The Gathering Storm

The internal divisions within Turkey have begun to boil over as evidenced by recent events. Ted Laskaris has a well thought analysis here. Regardless of how one views Turkey these days, its lack of stability is worrisome , especially for its next door neighbors. Traditionally, since Kemal's so-called modernization of the country, the Turkish military has been the guardian of Turkey's secular elite and status quo. How long the Generals can keep the emerging Islamists in line, even with their ability to declare martial law, is doubtful. During the Islamic Revolution in Iran, the Shah's disciplined military machine was unable to stem the tide of  a grassroots Islamic movement. Only time will tell  whether secular Turkey, the centerpiece of a dwindling American effort to establish some form of modern non-Islamic government in the region, can survive. 

As Turkey becomes more unstable, the possibility that the Generals will embark on some military adventure to galvanize the Turkish people against an outside threat, becomes increasingly more likely. Turkey, like Greece in 1974, is ripe for military adventurism. During Turkey's so-called War of Independence when Ataturk waged war against the indigenous Christian population and the Greek occupation forces, he united Turks as never before. For Turks of all stripes, the most serious internal and external threat Turkey now faces is the Kurdish people. The counter-insurgency in southeastern Turkey fueled by the PPK and tacitly supported by the Kurds in Iraq, in the view of the Turkish military, can only be ended if the sanctuaries in Iraqi Kurdistan are eliminated. More importantly, the Iraqi Kurds are sitting on top of the oil rich region of Kirkuk, once part of Turkey itself.  For an economy that is barely chugging along, Turkey would benefit immensely from such an acquisition. It has the potential of jumpstarting Turkey's lackluster economic performance.

For Turkey's small Christian minority and the Ecumenical Patriarchate itself, the future is bleak, regardless of which side wins the current struggle for power. The secularists are not about to give Christians religious freedom. To do so will mean that they have to give the Islamists similar freedoms. Conversely, the Islamists are headed toward establishing an Islamic State under Sharia law.  Such a state has no room for freedom of religion for anyone other than Muslims. Either way, Turkish Christians are living, once again, on borrowed time.

The wild card in all of this is how events will be perceived by Iran, the United States and the European Union. Given the increasingly remote chance that Turkey will achieve membership in the European Union and the likelihood of a precipitous American withdrawal from Iraq, all the pieces are in place for a Turkish thrust toward the oil wells of Kirkuk. The Turks have the military assets needed to achieve this objective.  The possibility of a widening civil war and the eventual partition of the country may cause the United States to move into Iraqi Kurdistan to maintain a presence.  Are the Turks willing to take on the Kurds and the Americans?  Are they willing to  form an alliance with Iran? 

One thing is for sure in this equation, Turkey is part of the problem, not part of the solution.

Comments

[Ted Laskaris]

Stavros,
Thanks for the link. Since you mentioned the Ecumenical Patriarchate, recent intelligence has repeatedly warned of plots to burn the place down and cause the Patriarch to flee. Needless to say, these plotters (both Islamists and supra-nationalists) do not give a hoot about what America and/or eunuch Europe are going to say or do re. the destruction of the locus of Eastern Orthodoxy. As the conflict between the army and Erdogan heats up, we should expect nasty surprises. Turkey is slowly but irrevocably approaching a showdown that won't pass before one of the opponents is completely disabled. It's going to be a bloody mess. Even worse, the army is rapidly arriving at the point of no return: they have come to believe they can fight and win the "two wars" -- one inside the country and one outside it against the Kurds and the Americans. These are dark times indeed.

[Stavros]

Ted,

I will be linking to other posts on your blog(s) as I take small bites at it. It has not disappointed me and I rather like the variety.

I have written previously about the growing threat posed by Turkish Deep State and its designs on the Christian and Armenian Patriarchs here:

http://greekodyssey.typepad.com/my_greek_odyssey/2007/03/the_turkish_dee.html

Once they are eliminated the last vestige of Christianity in Turkey will be expunged and even the illusion of religious tolerance will no longer be necessary.

[Peter]

As long as there is a Turkey, a victorious post WW1 Turkey, there will always be gathering storms.

By a rare quirck of fate the turks, having sided , fought, and lost together with the entente forces,are an egregiously unique example of how to lose a war and emerge victorious. Whislt the entente forces were smothered into dust, monarchies deposed, territories truncated, patched up babel nations created, the fortunate turks under the leadership of a homosexual, transvestite, masonic, salonican jew, Ataturk, carved and crafted a fantastic piece of real estate with turks and for turks. The masonic troika of Enver, Talaat and Evid, carried out the most successful ethnic cleansing in history. Uprooting, erradicating and exterminating a 3000 year old race of armenians from their ancestral homes is no mean achievement, even in war time conditions. This successful surgical intervention of ethnicide ( which puts the inept and bumbling germans into the shade, which failed even to deport their own alien jews from their own homeland)was followed with the routing of the greek national forces and the erradication of all greek presence and settlements on the eastern mediteranean coast. Former greek byzantine settlements were wiped out without any recourse to legality or justice. Might is right.
This does not make any sense, turkey loses the war,commits crimes of unspeakable nature, disposes of its old garb as ottoman, cleanses itself of the christians upon whose ancestral lands he is now permanently occupying, and emerges as the new secular and modern turkey. Accepted and admired by all european castrati and western nations.

