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Erdogan resets relations with Russia (page two)
Massive purge in civil and military bureaucracy
In the aftermath of the abortive coup, the government has dismissed 2,745 judges including members of Turkey's highest judiciary board. Licences of 21,000 private school teachershave been cancelled. Around 50,000 soldiers, police, judges, civil servants and teachers have been suspended or removed. Erdogan ordered 1,577 deans of universities to resign.
According to Metin Gurcan, an ex-army officer now working as a columnist for Al-Monitor's Turkey Pulse,on July 27, 1,684 ranking officers of the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) were dismissed for constituting a threat to national security and for their affiliation with the Fethullah Gulen Terror Organization (FETO).
The purge ruling, which cannot be appealed, covered 2% of 40,000 officers in the TSK and 1% of approximately 90,000 noncommissioned officers. The ranks most affected were generals and admirals.
Of the 325 generals in Turkey's army, air and naval forces, 149 (45.8%) were discharged on July 27, including two four-star generals, seven lieutenant generals, 27 major generals/vice admirals (12 army, 11 air force and four navy) and 126 brigadier generals/rear admirals.
Before the purge was made public, Land Forces Chief of Staff Gen. Ihsan Uyar, the No. 2 name of that major command, and Gen. Kamil Basoglu, commander of Training and Doctrine of the army, submitted their resignations.
Army, air and naval commanders will be under the Minister of Defense, and gendarmerie, police and coast guard will be under the Ministry of Interior.
Erdogan has already said the chief of General Staff and Military Intelligence Organization (MIT) should be directly attached to the presidency and that such a move would require structural reforms in Turkey's security. But because of a lack of support from opposition parties for such a radical change, a constitutional amendment will be needed to make those changes.
This is not the first coup plot to fail in Turkey
This is not the first coup plot to fail in Turkey.
According to the Geneva Center for Security Policy, following the 1960 coup, for example, Colonel Talat Aydemir spearheaded two coups in 1962 and 1963, but – like the most recent coup attempt – failed to win the support of the Turkish high command. The Turkish military, during this time, was divided – much like today – and ultimately took steps to prevent “factionalization” within the institution, beginning with a purge of 1,400 of Aydermir’s reported sympathizers from the military academy in 1963 and 1964.
The next intervention took place in 1971, through the issuing of a memorandum that forced the resignation of the then elected Prime Minister, Suleyman Demirel, and then again in 1980.
The military, in 2007, posted a memorandum challenging the legitimacy of the AKP’s then candidate for president, Abdullah Gul, because his wife wore a headscarf. The Turkish military has traditional viewed its role as guardians of Turkish secularism, a concept that includes other political tenets – known as “six arrows” – that collectively are defined as Kemalism. The constitutional court implicitly backed the military, as did the main opposition party, the Republican People’s Party (CHP). The AKP subsequently called a snap parliamentary election, calculating that the public would side with them, and ultimately won 341 seats, an increase from their previous position, and easily exceeding the number of seats needed to elect Gul.
Turkey court issues arrest warrant for Fethullah Gulen
A court in Turkey has issued a formal warrant for the arrest of Fethullah Gulen, who has lived in Pennsylvania since 1998, whom the government accuses of being behind the failed coup that resulted in the death of more than 250 people. The official Anadolu news agency said that on August 4, 2016 an Istanbul-based court issued the warrant for Gulen for "ordering the July 15 coup attempt".
The order for Gulen’s arrest is seen a step toward a formal extradition request to the United States, which Turkish officials say will be submitted after an investigation into the botched coup.
Erdogan has been calling for the extradition since 2013, when he accused Gulen’s followers, who held positions in the judiciary, of orchestrating a corruption inquiry that implicated Erdogan’s inner circle. An arrest warrant for Mr. Gulen was issued in Turkey in 2014, accusing him of directing “an armed terrorist organization” that illegally tapped the conversations of the prime minister and president.
Metin Gurcan, a senior columnist, provides an insight into the Gulen movement which has been active in Turkey for 40 years and operates in 130 countries employing hundreds of thousands of people in the fields of education, health and trade with annual revenue exceeding $50 billion.
Metin argues that “ we tend to see the Gulenist structure in a modern paradigm as a hierarchical body, with rigid internal discipline and followers who are strongly devoted to its highly charismatic leader. This is where we make mistakes when analyzing the Gulenist structure.”
