ANKARA, Turkey (AP)
The United States is withdrawing warplanes from a Turkish air base that has been used for patrols over northern Iraq and sending them to the Persian Gulf for the war, U.S. officials said Tuesday, a sign of the growing distance between Washington and Ankara.
Secretary of State Colin Powell is to meet with Turkish officials Wednesday in an effort to repair the fractured relationship, which has left Washington alienated from NATO's only Muslim member at a time when the United States is desperate for support in the Muslim world.
Some U.S. officials are questioning the usefulness of Turkey as an ally and point to the country's refusal to allow in U.S. ground troops to open a northern front against Iraq, a strategy that both sides agreed would lead to a shorter, less bloody war.
Washington began pulling some 50 warplanes out of Incirlik air base in southern Turkey after it became clear that Turkey would not allow them to be used in an Iraq war. The planes had patrolled northern Iraq since after the 1991 Gulf War.
"The U.S.-Turkish strategic partnership ... has been severely damaged and it needs repair," said Sami Kohen, a columnist for the Milliyet newspaper.
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