Turkey, Germany and the Wars in Yugoslavia

With the phasing out of the Cold War, not only the countries of the former Eastern bloc faced challenges in their internal and external policies, but also those of the Western bloc. Countries belonging to the Western alliance had to deal with indigenous problems that emerged with the end of the bipolar world order on the one hand, and also cope with changing international circumstances in their foreign policies on the other hand. Two countries of the western world emerged as the ones that were most deeply affected by the new phase of international politics and faced considerable pressure to transform their structures accordingly. These were Turkey and Germany. This study aims to explain the attitudes of Turkey and Germany to Yugoslav conflicts, beginning with the wars in Slovenia and Croatia in the summer of 1991 to the end of the Kosovo War. It tries to analyse how state identity or search for a new state identity affected foreign policy of Turkey and Germany in the the post-Cold War era in the case of the Yugoslav wars. It argues that during the conflicts Turkey wanted to prove that it was still Western-oriented, still interested in contributing to Western security by trying to acquire a new identity of "regional power." On the other hand, Germany was attempting to show that it was not considering a renationalization of foreign policy or projection of power politics. Berlinalso aimed at showing it was still a loyal ally and was concerned with not being behindthe other countries. In other words, Germany remained committed to its European identity. The aim of this study is to contribute to identity studies in the international relations discipline.