Bulletin de liaison et d'information - Institut kurde de Paris

Revue de Presse-Press Review-Berhevoka
Çapê-Rivista Stampa-Dentro de la Prensa-Basm Özeti
Turkey's Generals Face Ne'U)Kin4of_
. .
.Challenger: The .EU
By Richard Boudrèaux
Lost Angeles Times Service
balked at complying, the commanders
oréhestrated, a campaign by pro-secular
business, labor and women's groupsbacked
with threats of armed intervention
- that forced Mr. Erbakan to resign .
The armed' forces have powers, privileges
and obsessions that would be un-
ANKARA - At home and in their
troubled neighborhood, which includes
the Balkans, the Caucasus mountain
.range and the. Middle East, the generals
of Turkeyare accustomed to getting
theirway.
In the past three years, they have rid
their nation of an Islamist-Ied government,
crushed a Kurdish separatist insurgency,
dissuaded Greek Cypriots
from deploying Russian-made missiles
against Turkish planes, forged a defense
pact with Israel and begun a shopping
spree for tanks and attack helicopters.
. Threats to Turkey's security, by their
. own assessment, are at the lowest point
in decades.
Now the commanders of NATO's
second-largest conventional, military
force are staring uneasily at a most unconventional
challenger: the European
Union. Europe's leaders have accepted.
Turkeyas a candidate for membership in
the EU and now expect Turkey' s military
to give up the powerful role it has played
for 76 years as self-appointed guardian
of the republic's internal order.
That is a demotion the commanders
are clt~arly reluctant to accept.
Arguing that Turkey' s elected civilian
leaders are often lax in dealing with
Kurdish separatists and Islamic' fundamentalists,
the military exercises broad
constitutional authority to intrude in the
governance of this mostly Muslim nation.
In view ofTurkey's strategic value,
its strongest ally, the United States, has
tolerated much of this meddling. Euro-
, peans, however, want it stopped.
Negotiations over Turkey's entry to
the EU are expected to last for years and
cover thousands of laws and regulations
on i~sues ranging from child labor to the
. size of bananas. But of all the changes
. the EU is seeking, none would transform
Turkey as deeply as the generals' submission
to civilian control.
That prospect has energized Turkey's
beleaguered advocates of democracy
and human rights, who contend that the
military must surrender its Big Brother
role to join the EU.
. "There should be a revision of the
, entire security doctrine, the deployment
and the structure of the armed forces of
Turkey, whose territorial integrity can
be placed under' European guarantee,"
Cengiz Candar, a columnist persecuted
in the past for challenging the military,
wrOte recently in the mass-circulation
Istanbul newspaper Sabah.
Publicly, the generals say they sup-
. port EU membership beç:ause it would
, fulfill the secular, European-oriented vi-
.sion of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the gen-
eral who founded the army ànd the TurK- ,
ish republic on the Ottoman Empire's
ruins. More practically, they do not want
to be excluded as Europe forms defense
organizations independent of the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization.
But only in recent weeks have the
generals begun a detailed study of how
they might be affected by the EU imperative
that aspiring members achieve
"stability of institutions guaranteeing
democracy, the rule of law, human rights
and respect for minorities. " .
Signs of irritation and resistance have
surfaced in comments by senior officers
and in a memo by the general staff to rankand-file
units just before the EU voted in
December to make Turkey a candidate .
The memo focused on two membership
conditions often spelled out by European
leaders: that Turkey abolish its mil- .
itary-dominated National Security Council
and that it subordinate the general staff
to the civilian Defense Ministry.
"These efforts to change the administrative
structure of Turkey ," the memo
said, "result either from an ignorance of
history or, worse, a desire to unjustly
attack and weaken the Turkish armed
forces." .
Turkey has been under direct military
rule three times since 1960. Before withdrawing
for the third time, in 1983, the
generals wrote a constitution enhancing
their power to govern from behind the
scenes.
In the military's view, "practically
:e.v~rything in public life is related to
nlltional security," said a civilian who
:works in the National Security Council' s
policy planning center and likens it to a
parallel government. "Everything must
be seCure." . .
.Control of the planning operation
'gives the armed forces the upper hand in
decision-ml,lking by the Security Council
its~lf, which is made up of the president,
four senior cabinet ministers and the five
top military commanders. "The military
alwayS comes better prepared ,than the .
civilians and takes the initiative," said a
retired army general, Dogan Gures, who
'is a.former council member. .
" Some of the military's initiatives are
ultimatums.
,_.In 1997, the commanders used the
Security Council's monthly meetings to
badger Neemettii1 Erbakan, the nation's
fIrst Islamist prime minister, into agreeing
to curb MUlllimreligious schools and'
foundations. When the government-
Presslink
Kemal Ataturk, the officerwho
founded modern Turkeyafter the
fall of the Ottoman Empire.
thinkable in the democracies of Europe.
They report to the prime minister, not
the defense minister - and they once
attacked Kurdish rebel bases in Iraq with-
. out telling either minister. They take 9
percent of the national budget without a
word of debate in Parliament and spend
without civilian oversight. They cç>ntrol
arms procurement, much of it from defense
companies they own, and have extensive
holdings in Turkey's automotive,
cement, food and chemical industries.
Senior officers lobby quietly to maintain
laws curbing free expression and
encourage prosecutors to open criminal
cases against those who challenge the
military's views. .
A general once demanded that an
Istanbul soccer club take disciplinary
action against its British coach, who had
protested ..the army's conscription of a
star player. The club and the coach made
a public apology.
A Turkish officer's swagger comes
with. his training and is sustained by
genuine respect from most of this society.
From age 14, military school cadets
are taught that they are superior to
civilians, especially in understanding the
national interest.
"They teach you to obey the rules of
democracy as long as there is stability in
the country," said a retired air force
lieutenant colonel, Metehan Demir.
"But they also teach that if there is
instability, you have a special duty to
intervene. "
T,he anti-militarist sentiment prevalent
10 much of Western Europe is weak
in Turkey, where politicians are held in
low esteem. But the military was widely
criticized for a sluggish search-and-rescue
effort after a magnitude 7.4 earthquake
last August. .
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