Something big will happen in Turkey soon.

"Erdogan was always a loose cannon. Now he has become unmoored. Paranoia is endemic in Turkish politics because so much of it is founded on conspiracy. The expression "paranoid Turk" is a pleonasm. Islamist followers of the self-styled prophet Fetullah Gulen infiltrated the security services and helped Erdogan jail some of the country's top military commanders on dubious allegations of a coup plot. Last August a Turkish court sentenced some 275 alleged members of the "Ergenekon" coup plot, including dozens of military officers, journalists, and secular leaders of civil society. Now Gulen has broken with Erdogan and his security apparatus has uncovered massive documentation of corruption in the Erdogan administration. Erdogan is firing police and security officials as fast as they arrest his cronies. There is a world difference, though, between a prosperous paranoid and an impecunious one. Turkey cannot fund its enormous current borrowing needs without offering interest rates so high that they will pop the construction-and-consumer bubble that masqueraded for a Turkish economic miracle during the past few years."  Asia Times

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There is something deeply disturbing about the situation in Turkey.  I have the feeling that some catastrophic event waits for the moment of its appearance.  I would very much like to hear from the Turks who read and comment on this forum as to their views concerning the immediate future in their country.  pl    

http://atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-01-050214.html

Comments

[b]

Ten years of credit fueled bubble are coming to an end. The falling Lira has made energy 30% more expensive over the last few weeks. The state is still covering that though. But after the local elections in March the game is over and prices will rise much faster. While the lower Lira helps exporters they also depend on imports of foreign products. The current spat with Bulgaria that hampers fright traffic to Europe makes that even more difficult. Erdogan will soon have high inflation and high unemployment. Not a good position to win elections.

But what "catastrophic event" could happen and for what purpose?

And why is ISIS systematically capturing all border posts between Syria and Turkey? What are their plans for Turkey?

[toto]

Sir,

I'm impressed at the remarkable equanimity of Turkish democracy: apparently the state has been infiltrated by Nationalists AND Islamists AND Gulenists! How can you get more pluralistic than that?!

[William R. Cumming]

I agree with PL! Time will tell! Not much time no doubt!

[Charles I]

Well til then I learned a new word of which I am guilty over and over and over. Thanks

[Matthew]

toto: I noticed that too. So I'm confused: if the Gulenists manufactered cases against the military over the last 10 years, what faith do we have that they aren't manufacturing cases against Erdogan now?

[turcopolier]

Charles I

Is there an analogous organization in Canada to the Sons of the American Revolution or Descendants or Mayflower colonists? pl

[ISL]

All: From economonitor.com, Nouriel Roubini's site, the Fed's tapering of Quantitative Easing is going to bring the easy money rushing home from the developing economies, squeezing them hard. In such a situation, instability if unlikely to persist for long without blowing up one way or another.

That noted, I hope the Fed remains concerned about the US economy - no one forced countries like Turkey to get hooked on cheap credit, so . . .

[Bandolero]

All

I think the most important part of that column are the words:

"Spengler is channeled by David P Goldman. He is Senior Fellow at the London Center for Policy Research and Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum"

The Middle East Forum is headed by Daniel Pipes, undoubtedly "a good friend" of Israel.

I find that important. What's currently going on in Turkey I would describe as a fight between Brother Erdogan and the Gülen organisation of "friends of Israel." After the war against Syria is lost and Russia and China outmaneuvered Turkey in the Caucasus and Central Asia, the break points of the alliance of the Turkish brothers and the Turkish "friends of Israel" seem to go front stage. The strength of the "friends of Israel" of course is Wall Street, while the strength of Erdogan and his brothers is the Turkish street.

About what's at stake I think is the future direction of Turkey. Will Turkey continue to be a "Green Belt" proxy of the US and Israel or will Turkey go to the Shanghai 5, as Brother Erdogan would like it to have? FD-2000 could be the beginning of a new direction in Turkey, and Israel won't like it.

Because a lot is at stake I guess both sides fight with heavy punches under the belt.

[Alba Etie]

b -
What also is new; if not odd is that Turkey is either already buying, (or about to purchase big ticket items) from the PRC military - such as a non NATO compatible ABM system . Could this be a diplomatic head fake - or something more..

[Bandolero]

b

I think ISIS is systematically capturing all border posts between Syria and Turkey because ISIS sees an "infidel" (not my view, but I believe it's theirs) NATO-GCC threat is coming from Turkey.

[bth]

I'd also look at the high costs of fuel which impact current account deficits in EM countries. Turkey had the highest gasoline prices I had ever seen. Argentina imports heavily, so does India, China and due to nuclear problems Japan. Ukraine imports NG heavily. I'd like to point out that EM market weakness is about the sustained expense of imported fuel.

[confusedponderer]

Erdogan's people have introduced a bill into parliament that would allow the Turkish telecom authority to block down web sites without a court order.

[William R. Cumming]

Did I mention that earthquakes and water availability make Turkey tough to govern in any case?

[Tyler]

Steve Sailer over at isteve.blogspot.com had a pretty indepth series of articles on Turkey and the Gulenist movement, and how it looks like its infiltrated America in some ways as well. Definitely worth a look.

[Charles I]

Without looking it up, and more fully understanding the S.A.R or the D.M.C's, I don't think specifically so. Our history I dimly recall refers to the Family Compact that ruled Upper Canada, now Ontario, long ago. There are still all sorts of Catholic and Protestant lodges and that sort of thing now devoted to Good Works. I know a lot of charitable Masons, and in Canada at least, the Masons are still infused with a lot of Englishmen.

I will look into this shameful lack of knowledge or recall, but I have to read F.B.'s book first.

