Erdoğan friend-turned-rival Davutoğlu talks Turkey's post-election future

Arab Spring and new world order

Given Davutoğlu's role as foreign minister during the outbreak of the so-called Arab Spring, it was inevitable to discuss its outcomes.

Davutoglu candidly expressed that it had resulted in collective failure, with no one emerging as a clear winner.

The conversation also touched upon Davutoğlu's stance on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. While he has consistently called for al-Assad's resignation since 2011, his ally in the Turkish opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, expressed a willingness to meet al-Assad if he were to win the Turkish elections.

Davutoğlu clarified that this position is anchored in the implementation of United Nations Resolution 2254 – which calls for a ceasefire and political settlement – as the key to a solution in Syria. If al-Assad were to implement this resolution, it would open the possibility of developing relations with all parties involved, not solely the regime.

The international situation was also a topic of discussion. Davutoğlu underscored the necessity of redefining United Nations institutions to establish a multipolar system and advocated for a new regional order.

Read more: The birth pangs of a new world order

He dismissed the possibility of a conventional war between the United States and China, highlighting the shifting nature of conflicts. According to Davutoğlu, wars have taken on economic and technological dimensions rather than being strictly confined to the traditional battlefield.

Our discussion also covered the challenges facing Turkey's opposition, the repercussions of the Arab Spring and the evolving international landscape.

Below are excerpts from our conversation.

What lessons are to be learnt after the opposition lost in the Turkish elections?

Elections occur in an overall climate which encompasses the rule of law, equality, justice and a just competition between the political parties. This climate is important in Turkey.

Let's not forget the shift that took place in 2017 from a parliamentary system to a very special case of the presidential system, not a presidential system. In fact, the parliamentary system in place before was not a pure parliamentary system.

So, from a very deviated or fake parliamentary system, we were transformed into a fake presidential system. And according to this presidential system, the power is in the hands of the president himself.

It is not like the American way of the presidential system or other presidential systems where there is a clear separation of power.

In Turkey, under this constitution, the experience in the last five years showed a lesson that power has been accumulated in the presidential palace. So the judicial system is under the president's control. While in other real presidential systems, the judicial system is there to check and balance the executive power of the president.

Similarly, the legislative power of the parliament is under the control of the president because the majority of the parliament was in the hands of the governing party. So with this, we had a much polarised political climate in Turkey.

In fact, the opposition formed a six-party alliance — the People Nation Alliance. The main objective of this alliance was to try to prevent this polarisation and try to establish an inclusive political atmosphere and an inclusive political alliance.

In the modern history of Turkey in the past 200 years, there were basically three major trends: A conservative trend based on the traditional values of Islamic solutions, a nationalistic trend, which is a composition of these traditional values with the modern nationalistic approaches and the third is the secular leftist trend. 

Read more: Erdoğan's recipe for success is rooted in a history laced with contradictions

With these five other leaders, we tried to bring these political trends around the table to form a base for national reconciliation after 200 years of a polarised atmosphere. It was not just a political alliance.

The government and President Erdoğan had another coalition with a similar vision. The difference was the autocratic tendencies of conservative, nationalistic and leftist secular trends versus the freedom-oriented or liberty-oriented, conservative nationalist and secular leftist trends.

Those who are from the same tradition like myself and Erdoğan were competing. The difference was, he was basically trying to defend conservatives and more traditional values based on an autocratic approach.

While I was chairman of our party and today, I have been defending freedom-oriented conservatism, liberty, in the sense of human dignity, and respect for individual rights, not just the state but citizens are important. Public order is important, not state order.

Meral Aksener tried to formulate a more democratic nationalism, democratic conservatism from our perspective, and Devlet Bahceli was a typical exclusivist autocratic nationalism, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, was defending a more inclusive democratic secularism.

While Dogu Perincek, or many other political groups supporting Erdoğan, were defending autocratic secularism. So, the difference was there.

The lesson that we learnt during this formation: Although the opposition lost the election, in the sense of a result, at the same time, the opposition has shown with this exercise that all these different political traditions came together on a democratic basis.

This is a very important achievement.

Now that the elections are over, there is this sense, at least from an observer based in London, that there was a golden opportunity for the opposition to win and this opportunity was missed.

Why was it missed? Was it missed because Mr. Erdoğan succeeded to make the whole election pro-Erdoğan or anit-Erdoğan, or was it because the opposition coalition failed to present a charismatic leader?

