Chapter 6 explores how ideas about history and geography shaped Turkey’s relations with NATO and the Arab world. After joining NATO by de-emphasizing the alliance’s geographic character, Turkey went on to embrace NATO membership as proof of its European identity. Subsequently, Turkish and American officials clashed over what it meant for Turkey to be a “bridge between East and West.” During the 1950s, Turkey’s initial sympathy toward the Arab world quickly transformed into hostility as Arab nationalism took a pro-Soviet turn. As a result, Arabs who were initially seen as victims of British imperialism suddenly, in a Cold War context, became agents of Soviet imperialism instead.