特朗普为何偏爱埃尔多安？美土关系新动向

Donald Trump has pretty testy relationships with other world leaders, with fallouts and blow-ups with traditional allies a pretty regular feature of his tenure, particularly in his second term. But one person who can seemingly do no wrong in Trump's eyes is Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. In the past week, it's been reported that the Trump administration is pushing ahead with more than $700 million worth of jet engine sales to the Turkish military, and he expressed optimism about bringing Turkey back into the US's F-35 fighter jet program, which would represent a big win for Erdoğan.

Similarly, Trump told reporters that he's only going to this month's NATO summit because Erdoğan is hosting it. Considering that there are many potential tensions in the US-Turkey relationship, from ongoing democratic backsliding to Erdoğan's vociferous criticism of Israel and support of Hamas, Trump's affinity for Erdoğan is pretty eyebrow-raising. So, in this video, we're going to take a look at the Trump-Erdoğan relationship, why Trump is such a fan of the Turkish president, what Erdoğan gets out of it, and why it could hurt Trump back home.

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Russia once liked to think of itself as a major regional power. Perhaps it still does, but with resources depleting and attention still focused on Ukraine, the country's broader sphere of influence is shrinking. So, in the latest issue of our magazine, we unpack how Russia's influence in their sphere is slowly slipping away. That's just some of the 80 pages in the magazine, because there's more to chew on than you'd expect.

Purchase your copy by clicking the link in the description. To start things off, let's go through some of the things that Trump has done recently to demonstrate his strong ties with Erdoğan's Turkey. As we just mentioned, it was reported last week that the Trump administration intends to sell more than $700 million worth of jet engines to Turkey for use in the Kaan, Turkey's first indigenous combat jet. Furthermore, when Trump was asked about this and the potential for Turkey to be brought back into the F-35 program, Trump said, "I'm going to probably do something that will make Erdogan very happy."

For context, back in Trump's first term in 2019, the US imposed sanctions on Turkey and removed the country from the US's F-35 fighter jet program as mandated by an act of Congress in response to Turkey's acquisition of the Russian S-400 air defense system. This has remained a sore point in US-Turkey relations as it's frustrated Turkey's efforts to modernize its air force. So, any move by Trump to bring Turkey back into the fold would be warmly welcomed by Erdogan.

Meanwhile, it was more good news for Turkey last month when a US judge signed off on a deal struck by the Trump administration that ended the US Justice Department's prosecution of Turkey's state-owned Halkbank, which had been charged in 2019 with helping Iran evade American sanctions. The deal came after a meeting between Trump