Both, to be frank. This goes back to what I mentioned earlier about the overall political climate. It wasn't a level playing field.

On one side, there was an authoritarian government in power, controlling everything, controlling 80-90% of the media, where it was impossible for us to talk.

For example, I am a former prime minister, and you are a journalist. If you were working at TRT official TV, for you, as a journalist, it would have been interesting to hear my views regarding elections right? However, for the last seven years, TRT never showed my face to the people.

During the election campaign, my voice was not heard by the people through TRT, while every day, for hours and hours, Erdoğan, Bahceli, Perincek and others were given air time. This is a national TV company, it belongs to the nation because our taxes pay the salaries of TRT employees.  

But on TRT, there is no opposition voice. This is not democracy, and this is not a fair election.

Read more: With a lot to lose, Erdoğan canvases for votes with grand gestures

Similarly, before when I called it a fake parliamentary system, it was much more democratic than it is today. In the past, the Minister of Interior Affairs, Minister of Justice, and Minister of Transportation resigned two or three months before the election in the spirit of fair competition in the election.

In 2015, I ran in two elections as prime minister of Turkey, my Minister of Home Affairs, Minister of Justice, and Minister of Transportation resigned two/three months before the election, because these three ministries were strategically important ministries for a fair election.

But now, the most radical ministers pushed the people to vote for Erdoğan. So this is one of the reasons behind this failure.

Second, though, I am not only blaming them, from our side, it would have been more result oriented if we had better presented ourselves. We have produced several documents, but these were very integrated systematic documents.

We should have more effectively communicated this to the people. We were not able to do this. But in order to do this, you have to have freedom of press. There is no freedom of press, in this sense.

These are basically the differences and the most important issue until two weeks before the election. The opposition was advancing. But the government fostered a climate of fear convincing the people that an opposition win would boost the terror threat.

They used doctored videos to project this image. Erdoğan himself admitted these videos were fake, but they left a psychological imprint on the people. 

They also said that an opposition win would threaten Turkey's religious values and symbols like the headscarf. 

In fact, out of the six parties of the opposition, five of them are conservative parties that would never reign in religious symbolism. But the media monopoly of the government prevented our voice from reaching the people.

You mentioned that when you were prime minister, the ministers of home affairs, justice and transportation, resigned before election.

Mr. Erdoğan changed those ministers after the election. What is your take on this move?

It was a constitutional requirement to change the ministers of home affairs, justice and transportation and not to appoint any political figure. They were supposed to be neutral, not any political party member.

After the elections, Erdoğan made some changes in the cabinet because some ministers were friends of his son-in-law Berat Albarak, and some were there because of Bahceli's insistence like Suleyman Soylu.

So, in fact, there were not many members of the cabinet who have worked before, during the good years of the party. And they were not successful because that cabinet was formed to support Berat Albarak as the new potential president after Erdoğan.

Do you think so?

Yes, at that time 2018, but now, Erdoğan has realised that these choices are not valid anymore.

He tried to appoint some ministers who had experience and respect. For example, Vice President Cevdet Yilmaz was my deputy prime minister in 2015. Similarly, the Minister of Foreign Affairs Hakan Fidan worked with me for many years, the Minister of Defence Yasar Guler, worked with me as well, and many others.

So now, he understood one of the reasons why we created an opposition. When I say we this time, I don't refer to the six parties, but as 'Future Party', our party has created an alternative. So this alternative forced him to go to the origin of our party because this time in the parliament, there is now only a circular opposition.

Around 35 members of parliament from three parties, will be there this time to form an opposition from a conservative or traditional values perspective.

So, he tried to form a cabinet with some sort of a limited restoration, like Mehmet Simsek Minister of Finance, he was my Minister of Finance in 2016. In fact, some people said this is Davutoğlu's cabinet.

Do you consider it to be your cabinet?

No, many of my former ministers are there, but he pushed them away.

After my resignation, he tried to eliminate all the political figures who had relations not only with me but with this political approach of democratic conservatism, because he wanted to have a monopoly of power.

Erdoğan and I started our political struggle for a democratic country based on human rights and traditional values, including Islamic values.

For us, transparency, the rule of law, and human dignity are not only modern values but values of Islamic civilisation.

We try to have a democratic new political culture based on clean politics and against corruption, a democratic politics against limitations and restrictions and a welfare society against poverty.

