ABSTRACT
Turkey’s status as a regional power is beyond doubt. Its economic potential, the size of its territory and population and its geopolitical location all make it likely that Turkey will remain a key player in the regional scene for some time to come. In a security environment increasingly characterized by ‘transregional’ problems and ‘transsovereign’ challenges, from a western and, especially, an American perspective, Turkey is certainly a transregional partner par excellence.1
What in the early years of the twenty-first century seems to be less certain is the role Ankara will choose to play and for that matter how the Greek-Turkish relations will evolve. In the context of a – let us assume, durable – rapprochement process, will Turkey become a partner and a stabilizer or will it – rather aggressively to the Greek mind – seek regional dominance? Given this uncertainty, the challenge to Greek policy is to find a posture that can encourage positive evolution in Greek-Turkish relations and respond appropriately to any negative developments in the short term, while also protecting Greece against the possibility that in the longer term, Greek-Turkish relations may return to a rather unstable course.
