The Turkish Crisis: An Emergent Third Pole?

Turkey's recent politics appears to revolve around two court cases. In the one case, the ruling AKP (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi – Justice and Development Party) stands behind the bar in order to defend themselves in the Constitutional Court closure case against charges by the Head Prosecutor of the Turkish Republic of “having become a focus of fundamentalist Islamist threat against the secular republic.”

In the other, the defendants are headed up by former army commanders, who during duty may have mobilized the power they exercised within the state security and intelligence services for crushing the ruling Islamist-rooted AKP government. The complex web, built up under the leadership of a retired four star general, comprises of a vast array of figures from Turkey's broad political spectrum including covert killers, fanatic ultra-nationalist agitators, former-Maoist political figures, solemn academics, retired paramilitaries, and others.

Struggle for Power

The involvement of courts, judges and prosecutors in the ongoing strife may surprise an onlooker who is unfamiliar with the particularities of Turkey's political background. What unfolds before our eyes is not simply a legal process as such, yet a war for power ‘pursued by other means.’ Seen through the eyes of European or U.S. media, Turkey appears to being torn apart between secularists and Islamists.

But this ideological approach misses the real nature of the ongoing strife in the country: the warring parties' programs are related to the restructuring of Turkey's socio-economic relation in a globalized world economy, rather than particular worldviews toward secularism or Islam, though the latter has indeed had a considerable impact on the course of the conflict.

In the one camp stands a contradictory alliance of Turkey's big capitalist class – who strive to ascend a higher level for competition in the global market through membership in the European Union (EU) – and the ‘Anatolian Tigers’. The Anatolian group is made up of middle scale businesses generally owned by the conservative local bourgeoisie of central Turkey of an Islamic background.

They have been competing in the global market since the 1980s when Turkey adopted export oriented development strategies to replace the statist and import substitution approach of the previous two decades. The ruling AKP has had an eye to further influence in the Middle East as a NATO member with a 'strategic alliance' with Washington, contrary to neo-conservative paranoia of Turkey adopting the ‘Taliban model.’ In the last six years in government, it has been able to coalesce with the interests of the big capital from its Islamist power base, although there have also been at times fierce frictions between the allies.

In the other camp is a complex political and social network of Turkey's bureaucratic and military elites in alliance with certain sections of the bourgeoisie whose domestic interests are endangered by the influx of international finance-capital in the Turkish markets. They derive their power from their manipulative capacity over Turkey's powerful state apparatuses – from the military to judiciary, from the academy to administrative bureaucracy – rather than from their role in social production.

The recent crackdown on the secret special organization 'Ergenekon', however, has apparently inflicted a heavy blow on the most criminal elements of this network. This group, with their extensive network across Turkey among staunch secularist-republicans, and with their control over the military-industrial complex, still represents an attractive – even if irrational from the standpoint of the globalization – perspective particularly among white collar occupations, who comprise the urban base of Turkey's political landscape. They have argued for a future for Turkish capitalism in Eurasia – the giant political-geographical space between Russia and China.

The influential generals who have inspired this new direction had already in 2002 stated that “instead of bidding for membership in the unreliable EU, Turkey should turn towards cooperation with Russia and Iran.” The following years would prove that these were more than mere words.

Between November 2002 (the first year of the pro-Islamist AKP in power) and July 2007 (the general elections which gained the AKP even broader victory for power in the parliament), a huge counter-current against Turkey's EU membership bid and against Turkey's military alliance with the U.S. swept across the country. The movement, in spite of its 'anti-imperialist' rhetoric, said very little against Turkey's NATO membership.

It mainly targeted democratic reforms for freedom of speech and organization, broader rights for Turkey's Kurds and non-Muslim minorities (believing that these made Turkey more vulnerable to Western influences and open to Islamic fundamentalism) and agitated against a peaceful solution in Cyprus for the fear of what might result from the withdrawal of Turkish troops from the divided island.

On the eve of the July 22, 2007 general elections, when they seemed to have the full backing of Turkey's armed forces, the national and international media image of the 'Eurasian' camp (labeled as 'secularists') was so bright and powerful that political analysts could not have predicted their present collapse. Indeed, the media they control or influence – including TV channels, dailies, magazines – and the main opposition CHP (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi – The Republican People's Party) have converged around the opinion that the defeat is caused by AKP-backed persecution of the “patriots” through “slanders” and “false accusations.”

