New Delhi

Turkey's Presiden Recep Tayyip Erdogan dreams of becoming the leader of the Muslim world and to achieve his dream he's abusing his power. 

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He has been picking fights with neighbours, insulting world leaders, waging proxy wars and fighting territorial battles but a majority of Turkish people don't support his agenda and his party's ratings have fallen to 31 per cent.

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The Turkish economy is in no position to fuel his world domination projects. The currency has fallen and the growth rate is at a ten year low but Erdogan persists in his plans. He's waging wars left, right and centre.

He has started a proxy battle in Nagorno Karabakh, indulged muscle-flexing in Libya, Syria and around Cyprus, kicked off a fight with America, sided with Pakistan against India on Kashmir and practically called the French president "mental" but like Newton said every action has an equal and opposite reaction. 

Erdogan's adventurism has come at a cost. A cost that unfortunately the Turkish people will have to bear because as the Turkish president waged these battles to claim leadership of the Muslim world Turkey's economy has sunk.

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Turkey's currency Lira is in a bad shape. It hit a record low of 8.15 against the dollar. It has lost 26 per cent of its value this year. Turkey has spent $134 billion in the past 18 months to prop up the Lira but seems like those efforts have failed to deliver.

These are difficult times for the Turkish economy with inflation in Turkey reaching 11.7 per cent last month. The Turkish central bank has raised its inflation forecast to 12.1 per cent for this year. High inflation rate means the goods in the market become more expensive. The people of Turkey will have to shell out more money to buy something and they have only Erdogan to blame for the crisis.

It is the longest route for the Lira since 1999. There are three reasons driving the fall of the Turkish currency - the rift between Turkey and France, the threat of sanctions from America over turkey's purchase of the S-400 missile defence system from Russia and the growing geopolitical tension mostly of Erdogan's making which is the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and the dispute with Greece in the eastern Mediterranean.

It was Erdogan who started the fight with France by insulting Macron and bought the S-400 from Russia even when Turkey faced strong opposition for the deal from NATO. It is Erdogan who is supplying Azerbaijan with proxy Syrian fighters egging them on to keep the fight against Armenia going and it was Erdogan who kicked off a fight with Greece in the eastern Mediterranean.

Now, the Turkish economy is paying the price for his bullying and misadventures. The Ottoman dream drives Erdogan. The dream to re-build the identity of Turkey as a Muslim nation with him as the leader and the dream to lead the Islamic world. 

Erdogan is trying to project himself as the saviour of the Muslim faith. Even today when the Lira was taking a nosedive, Erdogan was busy sabre rattling with the West.

He accused Western countries of an attack on Islam to re-launch the crusades, a term that refers to a series of medieval military expeditions. Religious wars between Christians and Muslims.

"They literally want to relaunch the crusades. Since the crusades, the seeds of evil and hatred have started falling on these lands and that's when peace was disrupted," Erdogan said, adding, "it is an issue of honour for us to stand against the attacks against our prophet who honoured Mecca, Medina, Africa, Asia, Europe, in the whole world and at all times."

"Standing against the attacks on the Prophet is an issue of honour for us," he added. It is increasingly becoming clear that Erdogan is moving Turkey towards Islamic authoritarianism while waging proxy battles and diplomatic fights.