Trouble In Turkey

[Kathianne]

Turkey's top military leaders resign en masse The resignations of much of Turkey's military leadership is seen as a new sign of tension between the old guard of the armed forces and a rising Muslim political elite led by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The departures include the army's chief of general staff, Gen. Isik Kosaner, and the officers heading the Turkish ground forces, navy and air force. By Borzou Daragahi
Los Angeles Times
12:19 PM PDT, July 29, 2011
Reporting from Beirut

...



http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fgw-turkey-generals-resign-20110730,0,5015262.story

The Muslim extremists are now in control.

[KartRacerBoy]

Turkey is a stange bird. IIRC, it is the single secular muslim nation, but that is becz their military has kept it that way by working behind the scenes.

I'm of two minds on this. Turkey seems to be more of a friend to the US in power politics as a secular nation, but I dislike the thought of the military having such a strong role in civilian govt. If the US military played such a role in this nation there would be holy hell to pay.

I wonder what is going on?

[Kathianne]

Turkey is a stange bird. IIRC, it is the single secular muslim nation, but that is becz their military has kept it that way by working behind the scenes.

I'm of two minds on this. Turkey seems to be more of a friend to the US in power politics as a secular nation, but I dislike the thought of the military having such a strong role in civilian govt. If the US military played such a role in this nation there would be holy hell to pay.

I wonder what is going on?

What's going on? See Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Hamas, Hezbollah. The extremists are coming to power, they have been in government elections, now the military secularists that had been the leveling force are gone.

Revisit Ottoman Empire and who's going to stop them? Broke US? Dysfunctional NATO? Collapsing EU?

Good luck to Greece and Israel.

[KartRacerBoy]

:rolleyes:

The leader of Turkey has been in power for many years (a couple of terms?). What has caused the military leaders to resign after all that time? What is the issue in the immediate crisis and why has the power shifted (if it has)?

[Kathianne]

:rolleyes:

The leader of Turkey has been in power for many years (a couple of terms?). What has caused the military leaders to resign after all that time? What is the issue in the immediate crisis and why has the power shifted (if it has)?

Not that hard to find, Erdogan has been consolidating his power and going after military secularists:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/30/us-turkey-military-idUSTRE76S70M20110730


(Reuters) - Turkey (http://www.reuters.com/places/turkey) faced turmoil within its military on Saturday after the country's four most senior commanders quit in protest over the detention of 250 officers on charges of conspiring against Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's government.


Chief of General Staff General Isik Kosaner stepped down on Friday evening along with the army, navy and air force commanders, plunging NATO's second largest armed forces into uncertainty just days before a key promotions board convenes.


In a farewell message to "brothers in arms," Kosaner said it was impossible for him to continue in his role as he was unable to defend the rights of men who had been detained as a consequence of a flawed judicial process.


Relations between the secularist military and Erdogan's socially conservative Justice and Development Party (AK) have been fraught since it first won power in 2002, due to mistrust of the AK's Islamist roots...



The differences are not new, he's just succeeded:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2270642.stm


Monday, 4 November, 2002, 13:42 GMT Turkey's charismatic pro-Islamic leader

Recep Tayyip Erdogan, leader of the Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi, or AK) is one of Turkey's most popular politicians.

When his party swept to power in November 2002, he was unable to become prime minister because he was banned from holding political office.


But a speedy change in the law cleared the way for him to run for parliament - and within days of his victory he had been named as prime minister...

[Kathianne]

http://ricochet.com/main-feed/The-Questions-No-One-is-Asking-About-the-Turkish-Military


The Questions No One is Asking About the Turkish Military (http://ricochet.com/main-feed/The-Questions-No-One-is-Asking-About-the-Turkish-Military) Claire Berlinski, Ed. (http://ricochet.com/Profile/Claire-Berlinski-Ed) · 4 hours ago

...
Let me get this straight: The former commander of the military police has everything under control?


Now, this isn't easy to control. This is NATO's second-largest armed force, with more than 600,000 men and women serving in the army, navy, air force and paramilitary gendarmerie. Turkey is smack in the middle of the most volatile region of the world. It's at the heart of strategic land and sea lines from Gibraltar to the Middle East and Central Asia. This is an environment full of hot conflicts, and Turkey is the last link in the NATO defense chain. And it is, by the way, one of the six NATO countries that have hosted US tactical nuclear weapons, including 90 B61 gravity bombs. You want to hand control of this, right now, to someone wet behind the ears? Are you nuts?


This military's key role is not to plot coups or protect secularism but to preserve and protect the nation's independence, territorial integrity and vital interests. I'm well aware that if you superficially follow the news from Turkey, you might not realize that. But in fact, Turkey needs every bit of military strength and cunning it's got: This is a damned dangerous neighborhood.
The guys who resigned are the ones who have for years been planning for combat; they're deeply immersed in the details of intelligence, operations, organization, training and logistics. They coordinate with other NATO member states and probably have some important numbers on their cellphones. The military's also responsible for disaster relief (as in, for example, an earthquake--an ever-present possibility in Turkey). Turkey runs one of the largest combat air fleets in NATO. The Navy is heavily involved in NATO, multinational, and UN operations; its roles include control of territorial waters and security for sea lines of communications. The Turkish Navy is key to global anti-piracy operations and to ensuring maritime security in the Gulf of Aden. It's part of the International Security Assistance Force Operation in Afghanistan. Above all--amazing that I should have to point this out--Turkey borders Syria, Iran and Iraq. You can't play amateur-hour with neighbors like that, you just can't.


Turkey is also facing a severe internal threat in the form of the PKK. Three soldiers were killed yesterday (http://www.todayszaman.com/news-252386-three-soldiers-dead-four-wounded-including-governor-in-pkk-ambush.html) and four wounded in an ambush in Van province...


...So what is the effect of this on military morale? What is the effect on military capability? Seems to me those are more important questions, in the big scheme of things, than whether Turkey's becoming more democratic or more authoritarian, because in case you hadn't noticed, this whole region has gone completely berserk.


I note that Iran, twelve hours ago, (http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/WTARC/2011/me_iran0958_08_01.asp) issued a "tough warning" to Turkey:

Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has issued a harsh warning to Turkey to end activities in Syria. In an article in IRGC's weekly Sobh'eh Sadegh, the elite military force asserted that Turkish forces were crossing into Syria as part of a Western campaign to destabilize the regime of President Bashar Assad.
So much for Turkey's "toughened stance (http://www.worldbulletin.net/?aType=haber&ArticleID=76915)" on preventing civil war in Syria.


It's really time for all of Turkey's political parties to stop bickering, set aside all their differences about the Ergenekon and Sledgehammer trials, stop worrying about who's going to enter parliament, and cooperate to make sure these guys are replaced by the very best-trained, most experienced and most capable military minds the country's got. If anyone thinks the United States or Europe will pick up the slack in a major military confrontation now, they just haven't been paying attention to the news.


You want someone who doesn't have a lot of practice taking the helm of the military at a time like this about like you want to be on a jumbo jet with an engine on fire captained by a trainee pilot.

[KartRacerBoy]

Thanks for this thread, Kathianne.

IIRC, Turkey wan'ted into the Europeon Commonweath. That may have changed given the economic crisis and the common currency problem. If not, these developments would pretty much kill any such hopes.