A more coolheaded analysis, however, shows that their initial rise and dramatic collapse as was directly related to a major shift in the balance of power, particularly with the political stand of the armed forces high command. The unexpected consensus reached between the present Chief of Staff General Yasar Buyukanit and Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan on May 5, 2007, marked the beginning of the withdrawal of the support of the armed forces for the ‘Eurasianists.’

In spite of baseless arguments by the liberal supporters of the AKP, the Turkish armed forces' interventions in daily political life have not stemmed from an anti-EU reflex inherent in the army mentality. It has stemmed from their 'perception of threat' that Turkey's territorial integrity is at risk as long as Iraq's prospective dismemberment remains on the agenda in the aftermath of the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

EU Membership: A National Security Policy Principle

Indeed, the National Security Policy Document – a 'top secret' strategy document jointly drafted by the government and the armed forces which was leaked to the press in 1997 – posed, among others, several strategic aims: Turkey's westward orientation should not be modified by any means; Turkey's bid for full EU membership in the EU should be kept (although the negative attitudes of some EU countries should not be underestimated); and efforts directed at integrating Turkey into the world market, including via privatization of state assets, should be increased. This has framed Turkish state policy before and after the AKP government came to power.

In spite of Turkey's favorable strategic approach towards economic integration with global capitalism, Ankara-Washington relations worsened over this period, as the U.S. occupation reinforced the drive toward Kurdish autonomy in Iraq. Due to the fragility of Iraq's territorial control of its borders, the Turkish military perceived a growing threat from the prospective of Kurdish independence in Northern Iraq. For the Turkish military and ruling classes, this was a negative example for Turkey's own 12 million Kurds. The U.S. presence in Iraq, Ankara's military elite believed, also gave the insurgent guerrilla PKK (Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan –Kurdistan Workers' Party) a relatively greater sphere of action on the other side of Turkey-Iraq border.

Having missed the 'chance' to enter into Iraqi territory as part of 'Allied Forces' after a 'no' vote in the Turkish Parliament in 2002, the Turkish military continued its de facto military presence in Northern Iraq to prevent the area from becoming a safe-haven for the insurgent Kurdish guerrillas. Yet, the breaking point was reached when Turkish 'special forces' were embarrassingly arrested by the local U.S. occupation forces in their bases in Suleimania. Turkey was forced to accept a U.S. ban on its covert actions against the Kurds of Iraq and the insurgent Kurdish guerrilla PKK.

The Turkish army responded to the ban from its 'greatest ally' with a mobilization of its political influence against the interests of United States of America in Turkey. From 2002 to 2007, an anti-American and anti-Kurd 'nationalist' psychology and political effort swept across the country. Turkey's NATO trained generals praised “the popular support for the indivisible unity of Turkish Republic.”

The campaign peaked in 2007 when Turkish Armed Forces regained their right to launch cross-border air and land force operations inside Iraqi territory against PKK guerrillas with intelligence support from the U.S. occupation forces. With their security position regained and Washington's recognition of the PKK as an 'enemy', the Turkish Armed Forces consented to a new approach in handling Turkey's ‘Kurdish question.’ In order to balance the PKK influence in Turkey's mostly Kurdish populated provinces, the Turkish army (even as a stronghold of secularism) adopted the ruling AKP's perspective of forging an 'Islamic Brotherhood', with the aim of ideologically integrating the Kurds into the Turkish state. The strategy would be completed by Turkey's recognition of the Northern Iraqi Kurdish administration, whose support Ankara desperately needed to block PKK infiltration into Turkish territory.

The start of the massive Turkish air forces operation over PKK-controlled areas of Northern Iraq in the spring of 2007 marked the end of the 'nationalist campaign' against U.S. interests under the auspices of Turkish Armed Forces. There was no more need for 'anti-U.S.' agitation. The 'subversive organizations' mobilized to campaign against Kurds had to be removed from the scene. The sabotages, arsons, lynching attempts and assassinations directed at Kurds and pro-Western liberals were to be persecuted. The nationalist NGOs and manipulations within political parties, trade unions and the media were not as useful and they should be ended. The eccentric organizations formed during the five years campaign were denied former support and/or tolerance by the Turkish armed forces and by its 'special security apparatuses.'

