Gradually since 2002, Turkey's autocratic leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan has sought to make Turkey a great power in the tradition of past Turkish leaders from the late Ottoman sultans to Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey. Erdogan has attempted to cast his country as a stand-alone Middle Eastern power - breaking ranks with its traditional Western allies, including the United States.

Here the leading authority Soner Cagaptay, author of The New Sultan, provides a masterful overview of the power politics in the Middle East and Turkey's place in it.