These were the values we created but, after my resignation, and because of several influences in the political system, Erdoğan tried to transform our party and also Turkish political culture towards authoritarianism.

He preferred to work with Bahceli, an ultra-nationalist and exclusivist, and Perincek who is an atheist, Marxist, a secular, the ideological champion of 28 February what we call very radical secularists. So they formed a coalition of autocratic, authoritarian secularism, conservatism or Islamism or nationalism.

After my resignation, he tried to remove all these former elite in order to have low, less experienced, more ignorant, loyal followers. But after this election, he realised its impossible to win by pursuing this previous strategy.

Now the question is: Will these people in the cabinet be free to act based on the values which we defended? Or will he use them like he used me or other politicians for some months, for some years, then try to eliminate them after using them?

Like Mehmet Semsek, the finance minister, he kicked him out, although he's a professional. He accused Noureddine Nabati of being a British spy, and now he came back. But will he be able to act freely? This is the question.

What do you think?

After my long experience with Erdoğan, I think he will use these people until the municipal elections.

If the policies are successful, he will claim the credit. If the policies fail then he will say these people, Mehmet Simsek and others, are responsible, and his former policies were right.

And after municipal elections, if he wins, he will appoint new ministers based on loyalty, blind loyalty, rather than quality and professional career."

You know Mr. Erdoğan very well. You were very close friends. What do you think of him now? 

There is not just one Erdoğan, like many other political leaders I have observed in history. I am an academic in political history.

In history, you can see many similar examples of leaders who went from idealism to Machiavellianism. Like these leaders, Erdoğan will do anything to stay in power.

But when we worked together, I was proud of him because we defended the same values.

Many people do not know I am an academic. I was not in politics. 

I turned down three offers to become foreign minister and a parliamentarian. I was chief advisor and an ambassador until 2007.

In 2007, he again offered me the post of foreign minister when Abdullah Gul became president. I said no and went back to academia.

Do you know why I decided to come back?

There was a ban case against our party in March 2008, and a ban case against Erdoğan. I came and I told him that now is the time, this is a declaration of war against all of us and against democracy in Turkey. I am here to fight with you, to fight together against this autocratic approach.

So I did not become minister and prime minister, just to have a position. I entered politics to support Erdoğan, to defend Erdoğan against autocracy, against deep state operations to ban our party. So, therefore, I see this as a very special case of power corruption.

Power corrupts.

One more question on Erdoğan. When was the last time you met? And what did you talk about?

It was March 2018. I gave him a 25-27 page report and spoke to him about the deteriorating situation in the party and in Turkey.

I pointed to the rampant corruption in almost every state institution and said that the values we have been defending — the Islamic values as well as modern democratic values — have been compromised.

There is nepotism, especially practised by him, by his family. The state should belong to a nation not to one family, not to one group of people, not even to one party, the state belongs to all citizens.

I also said that basic civic values such as freedom of press, thought, and protest, have all been infringed upon. I told him we either have to fight against poverty, corruption or go towards authoritarianism.

I warned against forming a coalition with Bahceli, an ultra-nationalist, which would change the character of our party. Also, I warned him not to make any coalition with deep state actors of the 1990s, like Perincek and many others.

This was my attempt to give him one last chance to make things right but he chose atheist, ultra-secularist, and ultra-nationalist groups instead, to get full control.

Rather than work with his real friends, like me, he preferred to be with Bahceli and Perincek. This was my last face-to-face meeting with him.

Every Eid, I called him to extend my holiday greetings. On Eid Al Adha in 2019, I called him. At the time there was the municipal election in Istanbul. The first election was declared invalid, so there was a decision to repeat the election. I was against that.

He asked me to campaign for the second election, I said the decision for the second election was wrong and unfair. I criticised these policies.

This was our last conversation.

He then decided to expel me from the party, six of us, because of our clear position against his political ethics.

I heard from some people that maybe there will be a re-election before five years. Is the opposition preparing for such an election? 

In Turkey, you will never know the day you will die and you will never know the day an election. 

In the last 70 years, almost 80% of the elections have been held before the regular date. So you have to be ready for an early election, always. But of course, in this system, it is in the hands of the president himself.

I don't think that this government and President Erdoğan can run the country in an efficient manner to solve the huge, deep economic crisis. I hope they can, but if he continues his way of running the country, it will be very difficult for him to achieve success. 

