Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan. Photo: Christian Hartmannning/Reuters

They called it a new beginning in the relationship between the EU and Turkey. What the leaders of Europe and Turkey meant, however, was a new deal. Turkey will help stem the flow of migrants to the EU in return for cash, visas and renewed talks on EU membership. It’s unclear how long this deal can last.

The Turkish premier, Ahmet Davutoglu, said it depended on how many more refugees flooded out of Syria. Turkey is already hosting 2.3 million.

Meanwhile, the EU leaders lined up to emphasise that the deal did not mean that Turkey was anywhere close to finalising talks. Given the current state of human rights and media freedom in the country, the prospects of membership were remote.

Nor is the deal in itself particularly good for Turkey. Three billion euros in staggered aid might seem like a large sum but it amounts to less than €1,500 per refugee. How many weeks of support – it’s aimed at raising refugees’ living standards – would that cover? Yet, the EU seems reluctant to fork out even that amount year in, year out.

The lifting of visas (within a year) for Turkish travel to the EU looks like a gift but there’s a twist, which has naturally been noted in Turkey itself. It is conditional on Turkey tightening its borders in the east.

In effect, the deal recognises the EU’s right to waiver the need for a visa. However, the European Court of Justice has actually ruled in favour of the abolishment of a visa requirement for Turks – in no fewer than 58 cases.

According to Harun Gümrükçü, an international relations expert at Akdeniz University speaking to the Turkish daily Hürriyet, with this deal Turkey renounced its right to take legal action to lift thevisa requirement.

In other words, what is being called a historic step in Europe is being discussed as a historic kick in the Turkish media.

There is no doubt that both Europe and Turkey need each other and have mutual interests. But what recent events suggest is that their respective geostrategic interests might not be compatible enough to make membership in either’s interests.

Take three sets of issues, in each of which Turkey has pursued – quite legitimately – its own determined line.

First, there is the downing of the Russian plane that flew into Turkish airspace. Turkey has every right to defend its sovereignty belligerently. Indeed, it is in the character of the Turkish State, no matter the government, to do so.

Such behaviour, legitimate though it is, would however strain at the EU’s manner of doing things. With Turkey in the EU, the former’s difficult neighbourhood would end up putting a strain in the relationship between Turkey and the rest.

What is being called a historic step in Europe is being discussed as a historic kick in the Turkish media

Second, there is Turkey’s conduct in the current Syrian conflict. It has actively contributed to the fight against Daesh, arresting almost 350 members and detaining around 1,000 affiliates, and providing access to airspace and military bases for air action against Daesh.

But Turkey draws the line in enabling Kurdish fighters in Syria and Iraq to battle Daesh – who would make a significant difference to the fighting – placing a firm blockade on Kurdish-held parts of Syria. Turkey considers the Kurdish fighters to be terrorists and simply refuses to countenance helping ‘terrorists’ to fight Daesh. It’s a position we can expect any Turkish government, secular or Islamist, to defend.

At issue here is Turkey’s concern with its own current territorial integrity, which incorporates part of what could become an independent Kurdistan, should the Syrian and Iraqi crises lead to renewed calls for a new country for the Kurdish nation.

Once more, Turkey is within its rights to defend what it considers its territory. But to have Turkey as an EU member state would also effectively commit the EU to being against Kurdish independence, something that would rest uneasily with many member states, while also making the ‘Kurdish problem’ a European one.

Finally, there is Turkey’s current involvement in the politics of North African countries such as Libya and Tunisia. Once more, the policy is legitimate: a pursuit of national political and commercial interests.

But it is inevitably leading to ambivalence towards Turkey in these countries, with the jibe that a ‘neo-Ottomanism’ often being made by Arabs (who generally resented Ottoman domination, historically).

With Turkey as an EU member state, such a policy would have implications for the whole of Europe. While one of the original arguments in favour of Turkey’s membership of the EU was that it would help build bridges with the Muslim world, the way things are turning out are a bit different from what was intended. Instead of Turkey helping promote a European policy, it looks like it would end up more as Europe propping up a Turkish-led policy – or else deep disagreement.

Notice that none of these divergent interests have to do with Islam, per se. The limits of European enlargement are being defined by geostrategic interests. Whatever the differences of the core European group, their geostrategic interests are sufficiently similar that they can recognise that cohesion is in the interests of all of them. Turkey’s interests are such that nothing but a very loose Europe might suit it.

This space has always expressed itself in favour of Turkey’s membership if it fulfils the Copenhagen criteria. And perhaps the issues I’ve just delineated are themselves short-term, driven by events rather than long-term geostrategic interests. But Europe had better begin thinking of how best to construct a genuine partnership with Turkey, in the interests of both, and a bit less about ‘historic steps’ and raw deals in which Turkey ends up feeling it’s the loser.