Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: The E on July 15, 2016, 04:54:26 pm
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Jesus Christ, 2016, could you chill it with the large, tragic news events?
In any case, a couple hours ago, the military seized control of Istanbul and the turkish government. Martial law has been declared, the social internet has been largely shut down, and President Erdogan is calling for the populace to rise up in resistance.
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... this may get ugly.
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On one hand, we have a large, anti-democratic, strongman-theory governmental organization who will only use this incident to cement their own powerbase.
On the other, we have the Turkish military.
To misquote Ken White from Popehat: "The best way not to feel nauseated when you analyze a...issue is to assume everyone involved is going to be an asshole." Right now I'm not sure there is a clearly lesser evil in play in this situation.
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About time, Edrogan is a pro-Shaira asshole, nice to see the army step in on Ataturk's side.
EDIT: before anyone is angry at me: Yes, I know the military does not have a nice record of running things smoothly, but the alternative with Edrogan in charge is much worse.
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Why is it that everyone is recently ending up with having to chose between a rock and a hard place? Really, if it keeps going like that, people will be reading The Witcher stories, see all the dilemmas about choosing lesser evil and the like, then wonder what options there used to be besides greater and lesser evil.
TBH, I'm not sure about on that one. Probably with the military, funnily enough, juntas have proven themselves decent at keeping religious nuts at bay (in Egypt, for instance). So this might be just what Turkey needs. On the other hand, given what's happening at its borders, internal discord is just about the last thing it needs. For all we know, this whole mess might end with Russians moving in (they're not exactly on good terms with Turkey right now). Or with ISIS moving in. Or both moving in and turning the country into a wasteland. I don't know who will win this, but I'm sure that, as always, ordinary Turks will lose, no matter what.
Either way, it's not gonna be over anytime soon. It's another one of those events which create fallout that we'll have to deal with for the next decade or so.
Jesus Christ, 2016, could you chill it with the large, tragic news events?
There's more of that where what came from, I'm afraid. It seems that the post-Cold War order of the world from the early 2000s is crumbling and we're headed straight for an event that will later mark a boundary of the current historical period. It's still a bit early to speculate, but I'm more and more certain we're at the end of an era. Shame, for a while it seemed that all that idealism could have worked.
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The Turkish military has a long history of kicking Islamists out of office to preserve Ataturk's reforms.
Also, shame on Erdogan for goading civilians into getting involved in a military confrontation.
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Worst case scenario: Erdogan - who has been ever so *rational* lately - remains in power and somehow gets the idea that powers abroad (Germany, Russia, EU, your pick) were *really* behind the coup. Then sh** really hits the fan.
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I think he already blamed America earlier.
Soldiers who are surrendering rather than fire on civilians are being murdered by said civilians. It's not looking good for the coup.
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Well, with the terror attack in France and now this, it's been a rather "interesting" week...
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The Turkish military has a long history of kicking Islamists out of office to preserve Ataturk's reforms.
Indeed, which is why this isn't too much of a concern. I'm more worried about the implications for the conflict in Syria. It doesn't seem that all of the military is onboard with the coup. I hope it won't end up evolving into a civil war. That said, now that I look at it, there's a (however slim) chance that it'll end up handled in a "civilized" way, with relatively little disruption. Turkish military had managed that in the past.
Of course, if Erdogan manages to survive that... all bets are off. I don't think he will, though.
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The Turkish military has a long history of kicking Islamists out of office to preserve Ataturk's reforms.
The fact they did it more than once and are attempting to do it again kind of argues that the problem is beyond one they're able to solve simply by changing the government. The military doesn't seem to have changed or accomplished anything if they just have to keep doing it; apparently people are still electing them to public office. Or worse the people the military installs are also on the Islamic supremacy train.
Besides, as we've recently seen with Egypt, the military's intervention against Islamic supremacist governments has not necessarily been helpful to the country. Egypt's not really better off at the moment for its own coup.
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And by all indications, the coup has failed: Erdogan and his loyalists have taken back Istanbul, and they're busy purging the state of disloyal elements; the military and judiciary are being decimated, and they're making noises about reintroducing the death penalty. Meanwhile, a group of soldiers took a Blackhawk to Greece and have asked for asylum there; that is surely going to be good news for Greece/Turkey relations.
