Turkey’s president returns Trump’s threatening ‘don’t be a fool’ letter
- Despite tensions on policy issues, Donald Trump gave a warm welcome to Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the White House.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said he personally returned a letter that US President Donald Trump sent him last month, warning him against an offensive in northern Syrian before Turkey began its incursion.
Trump’s letter, dated October 9, cautioned Erdogan not to be a “tough guy” or a “fool”.
Erdogan said in a joint news conference with Trump that he returned the letter during a meeting at the White House earlier on Wednesday. Trump didn’t respond at the news conference.
“History will look upon you favourably if you get this done the right and humane way,” Trump wrote in the letter.
“It will look upon you forever as the devil if good things don’t happen.”
Turkey began its offensive later that week, pushing US-allied Kurdish forces out of a region close to Turkey’s border after Trump ordered American forces to withdraw.
US lawmakers in both parties criticised Trump’s decision, saying it amounted to a green-light for the Turkish offensive.
American lawmakers have also criticised Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian domestic politics. The House voted last week by an overwhelming margin to describe the early-20th-century massacre of Armenians by Ottoman Empire forces as a “genocide”, angering Erdogan, who considered cancelling his visit in response.
Initial reports said that Erdogan not only ignored Trump’s letter but threw it in a rubbish bin.
Erdogan’s return of the letter wasn’t the only uncomfortable moment the Turkish president created for Trump on Wednesday.
At the outset of the news conference, Erdogan delivered a more than 10-minute long monologue, a few minutes longer than Trump’s opening remarks, while the US president fidgeted at his lectern.
Erdogan complained about Kurdish forces in Syria allied with the US that he considers “terrorists” as well as a Turkish cleric, Fethullah Gulen, whom Erdogan blames for fomenting a 2016 coup.
The US has refused to extradite Gulen, who lives in Pennsylvania. Erdogan also again criticised the House resolution on the Armenian massacre.
Later in the news conference, Erdogan called on a Turkish reporter who asked Trump to explain why he had invited a Kurdish military leader to the White House, calling the person a “terrorist”.
Trump responded that the US was working closely with both the Kurds and the Turks, adding: “You sure you’re a reporter and you don’t work for Turkey with that question?”
Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