The road to the 'Ergenekon' operation was wide open. It was revealed during the prosecution that an aborted military coup was in the making from 2002-04. It failed to develop for the fear of international isolation as well as the lack of full support of the army high command. The Turkish Armed Forces Chief of Staff General Buyukanit, in his last public statement bluntly said: “Those who are guilty will pay for it. The Armed Forces is not a criminal organization!” The crackdown on the Ergenekon organization halted at the gates of Turkey's Chief of Staff's military campus, with the police having to suffice with the handcuffing of retired generals.

To the surprise of the once all-powerful 'secularist' camp, the Armed Forces also refrained from publicly backing the charges of anti-secularism against the AKP. Deniz Baykal, the leader of the main opposition CHP, sharply reacted against the Chief of Staff's silence as the AKP moved to lift the ban on wearing the veil in the universities: “We have been left only with the judiciary to rely on.”

The Head Prosecutor of the Republic charged the AKP with “attempting at establishing an Islamic state,” and this indictment was indeed a call for action in legal terms for the armed forces to play its historic role. It was not an ordinary legal document as such. It is highly unlikely that this indictment will retain its initial weight as the political forces are realigned amidst military operations in the southeast, police operations in the capital Ankara that are handcuffing the once almighty generals, and the deadly blasts in an Istanbul suburb which have claimed the lives of innocent civilians.

There Exists a Third Pole!

Although the two parties to the ongoing conflict would like to ally these social forces to their respective individual camps, there is a third party in the social struggle. This is the party of the labour, the oppressed, the poor, the Kurds, the Alevites, the women, the youth, and others.

Those who have marched towards the banned Taksim Square and paid the price of police brutality in May 1st; those who have poured out to the streets to protest against the neoliberal Social Security Law that deprives the workers of the last gains of the social welfare state; those who challenge the ecologically hazardous mining industries and nuclear power plants; and those who for decades have fought for the brotherhood of Turkey's peoples and for a peaceful solution to the 'Kurdish question' comprise the bulk of this camp.

Taking sides with one of the parties to the present conflict who strive for articulating Turkey with one or the other pole of capitalist globalization will not promote – and will actively be against – their social, political, economic and cultural interests. This third force is fighting to build its own capacities to address the people, and oppose playing one of the tunes in either of the bourgeois choruses.

The present situation throws up discussion of mainly two options. On the one hand, the restoration of a 'military guardianship' regime, which may or may not get along with the AKP government, is posited. Turkey, however, is not faced with an imminent military takeover as there exists no real social-economic pretext for such an extraordinary regime, in terms of the present balance of class forces.

On the other hand, the AKP is often posed as deepening Islamic solution to the impasse. But while the AKP pursues a social-cultural policy of pushing Islamist values in daily life as an instrument of its ideological-cultural hegemony, it is highly skeptical that they are aiming at an Islamic state, simply for the concrete reason that this would inflict more harm on their power base than their secularist opponents. An Islamist Turkey would inevitably be ousted from the negotiations table for EU membership (a major guarantee for the free circulation of Turkish capital and goods within the Euro zone, Turkey's major foreign trade partner).

That is why a 'third pole' is necessary to widen political options in Turkey. It is also necessary to bring to justice the Turkish political and military authorities responsible over the last decade for encouraging the secret Ergenekon organization. The military and political elites did so either through tolerance for extra-legal forces or by abusing their power to assist such forces for the sake of the survival of the military 'guardianship' regime. They did so at the expense of the lives of hundreds of people and the uncountable waste of human and material resources.

Such Herculean tasks can only be undertaken by a force that is not the accomplice of any bourgeois government, and that has no tolerance for oppression either by the political Islamists or by the ultra-nationalists. This task can only be assumed by those political forces that fight for a Social Republic. Such a pole in Turkey is emerging.(EK/EÜ)

* This article first appeared in Socialist Project's e-bulletin no 130.