Read more: Can Erdoğan turn Turkey's ailing economy around?

So for the municipal election, we will see. All opposition parties now are holding consultations on the matter.  

Now we are assessing and I am sure all opposition parties are doing the same. The next step will be municipal administration and municipal elections in March 2024. We will all prepare ourselves for these elections.

Some people say that Erdoğan is preparing for the day after.

What do you mean?

For his successor.

Erdoğan wants to be in power or in control even if he is not president. 

I resigned from being prime minister because I am not scared of anything, of any corruption case, or any nepotism.

No one in Turkey knows my family, my sons, my daughters, and my son-in-law. My wife works, and I work. We earned our living by ourselves. No one can accuse of any political or financial misconduct.

Some leaders have reasons to fear leaving power. Unfortunately, today, in the system there are many ministers and many politicians, if they leave power, the next day they have to face some real cases against them. So, Erdoğan will try to control the power.

As a former friend of Erdoğan, I hope he changes his attitude and genuinely assesses his decisions.

How politicians will be remembered is important. They are usually remembered for their most recent actions, not their past ones.

Erdoğan, in the early years when we were together, was one of the most successful leaders of modern Turkish history, and people loved him. But today people fear him — even those who voted for him voted for him because of the psychology of fear. He is not winning hearts. He is trying to shake them.

When I was chief adviser for him, I was his minister and prime minister. We worked together. In those days, people supported Erdoğan because of their love and affection for him.

Now they are voting for Erdoğan either because they are scared of him or scared of what will happen to the country without him in power. 

I am an academic and want to create a country based on human dignity. Today, the issue in Turkey is human dignity. People are getting poorer and poorer every day. And those who are close to Erdoğan are getting richer and richer every day.

I have the same lifestyle, I am living in the same house, and my living standard is the same because everybody knows my salary and I know my salary. Today some people are living on inadequate salaries. Therefore, I hope Erdoğan will assess his policies.

Can you imagine a former minister forming a company and buying material from the company for her ministry? Can you imagine?

The health minister has a private hospital and the tourism minister has a tourism company. Where are the Islamic values in this?

We had an argument with him because I gave all the gifts given to me, valuable gifts worth millions of dollars, to the Treasury. He said these are personal gifts, ministers can take it. I said no.

Prophet Mohammed did not say this. He asked the officer of the sacred collector, to give the gifts given to him to "Beit Al Mal"(exchequer). Now, this is the difference. Where are the values?

Slogans are not values. He is using slogans but he is betraying our values. I am responsible to God and to the nation.

Winning an election does not mean winning the hearts of the people.

Today I can walk without any security, in the street. Leftist, rightist, nationalist, Islamist everybody says you are the most honest politician that we have ever seen. Because they know that I am living in the same house, my wife works and I am working.

It is important that the success of a politician is marked by how much he has been praised when he is in power but how he was received by the people when he loses this power. Therefore, it is the last chance for Erdoğan to change his attitude, to change his environment, and to end nepotism.

You were considered in the Arab world as one of the engineers or the forces behind the Arab Spring. So now more than 12 years have passed, how do you see the Arab Spring? How was it? Where did it fail, where did succeed?

First of all, let me clarify. I am not an engineer of Arab Spring or anything. The Arab Spring emerged in Tunisia when a Tunisian youngster burned himself alive.

Did I ask the young Arab generation to raise their voices? No. Because there was an emerging global atmosphere and Arab youth wanted to have their own voice to be heard. It is not because of me or because of anyone. 

Read more: What does Erdoğan's win mean for the Middle East?

This was the internal dynamics. Now, I never supported any intervention in any other national issues of another country. No. I am with my understanding of zero problems with neighbours. We didn't intervene, and I am still against any intervention.

But if people in Libya, or people in Egypt during Mubarak's time, or Yemen or in other countries or Tunisia, if these people wanted to have more freedom, more human dignity and an honourable policy against Israel or whatever the Arab Spring main issues were, it came from them.

But what I can say to these young people is the Arab youth deserve the same as the Turkish youth.

Turkey's young generation is complaining because of the authoritarian approach of Erdoğan because they want to have the same rights as Europeans, like other nations. This is their right it is not our business. But we never – and I am also repeating it – never supported any intervention in another country.