According to Kahraman Sakul of Istanbul Sehir University who spoke to Al-Monitor, the Gulenist network is based on much more complex relations. He said, “Contrary to sustained media comments, I don’t think the network model of Gulenists emulates the classical pyramid model of terrorists. The Gulen movement has transparent, overt networks of trade, finance, education, media, health and social media and secret, covert networks of military and intelligence bureaucracy.”
“Until now, international opinion focused on overt Gulenist networks. But the testimonies of soldiers detained after the coup make it clear there are enormous differences between the overt and covert networks of the Gulenist movement,” Metin says adding:
“In their official narratives used by overt networks, Fethullah Gulen is portrayed as an “opinion leader.” We are told that his basic goal is to spread his service worldwide, to serve global peace by doing business all over, to overcome prejudices between religions and culture, and to ensure interfaith dialogue. But what we hear from testimonies of pro-Fethullah Gulen Terror Organization (FETO) military officers, the narrative used in secret networks is quite different.
“Chief of General Staff Hulusi Akar, who was taken hostage by his closest associates on the night of the coup attempt, has said he was approached by air force brigadier Hakan Evrim, who told him, “If you wish, we can arrange for you to talk to our opinion leader Fethullah Gulen,” which proved their absolute obedience to Gulen.
How covert Gulen nework works?
“Soldiers in the covert networks are obliged to carry out the orders passed on to them by their civilian “older brothers.” No Gulenist in uniform knew any other officer of the same affiliation. This is best explained by the testimony of Muhammed Uslu, a civilian working in the private secretariat of the Prime Ministry who was also the “older brother” of Lt. Col. Levent Turkkan, the senior aide to Akar. We were amazed to hear how Uslu received the daily recordings of the office of the Chief of General Staff and passed them on to another civilian brother he didn’t even know.
“The group that constitutes the core of the secret network would spread the unquestionable instructions to lower levels, where the only requirement was to carry them out. This blind obedience also meant that many bright Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) officers with master’s and doctorate degrees were passing on what they learned to “older brothers” they didn’t even know.
“ Secret cells of Gulenists do not operate on a hierarchical pyramid model. Their nets don’t operate on the basis of perpendicular hierarchies of command and control but on horizontal hierarchy. For example, there are reports that on the night of July 15, many generals were ordered around by colonels and even more junior ranks. An air force noncommissioned officer is said to have issued orders to generals to apprehend Erdogan.”
Gulen Movement’s absolute secrecy in a way was the basic cause of the July 15 coup failure, Metin concludes. Gulen followers successfully infiltrated the Turkish officer corps by outmaneuvering its no-beard and no-headscarf rules. Gulen no doubt justified such concealment with his own interpretation of the Islamic tenet of taqiyah. His interpretation of Islam allows the dishonesty of systematic deception.
“Turks Can Agree on One Thing: U.S. Was Behind Failed Coup,” this was the headline of the rticle published on August 2, 2016 by the New York Times. The article written by Tim Arango and Ceylan Yeginsu pointed out:
“Turks, in their exasperation that the United States has not turned over Mr. Gulen, have made this analogy: What if Turkey, in 2001, had harbored Osama bin Laden? Given the widespread sentiment that Mr. Gulen was behind the coup, a failure to extradite him would probably provoke a popular backlash in Turkey against the United States, and would confirm for many that the Americans had conspired against Turkey. “
Gülen came to America in 1998, reportedly to seek medical treatment. Since then, he has directed his global empire from Pennsylvania. A federal judge granted him a green card in 2008. Shortly after he left for America, a series of secretly recorded sermons featuring Gülen aired on Turkish television. In one of them, he told his followers:
"You must move in the arteries of the system without anyone noticing your existence until you reach all the power centers...You must wait for the time when you are complete and conditions are ripe, until we can shoulder the entire world and carry it..."
"You must wait until such time as you have gotten all the state power, until you have brought to your side all the power of the constitutional institutions in Turkey … Now, I have expressed my feelings and thoughts to you all in confidence. Know that when you leave here -- as you discard your empty juice boxes, you must discard the thoughts and the feelings that I expressed here."
Foreign Policy magazine has described Gulen as an opportunist while Pepe Escobar calls him a CIA asset. Interestingly, a former C.I.A. official and a former American ambassador to Turkey helped Mr. Gulen receive a green card, according to the New York Times.
Abdus Sattar Ghazali is the Chief Editor of the Journal of America (www.journalofamerica.net) email: asghazali2011 (@) gmail.com
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