As the world's leading arms dealer, the United States finds itself in the awkward position of supplying sophisticated weapons to two historic enemies while at the same time trying to promote peace between them.
In what vividly exposes a complete lack of coherent policy, America is providing armaments to Turkey and Greece, and those arms are being used by both to threaten each other.Greece and Turkey are ancient enemies and current tensions revolve around long-standing disagreements over the control of shipping lanes in the Aegean Sea and over the long-disputed division of the island of Cyprus in the eastern Mediterranean. But both are U.S. allies, and Washington claims they cannot be left militarily weak, although any real threat - aside from each other - is hard to discern.
Since the end of the Cold War, many weapons at U.S. arsenals in Europe were reduced under a conventional forces treaty in 1992. They have been declared in excess of American military needs and are being provided to Greece and Turkey - free of charge at that. Thousands of tanks and armored vehicles have been delivered to both Greece and Turkey.
This year, President Clinton has authorized giving Greece some 10,000 firing devices for conventional munitions, plus 10 A-7 attack aircraft and six P-3 patrol planes. Turkey will get 130 air-to-air missiles and 515 anti-aircraft missiles with launchers, presumably to shoot down those planes just given to Greece.
What possible logic is there in such an arms-supplying role?
American diplomats try to warn both nations not to use the U.S. weapons on each other, but the truth is that the arms buildup only feeds the current belligerent talk by both Greece and Turkey.
The United States should recognize the inherent contradiction and lack of logic in trying to be simultaneously an arms dealer and a peacemaker for two bitter antagonists.
Instead of giving modern armaments to both sides and then ineffectually saying, "Please don't shoot each other," Washington would better serve the cause of peace by refusing to arm either nation until they make some significant progress in resolving their disputes.