Turkey puts spanner in the works

President Erdogan, the autocratic leader of Turkey, didn't get where he is today by being concessionary, understanding and amicable. What he wants he generally gets, never mind the wider consequences. So he is the only Nato leader who is opposing the entry of Finland and Sweden into the Nato alliance because he accuses these two countries of harbouring anti-Turkey Kurdish "terrorists". If they don't hand them over to the Turkish authorities, he, Erdogan, will stand in the way of Finland and Sweden joining the alliance. All big political decisions by Nato have to be unanimous, so he will stop this historic move, and Putin will be laughing. He loves it when Nato is divided. I imagine the US is on the line to Erdogan every minute of the day trying to persuade him to be a little bit flexible. But Erdogan doesn't do flexible. Despite pleas from Washington and the whole of Nato he went ahead and bought Russia's air-defence system, the S-400, which posed an immediate conflict of interest with Nato fighter aircraft, especially the US F-35 joint strike fighter which Turkey was in the process of buying. Erdogan refused to give in even though it meant Turkey would no longer be able to fly F-35s. Erdogan invaded northeast Syria despite appeals not to do so by Washington and went about forging a buffer zone to prevent Kurdish "terrorists" from entering Turkey from Syria. Of course every country and every leader has the right to make decisions in the interests of their nation. But the world is now in a critical state and the entry of Finland and Sweden into Nato will play a crucial part in hammering home the message which that enlightened Russian lieutenant-colonel gave on Russian TV yesterday, that the whole world is against Russia. If Erdogan stops Finland and Sweden doing what they each feel is vital to their future security, he will be doing Putin a huge favour and will undermine what until now has been a remarkable display of alliance unity.