Cogito Ergo Non Serviam

Turkish Coup Fails, Purge Underway

Friday evening, elements of the Turkish armed forces attempted a coup d'etat against the elected, constitutional, democratic government of that country. It collapsed in a matter of hours after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan returned from vacation and told the people to take to the streets. The clash between an elected politician influenced by Islamist philosophy and a military founded upon and dedicated to the idea of secularism is important. However, it clouds a more fundamental development. The military coup d'etat is becoming obsolete in the face of people power.

The Turkish democracy is not as well-established as that of France, the UK or the US. However, the people of Turkey have chosen their leaders since 1983 when the last junta left office. That means that people in their 40s have no recollection of Turkey being something other than a democracy. Their default opinion is democratic.

Yet, the armed forces continue to threaten, or at least monitor, the elected government. In 1997, the military maneuvered Islamic prime minister Necmettin Erbakan out of office. In 2007, the military stated that it was the guardian of secularism; it issued a statement ahead of that year's elections saying "the Turkish Armed Forces maintain their sound determination to carry out their duties stemming from laws to protect the unchangeable characteristics of the Republic of Turkey. Their loyalty to this determination is absolute." This was in response to Abdullah Gul's popularity, and his past participation in Islamist political movements.

President Erdogan has chipped away at Turkey's secularism and its constitutional separation of powers during his years in office. Some sections of the military have remained his foes. In 2010, forty officers were arrested and charged with plotting to overthrow the government, the "Sledgehammer" affair. Detractors say that the president is behind all of these coup attempts and conspiracies, using them to crush his opponents. A likelier explanation is that these plots are genuine because the president is undermining secularism, a principle that has served the nation well for almost a century.

Friday, some members of the military decided to take advantage of the fact that he was on vacation and mounted their coup. They seized the TV and radio stations, they turned off the internet (almost completely), and they put tanks on bridges. They dropped bombs on all the appropriate targets like the president's vacation residence, the parliament, the police headquarters.

What they failed to do was control the streets. Within a very short timeframe, their troops on the streets were confronted with thousands of their fellow citizens who essentially told them to go back to their barracks. Unless the army is willing to shoot thousands of civilians, a situation like that goes against the army every time. Turkey's military relies on conscription to fill the ranks. So, non-professional soldiers were sent out to take control and if need be, shoot the people they had sworn on induction day to defend. All they really wanted to do was go home, so they did.

The police stayed loyal to the government, and that sped the collapse of the coup, but the important thing is that the people sided against the military. In any successful coup, the people are at least neutral until it is too late.

This journal suggests that the people of Turkey have been democratic too long to put up with the military simply removing a democratically elected government, even one that threatens secularism. It wasn't just President Erdogan's supporters who confronted the military. His opponents came out to halt an attack on democracy. This week-end the Turks proved that the people not the military are sovereign.

In Turkey, the coup d'etat may be a thing of the past.

© Copyright 2016 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.



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