A lot of our patriotic history as both Dominion and constitutional parliamentary democracy was so over laid and intertwined with Empire and Commonwealth that separate independent truly Canadian patriotism was likely viewed as seditious for a long time. Regional, Native or Linguistic patriots pre-Canada, sometimes compounded of all three as with Louis Riel, were anti-Empire terrorists. The British won out and made a British linguistically divided country.

Today, and for a good long while, and out of ignorance, I would count the Canadian Legion, which is our independent Veteran's organization as such an organization.

We love our vets, who are currently the subject of a sh*tstorm up here due to the government's shoddy treatment of them. It may affect the next election.

Legions - bars/community centers - in every community, struggling with changing demographics and tough economies. As I think of the Legion centrally Located in Bala where I live, to me, and I'm certain, to many informed and ignorant alike, they and our Vets are the singularly analogous organization.

The Conservative government is currently trying to cash in on manufactured patriotism selling n an Empirephilic interpretation of wars rather than the vets as embodiment and focus of our sentiment. History, unlike vets, seems cheap and malleable.

Thank you for making me think of all this. I'll look into it.

[Peter Brownlee]

I have been wondering for some time how Erdogan's attempts at gross desecularization will square with the near-universal adulation and celebration of Atatürk -- whose revolution (and personality and lifestyle) modes of was explicitly secular and Western in focus.

Telcos now will have to retain all comms records for two years I think.

Coup, anyone?

[William Fitzgerald]

Pat Lang,

The United Empire Loyalists are descendants of Americans who supported the crown during the revolution and afterward emigrated to what is now Canada, settling mainly in the Maritimes and Upper Canada. They would be analogous to their distant cousin of the Sons and Daughters of The American Revolution. There is also a society of descendants of the early settlers of New France who would be equivalent to Mayflower descendants.

WPFIII

[Thomas]

That Kunuri and Ishmael Zechariaih have still not commented is another worrying part.

Could the catastrophic event be a civil war between the AKP and Gulenists already quietly underway?

[turcopolier]

Thomas

Their silence worries me as well. pl

[Ishmael Zechariah]

Colonel Lang, SST;

Sorry about the radio silence. There is nothing to worry about; Turkey is reasonably calm. The tayyip government is now trying to control the net but they will have a hard time. I will try to write a summary of what is going on by tomorrow. COl. Lang is right: things are fixing to blow and when they do, it will be interesting.

Respects,

Ishmael Zechariah

[Ishmael Zechariah]

SST,

I apologize for this late response. Colonel Lang is quite right. Turkey is undergoing perilous times and the situation can turn kinetic quite rapidly. The AsiaTimes article is actually an optimistic take on the issue. Following the raids on the houses of some ministers/their sons where millions of (undocumented) dollars were found, the followers of the gulen nurcu movement are being purged from the police, municipal government and judiciary posts that they have been occupying for the last 10 years. They, in turn, are publishing and posting details of corruption in the tayyip circles. His children, his ministers, MPs, the whole lot, are clearly implicated and the issues cannot be denied. Rather than trying to defend the indefensible, the tayyip government is trying to stop these documents from circulating by imposing bans on the media and, now, on the internet. Whether these will work and get tayyip past the upcoming election is an open question. In the cities tayyip & co. have lost their moral authority and most -including a lot of tayyip’s ex-supporters- do not trust the police or the prosecutors. The opposition parties are extremely ineffective; they are, actually, part of the problem. The sheeple, say about 40% of the population, may still vote for tayyip; his supporters are distributing coal, food, appliances, etc. in the ghettos surrounding the cities. The elections are not going to solve any of the structural issues that the country is facing; tayyip needs to find money and find it fast. This is unlikely. In addition, there is a drought in the most fertile farming regions which may put significant pressure on staple food supplies in as little as four months. The population is calm at this point, but things are moving. A very small event can trigger a very large explosion. In my opinion Turkey’s problems cannot be solved without serious societal conflict. Events like these demonstrate the wisdom of having the means of defending one’s own, independent of any regime which might be in power.

Ishmael Zechariah

[Kunuri]

Sorry all, I have been been working on location. Will comment as soon as I unpack.

[Kunuri]

Something big has already happened in Turkey, the arrests of December 17 has put into motion events that would change the course of politics in years to come.

First of all, the AKP government is exposed. The scandals and lies has not yet trickled down to hapless masses who vote for him consistently, but it is happening. Secondly, it has unified the secular opposition and caused the in betweener neo liberals to reconsider their support.

Thirdly, the rift between the Tayyiban and the Gulenistas has destroyed the Justice system so completely that all court cases maybe retired going back 12 years.

I get my best information from the taxi drivers, at worst, three years ago the support for AKP government was unshaken, the trust in their ability to get things done, the stability they brought, and implicitly the glee they felt in finally being free to practice their religion without the fear of the Army. Now it seems they are not so sure which may manifest itself in AKP supporters staying at home in the upcoming nationwide municipal elections and handing AKP their first real set back at the polls.

Things are stable enough on street level, but so much is happening all at once, journalists and news outlets are complaining about not being able to keep up.

But the most worrying of all, is the revelations of AKP support for ultra Islamists in Syria and implicit Al Kaida support coupled with the very credible allegations of bypassing the ambargo on Iran. RTE maybe stepping on some very big toes.

[Kunuri]

Thanks Ishmael Zechariah, this is a very accurate sum-up, I had in plans writing up something similar, though I could not possibly hope to match your eloquent prose here.

[Kunuri]

Not really, people just ignore the possibility of an earthquake and the possibility of drought, as long as Minister of Agriculture organizes large rain prayer events. Yes, he does-why worry about water.