To my non-Turkish friends, who have been asking me about what has happened in Turkey in the past few hours.
Here is what we know with some background. I'll try to keep it as unbiased as possible.
Background:
- Turkey is de facto ruled by Erdogan since 2002. He started his political career as a traditional islamist and rebranded himself as a conservative politician as the founder of AKP. (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justice_and_Development_Party_(Turkey)) )
- Turkish Military used to be strictly secular until ~2010. They have staged several coups within the past 60 years. (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Military_coups_in_Turkey )
- They have also released a statement targeting Erdogan's non-secular politics in 2007, which became a political crisis. (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-memorandum)
- In 2010, there was a constitutional referendum, which gave Erdogan's government more control over judicial system. (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_constitutional_referendum,_2010)
- Following the referendum, certain prosecutors were given extraordinary powers to prosecute secular high-rank officers in the military, for planning a coup against Erdogan's government. Whether there really was a coup attempt remains controversial and the answer you get will be different depending on who you ask. (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sledgehammer_(coup_plan))
- It is fair to say that Turkish military has not been secular in the same sense after the prosecutions in 2010. There was a shift of power. A number of new high-ranked officials who filled the vacant spots allegedly had ties with Gulen movement. Gulen movement is an islamist movement, which has traditionally been allies with Erdogan.
(
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gülen_movement)
- In 2013, Erdogan and leader of Gulen movement parted their ways. I'm not going to go into detail about this, but since 2013 a lot of prominent members of Gulen movement were prosecuted for attempting a coup against Erdogan. That includes military officers, police staff and politicians. The leader of the movement, Fethullah Gulen, is a religious clerk and he's currently in exile in USA (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fethullah_Gülen#Split_with_Erdo.C4.9Fan)
What happened today:
- A group of ~50 mostly medium rank military officers tried to topple Erdogan's government. As of now, it looks like the attempt has failed.
- A number of government officials, including President Erdogan and Prime Minister Yildirim, spoke to the media saying the coup attempt was staged by military officers that are affiliated with Gulen movement. (
http://www.theatlantic.com/news/archive/2016/07/turkey-government/491579/
- Erdogan called people to take to the streets and stand against the coup. People reacted strongly and took over the streets. Within a couple hours police forces took control and restored the order in most places. People walked on top of tanks and chanted against the coup. Also, several high rank military officers from different parts of Turkey strongly expressed their opposition against the coup and sided with the government.
- To reiterate: It looks like it was NOT the secular military officers who tried to topple the government. It seems it was mostly medium rank officers who were affiliated with the Gulen movement, which is an islamist movement. However, Gulen movement rejects this claim.
-
Another popular theory is that this coup was a hoax staged by Erdogan to increase his popularity. Whether this is true or not, it will certainly serve for that purpose. People are concerned that Erdogan will use this coup attempt to start a witch hunt against all opposition and Turkey is on the verge of an even more authoritarian period.
Couple of other observations:
- It was interesting that almost everyone, regardless of their political position, stood against the coup attempt. The members of parliament from the secular/social-democrat CHP, nationalist MHP and left-wing HDP all opposed the coup attempt. I have never heard anyone (or read any comments) that supported the coup, even in the very beginning when it seemed like the coup would succeed. That was also true for various media outlets in very different sides of the political spectrum.
- It was also very interesting how government officials used FaceTime to make live announcements. I may write a whole another post about this once the dust settles. (
http://money.cnn.com/2016/07/15/technology/turkey-coup-facetime-interview/)
- Whatever is the case, I think it is fair to say that this attempt will help Erdogan to solidify his power and use it to push his political agenda.
