ANKARA—For weeks, the main shopping areas of Turkey’s capital city have been eerily vacant. On October 29, the U.S. government advised family members of embassy staff to leave the country, while other nations sent out warnings, recommending their citizens avoid streets with high foot traffic throughout the month of December, in response to intelligence indicating a likely attack by the Islamic State. With two bombings and one assassination over the past ten days, everyone expected an attack of some sort in Ankara. But few would have predicted the form it would take, when, on Monday night, a 22-year-old police officer named Melvut Mert Altintas gunned down Andrey Karlov, Russia’s ambassador to Turkey. “God is great!” he shouted in Arabic, and “Don’t forget Aleppo, don’t forget Syria!” in Turkish, as he stood over Karlov’s motionless body.
For months, Turkey has been unraveling. Shortly after the attempted coup of July 15, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government announced a state of emergency to remove any lingering threats from supporters of Fethullah Gulen, the exiled religious and political leader who the state blames for orchestrating the failed putsch, as well as people affiliated with the Kurdish movement. Mass purges touched nearly all job sectors, with education and the state judicial system taking the biggest hits. Anyone suspected of a crime could be held for 30 days without charge in detention centers where inmates are reportedly being tortured.
Even the most mundane rituals changed. An extra security check was installed in airports, just after the second set of x-ray machines, where Turkish citizens—as opposed to foreigners—are closely monitored. In the corners of once-bustling restaurants, the prospect of civil war with the Kurds is a common topic of discussion; the slowing economy is another, as the Turkish lira breaks its own record lows against the U.S. dollar from one week to the next. A vacuum salesman told me he no longer made a profit at the current exchange rate; a wine seller said he’s on the verge of closing his shop.
Erdogan’s intervention in Syria, meanwhile, brought Turkey to the front lines in the war against ISIS, whose militants benefited from Turkey’s loose border controls. And the Turkish state remains a target for several guerilla networks operating within its borders.
While the full impact of Karlov’s assassination remains to be seen, the fact that Altintas was a police officer may suggest that the state can no longer contain the many groups swirling amid the chaos. Altintas was a staunch supporter of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), and a graduate of Erdogan’s restructured school system, which put more emphasis on Islam in a move away from secular Kemalist tradition. Following the assassination, state media reported Altintas had links to Gulen; some accounts on social media alleged he had ties to the Kurds.
When I asked Turkish officials how the security situation might change after the assassination, few could come up with an answer. The state of emergency has already given the government the power to search and detain suspects without evidence. Despite the widespread use of traffic stops and road-side car searches, suicide bombers still managed to slip through checkpoints, making their way to what was thought to be one of the most secure parts of Istanbul, just outside the Besiktas soccer stadium. In addition, the police detained 290 members of the pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) in connection with a bombing in Istanbul on December 10, even though the attack was claimed by an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party. It is difficult to imagine how much further the state could expand its crackdown.
Few expect Monday’s events to result in a conflict with Russia. The two countries have begun to patch up their relationship following the November 2015 downing of a Russian jet by Turkish forces after it flew into the country’s airspace, and have vowed to work together to end the war in Syria and to conduct a joint investigation into Karlov’s death.
On the way back from the scene of the assassination, my driver and I discussed the night’s events. He boasted about Turkey’s 80 million citizens, the strength of the military, and how everyone was united under the Erdogan’s leadership. As the country enters an uncertain new year, some, it seems, do not lack for confidence. “Russia is not a great country like Turkey,” he said. “We can win a war against them. We can win a war against anyone.”
I loved Turkey when I lived there, but it seems to be changing rapidly and not for the better. Since the EU told Turkey it had to change their constitution to be more inclusive, then thumbed their nose at Turkey when they did......they are complicit in this. The country has been on a downward spiral since Erdogan gained power and is dragging the country towards an Islamic Republic. Sad to see.
Sorry, I forgot the source .
Seems that the article is pretty much right on.
Turkey has turned into a dictatorship, and seems to be headed deeper into that territory. The various factions are numerous and there are splinter groups within each faction. All the factions are armed and very dangerous. I assume that is why Erdogan needs to be in complete control.
The situation with Russia brings up an interesting point. If Turkey is headed toward being an Islamic state, and Russia already has problems in that regard, what will Russia do or not do?
With Turkey controlling the straights from the Med to the Black Sea, will Russian push back since it is their only outlet for the Russian navy.
Well, right now it appears that Russia is content to work with the Turks, but we all know that could change at any moment.
Ergodan, is over the top though on his crackdown, but one does have to understand the political vise he is in. Does he want to get pulled into the radical Muslim war just to the south, or allow dissident operatives within his own government push him into conflict with Russia.
Add into the mix that Turkey is a full member of Nato...... which makes any real military cooperation with Russia moot.
But then again Turkey does not like the eurocentric nature of Nato either, their main goal of being in Nato is full integration with the US defense system which stemmed from the Juno nuclear missile batteries we had stationed there on Russia's southern border into the 60's. (which was the prompting for the Cuban missile crisis, and subsequent withdrawal of said missiles by Kennedy)
Add on top of this the Kurds and their desire for at least autonomy if not outright independence.
I think Ergodan needs to be very careful that forces beyond his control don't push him into becoming an autocratic dictator.
It's pretty easy to become one in that part of the world I'm told...
This is a complicated game. Turkey hates Assad (in Syria) and wants to remove him. Obama agrees with Turkey. Russia wants just the opposite. Obama and others want to arm the Kurds in Syria to fight Assad but Turkey sees the Kurds as a threat. Turkey and Russia both hate the cleric Fethullah Gulen. Gullen's followers may have been behind the attempted coup against Erdogan. We, however, have essentially given him haven in Pennsylvania. Obama needs Turkish bases to carry out airstikes in Syria against ISIS. Putin is clearly making a pitch for Turkey while Obama basically does nothing.
Putin's ploy to lure Turkey toward Russia will potentially limit Trump's options in Syria (if Trump chooses to get involved at all). That expands the Russian footprint in the region from Turkey to Iran and Iran is (or will be) aligned with Iraq because they are both Shia. It would also give Russian ships unimpeded access to the Black Sea and its expanded permanent base in Tartus, on the coast of Syria. With a naval base in Tartus, Russia is in a much better position to project power into the Mediterranean and the Middle East. Putin is a much better player than Obama (who's now out of time) and he's trying to stack the deck against Trump (who seems clueless at the moment).
The military in Turkey once had the power to enforce constitutional law-if a politician broke the rule of law, the Army would arrest and imprison them. That's how their government worked form the 1920s to into the 21st century. It kept fundamentalism out of the government and allowed the citizens to live their lives. Now, with Erdogan and his party in power, those freedoms are disappearing and religion is creeping into government and being forced on the citizenry. If you think of the modern progress in Iran that was reversed under Khomeini, think of how 90+ years of progress are heading backwards to the dark ages of Islam.....