But if you asked me: What do you offer to the young Turkish generation, I will say, the same level of freedom, the same level of human dignity, like Europeans, like other generations everywhere in the world.

If they think that they deserve more, they can raise their voice. Nobody can impose democracy.

For example, when we had good relations with Bashar Assad, was Syria democratic? No. But Syrian people living in Syria were happy with Bashar al-Assad. There was no internal dispute so we had excellent relations. Same with Mubarak, we didn't support anyone.

You did not engineer the Arab Spring but it happened. After 12 years we have seen different models like the Nato intervention in Libya, the peaceful transformation in Egypt, and Tunisia, and war in Syria and Yemen. None of these models worked. Why do you think that is?

Because there was an established regime and the opposition was not well organised.

In Turkey, the difference is that we had a long fight against military regimes, etc, etc. So, there was some sort of a culture of opposition. Even today, despite this autocratic approach, we have this culture of opposition, but in Arab societies, there was no such organised culture of opposition.

Now, if a wise leader in the Arab world helped people and allowed them to raise their voices without harming public order, that Arab leader would have been the greatest leader of this century. Therefore, we suggested to Bashar al-Assad to allow opposition without harming public order.

The problem in Muslim society is not only in the Arab world. We have state authority, we have anarchy. We Muslims unfortunately either have state control or anarchy. 

Read more: Fuelled by corruption and nepotism, Libya finds itself trapped in political anarchy

When there was autocratic state control, people rebelled against these, like in Libya, etc. But if these movements were not able to establish public order, anarchy came out. Libya has been divided. Syria has been almost divided. In Egypt, there was another military intervention.

The issue is public order.

When state control is threatened and transformed into anarchy, terrorist groups exploit this anarchy.

In Muslim society, there is no nation with one sectarian character. Iraq, Syria and Turkey are multi-sectarian and multi-ethnic. 

How can you run such a society? You can run it only if you develop a concept of civil equality.

I supported Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, a Kurdish Alawite, in order to show that yes, I am a Sunni Turk, I am the majority, but I always say I am a Turk from a very typical Turkish tribe from Konya but I will defend the rights of Kurds.

I am a Sunni, but the rights of Alavites I will defend. Otherwise, you cannot unite a nation. But in Iraq, a Shiite Prime Minister, a Kurdish president, or in Syria, an Alawite president, this is not the way to run the country.

Do you believe that the Arab Spring has failed?

In history, you cannot judge within the span of 10 years. Unfortunately, all of us failed. There is no winner.

Those who came after the Arab Spring they are also not victors, they failed as well.

Do you think there is order now in Yemen, or a viable state in Libya? Or in Syria do think Bashar al-Assad is successful, did not fail? Or in Tunisia?

Why am I in politics today?

To prevent Turkey from becoming another autocratic system in the world or in the region. This my duty. My responsibility is basically to my nation and, therefore, I am trying to fulfil my responsibility to my nation, I will not allow Turkish people to be divided by sectarian and ethnic lines.

And I will never allow the Turkish nation to be subordinate or be controlled by a system preventing human dignity, allowing corruption. 

 How do you feel about the normalisation efforts between Arab nations and the al-Assad regime? Had the Turkish opposition won, he promised to visit Damascus and I suppose you might have visited Damascus as well. How do you feel about this?

First of all, for me, what is important is not personalities. The most important for me is the destiny of a nation. If almost half a country's population are refugees, one out of five or one out of 10 were killed in a civil war, what does this say?

I visited Syria several times, more than 60 times. I was the mediator between Israel and Syria, between Bashar al-Assad and Ehud Olmert. I was in Lebanon in 2008 and worked with Syria for the election of Michel Suleiman as president, and we worked together with Syria on many other issues.

I am proud of my experience with Syrian people, with our Syrian brothers and sisters in those days, and even today. All Syrians are our brothers and sisters, regardless of their ethnic or religious background or sectarian background, because we share the same geography, we share the same history.

I felt pain, and I still feel this pain, when Syrian cities like Aleppo, Hama, and Homs were bombarded by barrel bombs or by chemical weapons or attacked by terrorist groups. I cannot separate pain I cannot say the regime used chemical weapons and just ignore Daesh (the Islamic State).

People suffered because of Daesh and because of the regime's attitude. What is the right way? In fact, I think the only success of the United Nations during the Syrian crisis was the Security Council resolution 2254, 18th of December 2015, while I was Prime Minister. I supported that.

