How bizarre, there is a uniform chorus of genuine amazement at the late night communiqué released from the General Staff HQ last Friday. I am personally astonished at the amazement the communiqué has caused. It was not a declaration of war, it just marked the opening of a new battle in an ongoing war. I was 21, a student of economics and a part-time reporter for this newspaper, when I learned from Suleyman Demirel, many times a former prime minister, then an opposition figure banned from politics, a future prime minister and president, the simple rule of logic that was, in his words: “In order to safely predict what is going to happen, you must drop from your analysis, one by one, what is most probably NOT going to happen.” Two decades later, Mr Demirel's teaching looks applicable in predicting the future of the war - between the ones who say that there is a war and the ones who say that there isn't (as the Canadian poet/singer once wrote.) What is going to happen in the war between the increasingly polarized Islamists (or self-declared Conservatives) and the Secularists (including the Army?) But, first, what is NOT going to happen?
What is not going to happen is (a) the Islamists giving up their strategic fight for a Turkey that is best described in the American nation-building jargon as “a modern Islamic state,” and (b) the Secularists (including the Army) giving up fighting back. With these two options dropped from the analysis, we safely reach the uncomfortable conclusion that the Cold War in Ankara will go on. That given, what other options, then, could be dropped? These would probably include Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his men taking such bold moves as to further provoke response from the military HQ and challenging the already very fragile modus vivendi; and, on the other extreme, the Army taking over in a conventional coup. No, these are not going to happen. But, what will be the most likely “weaponry” in the old war with a “new battle” opened last week? The principal weaponry in the new phase of the War will probably be the miracle word that is taqiyya -- till the next phase which may see less polite weaponry. For example, we will probably see Mr. Erdogan's men, particularly presidential candidate, Abdullah Gul, switching to a more secularist, more moderatist rhetoric, in order not to alert the enemy. And similarly, the generals will “wait and see” when they do not wholeheartedly assure Mr. Erdogan that he should “not worry,” but will privately craft numerous “contingency plans” – more than they normally do. For the same reasons, the “psychological warfare” will gain prominence. Actually, the military's communiqué, among many other objectives, aimed to add ammunition to the “civilian initiative” on the part of the Secularists such as the Apr. 14 and Apr. 29 crowds of millions in Ankara and Istanbul; to reinforce the “new spirit” these spectacular demonstrations may create between now and whenever the elections will be held; and send unity messages at many wavelengths to the hopelessly split opposition. Understandably, there is a uniform chorus of criticism of the military's warning of Apr. 27, timed carefully so as to minimize the financial market damage.
Although the “but-this-is-against-democracy” cliché naturally finds supporters among both one side of now deeply polarized Turkey and unbiased democrats, it does not explain the picture as a whole. It would be fairer to say the military's warning was against “arithmetical democracy,” not democracy in its true meaning. The message looked less like a Thai military communiqué and more like sensible EU warnings that ousted Austria's Joerg Haider. It is always debatable whether it is in democracy's purest spirits if a party should control two-thirds of parliament with votes amounting to one-quarter of the electorate and elect a president only half a year before its term in office expires. Moreover, it is always questionable whether it is “the will of the nation (or its majority)” to have all three of the offices of the president, parliament speaker and the prime minister run by men coming from a political doctrine that has left behind numerous political parties closed down by court warrants over radical Islam – warrants also endorsed by the European Court of Human Rights. But there is more. Essentially, the military's communiqué, (well, the next one may be less polite and come out at the opening hour of financial markets,) without mentioning any political party, said that the military would take sides and defend secularism (vis-à-vis Islamism as a political doctrine.) But what would the General Staff have said? That the military has given up defending secularism? Perhaps Bulent Arinc, parliament speaker, was right when he said that the military repeated what it had always said. But then, if Mr. Arinc is right, why all the high-alert tone at Mr. Erdogan's party HQ? The Constitution authorizes the military to defend Turkey, its secular regime and its territorial integrity against “foreign and domestic” enemies. But who are the foreign and domestic enemies/threats? Of course, the military cannot decide itself, and there must be democratic rules and practices to establish what these threats are. Actually, there are…
What is widely known as Turkey's national threat whitepaper, or in its full formal name, the National Security Policy Document, can be helpful in understanding why the communiqué was not a deviation from democracy, although it may be seen as a deviation from “arithmetical democracy.” The threat paper now in effect was signed by all of Mr. Erdogan's ministers and, finally, by himself. It deems Islamic fundamentalism, the subject of Friday's communiqué, as top domestic security threat – repeat, with Mr. Erdogan's signature underneath. The question is: If the Constitution authorizes the military to defend Turkey against foreign and domestic threats, and if, further, the elected government has established that the top domestic security threat is Islamic fundamentalism, what is so strange about the military issuing a warning against Islamic fundamentalism? In fact, this simple logic very much resembles Mr. Erdogan's political rhetoric. Mr. Erdogan often argues that his party came to power as a result of perfectly legitimate elections for a term of five years, that his party has every right to use this term in full, that it is perfectly constitutional that this parliament elects the next president and, further, that everyone should respect if parliament elects Mr. Gul as president. Both arguments look convincing, and no more or less convincing than the other. Of course, we all know that they are both nice pieces of rhetoric hoping for the best use of what the word “taqiyya” stands for. But that's all normal in a long-term strategic warfare. But what will be the military's next move? We can only know that we cannot know. Anyone with some understanding of Turkey's “military affairs” can guess that there will not be another communiqué soon. The generals think that this time, when they pushed up the volume a little bit, the “music” was better heard. For the time being, there seems to be no reason for “louder music.” That, however, does not mean we shall never hear it louder. Funny, each time there is a warning from the military, HQ people tend to speculate around the word “coup.” In military contingency planning there are always dozens of different scenarios, their proper and prioritized actions, counter-actions, counter-counter-actions and their timings vis-à-vis the threat, but not a coup – a coup is like using a nuclear weapon in a war which an army thinks it can win conventionally, but would resort to when all other conventional options failed. What these contingency plans have in common is their “unpredictability.” How many members of the government, really, how many analysts, speculators, pundits, diplomats were able to anticipate the Apr. 27 communiqué?
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=72078
JPTF 2007/05/02
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