Whatever happens in turkey, whether it implodes or explodes, it is of concern to greece. The downside it is that the present nomenclature is unfit , unprepared, and unsuitable to deal with the potential oportunities that such a cataclysm in neighboring mongoland might offer.

If turkey were to implode it is doubtful whether the states that nurture historical grievances ( greece,armenia,syria,iran)are in a postion to take a profit from its disintegration. The Kurds might create some hullaballo, but turkey can deal with them effectively.
The gravest consequences for greece, stemming out of a conflict in that region will arise from the "invasion armada" of a tsunami of refugees, escapees, stragglers, smugglers, and other flotsam which will pour out from the region and whose first port of call will be greece. It will resemble the second fall of constantinople.

The government does not have the capacity, the will nor the wherewithal to manage a disaster of such proportions.

As for christian vestiges in turkey, they are few and far in between. The greek and armenian patriarchates can be dispensed with a wave of the hand by the turk government if they wish to do so. The few greeks and armenians remaining in the main towns in western turkey, are cowed into submission and live timidly and unobstrusively, their only sustaining backbone is their businesses and material assets which helps them lead a life of contented captives. Both patriarchates pay lip service and are unashamedely subservient to turkey. They will run away , one day, when the turk tires of them, but they will be surprised when the flleing day arrives, and running west into greece they come up to a welcoming string of mosques and the ululuations of the imam on duty , in a land they imagined to have been a bastion and sanctuary of orthodoxy.

[Stavros]

Peter,

Your rendition of Turkey's emergence from the ashes of defeat is spot on. Say what you will about Ataturk, it was quite an accomplishment. I have no doubt that whatever happens, Turkey will still be a formidable dangerous entity. Even if the secularists win they have shown on countless occasions that they don't have what it takes to build a truly democratic, peaceful nation.

Most of the possible scenarios for the future are grim and I don't think anyone, especially Greece is ready.

[Hermes]

The Greeks should have been preparing for this for the last 50 years. But no, we were raising the placards of Che Guevara - the great 1821 revolutionary fighter of the proletariat! These Golden Opportunities only come every 100 years or so. Another missed opportunity brought on by bumbling sycophantic spoilt children of energetic politicians of yesteryear when Greece used to dream of the Megali Idea.

[Kirk]

"... the fortunate turks under the leadership of a homosexual, transvestite, masonic, salonican jew, Ataturk, carved and crafted a fantastic piece of real estate with turks and for turks."...

And how would you know that Peter? That he was a homosexual and transvestite?

You're pathetic.

[kosta]

Turkey has no chance of becoming a regional superpower.

[Stavros]

Read and heed:

http://www.rieas.gr/research-areas/global-issues/greek-studies-gr/1672-turkey-as-a-regional-power-neo-ottomanism-in-action.html

[kosta]

Its ridiculous because Turkey has no control or influence over any regional or global economic clearinghouse.

[kosta]

Their economy is mostly a mirage like every other economy or internal economy except the private sector. They dont have a seat at the main private club table and I dont see them becoming main players. In order to becoming a regional superpower you have to control your own clearinghouse, central bank trading and resource bourses etc which I see no indications of. GDP growth doesnt make you a superpower or major world power.

[kosta]

Unless they go "rogue" but that means an entire Cold War ruling clique has to be destroyed and they enter an uncertain path which they probably wont risk.

[kosta]

I see no "indications" that their currents accounts, balance of payments and trade and investment cycles are deviating from the Euro-Atlantic bloc in any siginificant fashion. Their process of "indigenization" is also insignificant. Historically, most powers who have historically been in the Third World and are trying to either "catch up" or take their own path have crashed and burned. The problem with "hysterisis" is that you never catch up to the leader like Achilles and the Toirtoise because the leader has such a great lead on you and can use all kinds of methods to keep you at the back of the track including indirect punishment for trying to sit at his table. At most the Turks could be using it as an attempt mostly to gain concessions from the Euro-Atlantic powers and I doubt their ruling circles want to lose hunior partner status in the political, economic and military organisations of the Euro-Atlantic centres.

[kosta]

Also now that NATO is in Central Asia and possibly moving into the Middle East all the countries between Europe and those regions are canned food including Turkey and whatever they export to those regions they will lose to European, American, Chinese and Russian companies. The benefits of them going rogue against the blocs could be catastrophic and Im sure they know that.

