The
republic of Cyprus
has entered into the maelstrom of the world’s most volatile region,
thanks to newfound gas and oil reserves, combined with an erratic
Turkish foreign policy and a civil war in
Syria.
Even as leaders of this Mediterranean island show skill dealing with
these novel threats and opportunities, they need support from a strong
U.S. Navy, something not now available.
Cypriot
underwater gas and oil discoveries follow directly on ones found
earlier in Israeli seas, located adjacent to them and uncovered by the
same American (Noble) and Israeli (Delek, Avner) companies. The current
estimate of 5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, as well as some oil,
has a value estimated at $800 billion, a huge sum for a small country
whose current gross domestic product is a mere $24 billion.
The great majority of this energy will likely be exported to
Turkey or Europe. A pipeline to
Turkey would be cheapest and easiest but so long as Turkish troops continue to occupy 36 percent of
Cyprus, this will not happen. A recent court decision permitting the
Israeli government to decide what quantities of energy to export now offers other possibilities:
Cyprus could swap gas with
Israel that then goes to
Turkey, or the two allies could jointly build a liquefied natural gas terminal in
Cyprus.
Eventually, should
Egypt, Gaza,
Lebanon and
Syria find gas and join the modern world, they too could take part, turning the area between
Egypt and
Cyprus
into a truly major resource. According to the U.S. Geological Survey,
the contiguous Nile Delta and Levantine basins together contain an
estimated 345 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 3.44 billion
barrels of oil.
These newfound reserves can help either solve or inflame the
Cyprus problem. The
Cypriot government wisely delimited its maritime boundaries with
Egypt in 2003,
Lebanon in 2007 and
Israel in 2010. It has contracted new exploration to
France’s Total,
Italy’s Eni and
South Korea’s Kogas. Energy-hungry
Turkey looms over this treasure, however. Ankara wants its northern
Cyprus puppet-state to receive part of the income from the new reserves, while
Turkey’s 1974 invasion of the island raises fears that its erratic and roguish prime minister,
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, might invade the republic’s territory.
Mr. Erdogan
and Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu have pursued an ambitious foreign
policy of “zero problems with neighbors” which, ironically, has led
instead to zero friends. Strained relations with Georgia, Armenia,
Azerbaijan, Iran, Iraq,
Syria,
Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Saudi Arabia,
Egypt and Serbia raise the prospect of Ankara reverting to an older Turkish pattern of lashing out at
Cyprus and Greece. In both cases, for instance, it could encourage disruptive refugee flows.
This is where the brutal civil war underway in
Syria, just 70 miles away, enters the equation. So far, that conflict has not had a major impact on
Cyprus,
but the island’s proximity, its minimal defense capabilities, and its
membership in the European Union make it exceedingly vulnerable (an
illegal immigrant setting foot on
Cyprus is close to reaching Germany or
France). The 2.2 million refugees from
Syria since 2011 have so far bypassed
Cyprus in favor of
Lebanon, Jordan,
Turkey,
Egypt and Iraq, in that order. However, this could quickly change if the Alawites living closest to
Cyprus take to the sea in sizable numbers, or if Ankara encourages Syrians to emigrate to northern
Cyprus and then sneak across the border into the republic.
Unlike nearby
Israel, which is also surrounded,
Cyprus
lacks either a military option or protective fences: The personnel of
the Turkish armed forces, about 700,000 strong, approximate the size of
the entire population in the
republic of Cyprus — about 850,000. Put another way,
Turkey’s population outnumbers that of
Cyprus by nearly 100 times. Nicosia can, however, create alliances, especially with
Israel, to enhance its security.
Israel in turn gains by combined gas operations, strategic depth for its air force and a diplomatic friend. As an aide to
Cyprus‘ President Nicos Anastasiades told me, “We are
Israel’s ambassador in the European Union.”
So far, so good. The
U.S. Navy,
though, has been hollowed out in the Mediterranean Sea to the point
that Seth Cropsey, a former Navy official, describes the 6th Fleet as
just a command ship in
Italy
and a few ballistic-missile destroyers in Spain. This force urgently
needs to be revitalized to support America’s Levantine allies as
tensions further heighten in their immediate region.
05/11/2013
