On a slightly offbeat track, this latest report from MEMRI on the ongoing attempt by Islamists to drag Turkey, a secular Muslim nation with a democratic tradition, back into those halcyon days of the 7th century. It suffers from being a translation but, if you just stick with it, it gets really fascinating at the end. Apparently, the Turkish military is the major obstacle standing between the democratic Turkey envisioned by Attaturk and the Islamist utopia of severed limbs. Current Chief of Staff Gen. Buyukanit has started sounding the alarm.
The warnings expressed by President Sezer and by Chief of Staff Gen. Buyukanit in their addresses – which came during an official visit by PM Erdogan to the U.S. – seemed to draw the lines between the sides in the controversy about the upcoming election by parliament of a new Turkish president, slated for May 2007. It is expected that PM Erdogan, an Islamist and a former member of the banned Islamist party Erbakan,(2) will be elected – and this would mean the AKP’s capture of the presidency. Secular circles in Turkey fear that if the AKP has both a majority in parliament and the presidency, it will then have the power to change the country’s constitution.
The Islamist press has expressed dismay at these warnings of an Islamic threat in Turkey voiced by President Sezer and Gen. Buyukanit. On the other hand, most of Turkey’s secular press applauded and supported the addresses.
The Turkish military is now the object of a concerted effort to discredit it and place it in the hands of civilian authorities who will ultimately consist of, if all goes as planned, nothing but Islamists. The intent, obviously, is to undermine it and crush it as an opposition force.
The matter on which Büyükanıt did not pull any punches was the increasing level of criticism and pressure on the TSK’s social stature.
He accused the AKP of using the European Union and some nongovernmental organizations such as the Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV) to harm the military and support such dangerous initiatives.
In June of 2006, TESEV released a controversial report ostensibly about “furthering the agenda of democratic and civilian oversight by the country’s security sector.” timed to embarrass the military before an EU progress report. Now, the really fascinating part about the TESEV report, a footnote at the very end:
(11)TESEV, the Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation, is a non-governmental organization sponsored by George Soros.
Not content to bring down the Bush administration with slimey shadow organs like CREW–the vermin who just pulled the dirty trick with Foley–Soros needs to inject some of his billions into Islamicizing the EU.
He forgets that there’s a great chance his own political sympathizers will be among those forced to clean up his mess. I wonder how the Left will feel about his dirty work when the monster gets out of its cage–a monster, not even Soros with his bloody billions can stop? Don’t you remember, George? At the end, Faust is damned.
But, but…George Soros said he was “quitting politics”!!!
Holycrap! That is fascinating. And disturbing. And frightening.
– Yes…yes he did, and he presented as a soft spoken, kindly old gent on FOX the other day. That is until he was asked about dodging American taxes via the use of offshore shell corporations, at which point he went ballistic, immitating the crazy aunt in the attic, and using the famous “Clinton finger-wag of death” on Cavuto.
– Earlier he mentioned being “under” Communist and fascist regimes in Hungry. From the looks of it, and knowing his rabid socialistic bent, “indoctrinated” would be more accurate. He learned his Nazi lessons well. The man is a cockroach.
And now that Heroes is over, I did a couple of quick searches on Soros and Turkey. Surprise, surprise, not many English pages.
So much for his Open Society and access to information.
This really is fascinating, ahem.
– The only “open” society Soros and his ilk are interested in, are graft filled totalitarian regimes he and his merry gang of international scam artists can pillage through kickbacks.
– I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find he’s involved in some of the money movement and laundering concerning international drug sources, and Jihadist funding. Unfortunately, if there’s a known connection, the Bush admin. probably can’t expose him for want of tipping off his customers. Pity. Wouldn’t that be a feather in the Lefts political cap. Come to think of it, the perfect Rovian October surprise:
“Major Democratic donor Exposed as international drug money source. Soros claims its a political smear”
You know, I have always viewed him as a rabid Bush hater, and so I quickly quit reading. Apparently I’ve missed alot. I’m just reading up.
I had no idea he was involved so much internationally.
Needs to be said twice.
There are no free-market “capitalists.”
Come to think of it, can anyone think of a lefty icon who’s not a living Marx villain?
I don’t mean a name cleansed of its human referent and made a slogan, like “Mumia” or “Leonard Peltier”â€â€I mean someone they actually acknowledge as human.
Y’know, a rich white guy.
I can’t name one.
The Turkish military has time and again taken over when it felt things were getting out of hand. I don’t doubt that if the government goes Islamist then there will be a coup and a number of dead Islamist leaders followed by a martial law, sweeping arrests and all the rest of the fun stuff from a military takeover.
Mikey: I agree. It’s a matter of time.
Interesting how it is the Turkish Military that stands in the way of Islamization. Could this be a weakness in the Islamic tradition? Perhaps exploitable by us in Iraq/Afghanistan? Military rule/no check by civilians is considered terribly dangerous in our western tradition; but could it open a door through which Iraq and Afghanistan could be checked against Islamization?
Four branches system? Who knows. Just thinking aloud here.
‘course, if Soros, that old louse, is successful, it might mean that my idea is completely moot.
Sad thing is that Soros wasn’t always this far around the bend. He seemed genuinely interested in freedom back in the day.
Mikey beat me to the punch – Turkish generals still see themselves as Attaturk’s heirs. They probably wouldn’t go quietly into the political wilderness.
River – Afghanistan had its fill of “Islamization”. They are not really under threat of that, as much as other, more regional and ethnic centripital forces. That and having Pakistan as a neighbor…
Major John: What do you hear about Pakistan ceding entire provinces to the Taliban?