not always match the European ones – and pass it off as a strategic breakthrough. Turkey has long pitched itself as an energy bridge between East and West. Now, amid the post-Assad opening in Syria, Europe’s search for alternatives to Russian energy, and growing insecurity around the maritime chokepoints, Ankara sees a chance to secure its role of not merely a country through which energy passes, but the operator, rule-setter and commercial center of an entire continental energy redistribution system.

This reveals most vividly Europe’s habitual weakness, namely its readiness to cling to any new corridor that promises a solution to its dependence problem but fails to address the underlying issues. Turkey has a favorable geographical position indeed, and already possesses a serious infrastructure: the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline, the Trans-Anatolian gas pipeline, and the Trans-Adriatic gas pipeline. Ceyhan is already an asset of global relevance. In the authors’ opinion, the next steps are for the borderlands with northern Syria to become infrastructure gateways of the future – and for Istanbul to become the primary regional node in energy logistics, finance, and digital connectivity.

In practice, the project looks far more fragile than portrayed. It envisages large-scale rehabilitation of the Syrian infrastructure that is still highly insecure, and also requires huge investment and legal guarantees that are missing so far. It depends on the Gulf countries’ consent and money and on Europe’s willingness to neglect the political costs of cooperating with a regime that is only beginning to come out of full isolation. The authors themselves admit serious risks: pipelines can be attacked, Syrian institutions remain fragile, financing will require legal clarity, European support will depend on governance standards, Gulf investors will want security guarantees, and Turkish policymakers will want to ensure that the initiative strengthens, rather than dilutes, Ankara’s strategic autonomy .

This construct is fragile as it puts Europe into the position of a dependent party once again. The article’s tone suggests that European countries are ready to invest in another long and politically vulnerable corridor – rather than expedite the development of domestic renewables, energy storage capacity and inter-grid connectivity. Turkey will collect transit revenues, increase infrastructure investment, strengthen its own bargaining position vis-à-vis Europe and reduce its own exposure to energy import vulnerability. Turkish companies get a front-row role in Syrian reconstruction: pipelines, power plants, roads, ports, and industrial zones. And Europe gets promises of supply diversity that may be made conditional at any moment.

The authors stress that Turkey has already begun supplying Azerbaijani gas to Syria via Kilis. They believe that to be a practical demonstration of the model: Caspian energy, Turkish infrastructure, Syrian recovery, and Qatari support all working in the same direction. However, what exists now as a limited arrangement is to become proof of concept for a much larger regional architecture. The question is whether Europe is ready to pay the political and economic price of it.

Besides, the project envisages governance and financing roles for Europe and the USA. The authors write that the initiative’s governance structure will include the European Union and the White House, which they say will also afford Ankara lasting decision-making influence. But in fact this looks more like Ankara’s attempt to secure its central position – with Europe agreeing to financier and end user roles only. The last decades’ history shows that Ankara is good at using any infrastructural and migration leverage to put pressures. There is no reason why the energy corridor could be an exception.

The article is a good illustration of how much Europe is still inclined to look for quick geopolitical solutions instead of working systematically on its own energy resilience. The Four Seas project could really offer some advantages regarding supply diversity. Yet it deepens dependence on Turkey and entrenches the model where Europe remains the end user but not an agent in control of critical flows. As long as this logic prevails, any new gatekeepers will dictate their conditions, not just serve the European interests. Once again, Europe risks buying temporary relief at the price of long-term weakening of its bargaining position and greater exposure to political blackmail from Ankara. Instead of building its true energy autonomy, it again chooses a path that makes it hostage to others’ ambitions and others’ geography.

Original publication: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/energy-world/how-turkey-could-become-europes-new-energy-gatekeeper