In this resolution, it was identified that there is a need for a transitional government composed of Syrian regime and opposition groups as a national reconciliation process and refugees will go back after this formation of transitional government.

Either the status quo will continue. Bashar al-Assad, as you said, has been rehabilitated, but still, a significant part of Syria is under the control of either opposition or Kurdish groups, etc. Now, there is a real need for and inclusive national reconciliation in Syria.

Yes, had Kılıçdaroğlu won the election, the opposition, our position was clear and it was declared by the documents that resolution 2254 should be implemented.

If al-Assad implements this resolution, of course, we will develop our relations. Why not? With all the parties in Syria, not only with the regime but what is the objective of this diplomatic relation? What will be the orientation of these agreements or relations?

I hope I have a chance to play a role in a peaceful Syria, not only for one ethnicity, one sect, one group, or one family, but for all Syrians, and not only those who are living in Syria but those who are outside Syria as refugees like the millions in Turkey right now. 

Read more: Syrian refugees in Turkey express worry ahead of crucial vote

When it comes to developments in the new world order, the war between Russia and Ukraine, and the tension between China and America over Taiwan. How do you see the whole world now?

After my resignation, I wrote two English books and five Turkish books.

I wrote a book, published by Cambridge University Press in 2020, "Systemic Earthquake and the Struggle for World Order".

My view was that in the world today, we have a systemic earthquake, systemic disorder. If you have a crisis but a functioning system, you can manage this crisis. But if the system itself is producing the crisis, it is much more difficult.

After the cold war, we had four major crises. I call them 'earthquakes'. One was a geo-political earthquake in 1991, the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The second was 2001 the 9/11 attacks. 

The third was the big economic crisis of 2008, and the fourth was the 2011 Arab Spring, which dissolved national structures, and national economies like economic crisis, and also made international organisations ineffective.

Now because of this accumulation of crises, and because of this accumulation of earthquakes, we have a systemic earthquake today.

The Russia-Ukraine crisis goes back to the 1990s. The Afghanistan crisis goes back to 9/11. Many instabilities in the Middle East go back to the Arab Spring, and the general international economic crisis goes back to 2008.

Now, how can we overcome this crisis? Until a full re-institutionalisation of world organisations starting with UN reform, it will be difficult for the international system to resolve the internal dynamics.

And until we achieve certain values of humanity everywhere in the world, respect for these values of humanity, including the climate crisis, ethical crises or technological transformation, we have to have a new set of values to reach all of the nations respect, like human rights declaration of United Nations. Without having such a framework, these types of crises will continue to emerge.

Blinken's visit to China is important, and the Chinese premier's visit to Germany is important because China should not be excluded as it is one of the rising powers. 

Read more: Blinken visits China in attempt repair to rock-bottom relationship

In my book "Strategic Depth", I said the 19th-century was century of Europe, the second half of the 20th century was Atlantic century. The first half of 21st century will be Asian century while the second half will be African century. It is the rise of Asian powers in general.

The next will be Asia, we are in the phase of the rise of Asian and then a power struggle for Africa.

So with the global change will we adjust international order and will we be having a wise approach, wise leaders, like the leaders who established United Nations, to reframe these international orders, and have a multipolar system?

UN Security Council permanent members are still the same since after the Second World War. The Second World War has passed, the Cold War has passed, and many other wars have passed. Still, five states have special power in United Nations Security Council, and some of them may be irrelevant.

So, there is a change of reformation of international organisations. There is a need for regional order, including the Middle East. All nations should respect each other.

I am very happy that today Saudi-Iranian relations are improving. I am very happy that Saudis and Egyptians are talking, Egyptians and Iranians are talking, and I am very happy that Turkey is improving relations with many powers.

We need to work towards a viable regional order.

The same should be valid for the Black Sea. Russia and Ukraine should agree on a regional framework. These regional and national reconciliations, like in Syria or in Iraq or in Ukraine are important. Three levels: national, regional and global. These levels should be restored with the new approach.

Intellectuals say always a superpower will never ever lose its status without a war. Do you think the US will lose this seat without a war?

Today the character of war has changed. That was the case when the war was on a real battlefield. Today there is technological war, economic war, and there are several faces of wars and competition.

So nobody should expect a new war for change of power shift but economic transformation, the role of technology and artificial intelligence. These are the new ways, new methods of competition, not just battlefield wars.