[kosta]

Read here for example,:

http://www.meforum.org/meq/pdfs/3134.pdf

[Stavros]

Kosta,

Apologies for the delay in responding to your comments.Thanks for the link, very interesting article. We can only hope that Turkey's economic situation can curtail her appetite for adventurism. It certainly did not hold Greece back from it's disastrous course in Asia Minor in 1922.

Erdogan and Davutoglou sense an opportunity, Turkey will fill the vacuum left by the US in the eastern Mediterranean.

[kosta]

I doubt the US will be leaving the East Med anytime soon and I doubt even more Turkey can fill any such gap against other NATO states(France, Great Britain etc) and also the Russian Federation, Greece, Cyprus and Israel. Turkey's adventurism may lead to many things including a cascading economic crisis and a sovereign Kurdistan. And Turkey still has serious internal problems that have merely been swept under the rung from the 1960's and onwards.

[Stavros]

Let's hope for the sake of Greece and Cyprus that you are right and I am wrong.

[kosta]

Turkey poses no threat to Greece in the age of lightning long range war, standoff weapons and force multipliers Greece just has to keep the hightech qualitative advantage(a larger navy and air force would be nice although they are more then capable of tangleing with Turkey in the air and sea), develop multiple alliances and reconstruct her economy rapidly in order to clear the table with her enemies.

[kosta]

The recent reorganisation of the Armed Forces is a step in the right direction for lightning war in Thrace the Aegean and Cyprus, although we need more systems and more imaginative organisational structures. The problem is we have to take the diplomatic card out of their hands because they are always using third parties to achieve gains against us(Cyprus etc), or they will prefer to start an incident in an isolated spot that streches our reaction capabilities(Kastellerizo etc). Personally, I have been arguing for the first strike for a long time now in the Aegean.

[kosta]

Greece has a chance to destroy the Turkish Navy twice in 1987 and 1996 but the politicians and diplomats intervene to stop everything. The Turks are merely trying to nibble at the cheddar block but we should just smash them in the entire Aegean Sea once and for all.

[Stavros]

We're sounding rather bellicose today :) Have you ever been in a shooting war? I assure you it is not as easy as you make it sound. Never underestimate the Turks, when Greeks do that disaster soon follows. The last great Greek strategic thinker was Panagiotis Kondylis, who unfortunately died in 1998. He advocated a doctrine in which a first strike was the keystone but only under the right conditions. Greece has no coherent strategic doctrine just as it has no viable economic plan. That is because you need leadership to create both. A war would be disastrous for both countries. How can Greece maintain its qualitative advantage at time when Greeks are lining up for food at soup kitchens.

[kosta]

This is true. First strike should have occured a long time ago.

[Stavros]

I think it is unwise to give Greece a huge advantage in the qualitative sphere as it pertains to its navy and air force. It doesn't take long to run out of missiles and parts and I daresay the Greek military supply system is probably not up to the task of maintaining the momentum needed to sustain operations in an air/sea conflict in the Aegean. Think Argentina. The last time there was a general mobilization during the invasion of Cyprus, it turned into a fiasco. I have great respect for the Greek military based on personal experience, one of the few Greek institutions that functions with a modicum of efficiency. Unfortunately advancement is based on political loyalty rather than professional expertise. One of the reasons for the Asia Minor debacle was the replacement of Venizelist officers by less experienced Monarchists. Old habits die hard.

[kosta]

Alot of what you say is true. Short of a dissolution of NATO(now since NATO is expanding both Greece and Turkey are being put into chicken coops) or a major change in the world system I dont see general war breaking out between Greece and Turkey but the usual incidents in the Aegean and possibly along the borders. The recent building of defensive works along the Thracian border is a step in the right direction. The Turk try to play a war of attrition using nibbling tactics and diplomatic games aided by third parties(think of the role of Kissinger in Cyprus and Holbrooke during the Imia Crisis-when the Turk had no diplomatic card during the Seismik crisis they balked at confrontation for example)to try to attain superior position. So either one has to put up with rounds and cycles of provocations or go to first strike and neither Greece or Turkey have excalated to that level.

[kosta]

And for all their pseudo-patriotism the Right have been the ones who have always implemented the foreign policy of the Great Powers, it was George Papandreou for example who sent the Greek division to Cyprus(withdrawn by the Colonels) and his son Andreas who gained advantage for Greece during the Seismik Crisis. And now its this clown GPAP Jr who has thrown the country into the hands of the World Bank/IMF?ECB/Goldman Sachs and is ready to allow NATO to divide the Aegean for the energy MNC conglomerates and to pasteurize and colonize Greece in the name of Euro-Atlantic golden age plutocracys "Globalisation" project.