As much bad news as a military coup usually is, the fact that it failed will make the situation in Turkey even more troubling for the people living there.
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Somewhat romantic about military coups myself, because my country benefited from the last one immensely.
But that is totally not the norm.
It appears however that, on the long run, this will probably be seen as the last gasp of secularist intervention on what is increasingly an full islamisation of Turkey, which in one decade or so will probably look a lot more like Iran than anything else.
Which is disturbing in itself, this notion that europe will soon share borders with a theocratic authoritarian insane government.
Autocracy is winning around the world. And I can't see the west doing anything about it. It's as if the so-called Western Empire no longer cares about being able to deal the cards. And while some anarchists might cheer at this, when they realise what will substitute this Pax Americana, they will ask themselves "What the hell has happened to the world?".
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Autocracy is winning around the world. And I can't see the west doing anything about it. It's as if the so-called Western Empire no longer cares about being able to deal the cards. And while some anarchists might cheer at this, when they realise what will substitute this Pax Americana, they will ask themselves "What the hell has happened to the world?".
"But we did stop the flow of refugees!"
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Although, to be fair, I don't really see what the european powers *can* do that Erdogan's regime will not take as an excuse to escalate the situation further. Aside from that appalling refugee deal (Which has done nothing to stop the rising death toll in the mediterenean crossings) Turkey is already going further and further away from EU acceptance.
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Well, gather the bricks, it's time to build a GREAT WALL. That will surely solve all our problems.
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Autocracy is winning around the world. And I can't see the west doing anything about it. It's as if the so-called Western Empire no longer cares about being able to deal the cards. And while some anarchists might cheer at this, when they realise what will substitute this Pax Americana, they will ask themselves "What the hell has happened to the world?".
Well, I've got an answer to that. :) One that I've been preaching for the last few years or so. People in the West got so used to being able to deal cards that they now take it for granted. The "Western Empire" only lasted as long as it did with its democratic ideas because it was backed by the US, united by the fear of Soviet Union. After USSR fell, this pressure was gone. European countries are too weak and indecisive to stand on their own, and too bogged down in arguments and nationalism to stand together. These are though times and people aren't smart enough to recognize harsh measures that might be needed (they never were, to be fair), while democratic politicians are unwilling to take those measures, because it'd decrease their chance at staying in power. Autocratic regimes are in a position of advantage in such cases, which is really showing now (why do you think I keep saying that a return to monarchy would be great?). And this will only get worse from here.
The way I see it, the Western countries are trying to lead the world with all carrot and no stick, while simultaneously being increasingly short on vegetables in general. :) If European countries are to remain relevant, they needs to stop treating everything with kid gloves and realize that sometimes, war might be preferable to what kind of peace you're going to get if you don't fight. Sadly, it might have been too long since Europeans had to fight for their values, their freedom and countries. I won't be the slightest bit surprised if they end up giving them up without much of a fight. The worst thing is, Democracy is such a buzzword now that even if someone does fight back and win, they'll put up a democratic system again and we'll be back to the square one.
Although, to be fair, I don't really see what the european powers *can* do that Erdogan's regime will not take as an excuse to escalate the situation further. Aside from that appalling refugee deal (Which has done nothing to stop the rising death toll in the mediterenean crossings) Turkey is already going further and further away from EU acceptance.
By now? Certainly not much, short of invading, occupying the country (which would be as likely as not to backfire anyway, but I don't know what's worse, really) and shooting Erdogan and his goons in the back of the head. I don't know if something could have been done before, but it's likely that it could.
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The fact they did it more than once and are attempting to do it again kind of argues that the problem is beyond one they're able to solve simply by changing the government.
This goes all the way back to Ataturk. Laicism never had popular support, but Ataturk had enough influence after rebuilding the army and raising the country from the ashes of the Ottomans that he was able to drag them kicking and screaming to a modern standard of living. Every twenty years or so Islamists like Erdogan take power in the government, and the military ends up invoking the Constitution to overthrow them.
Unfortunately this was an extremely poorly executed coup (regardless of whether it was secular Kemalist, or if it was Gulenist as Erdogan claims) that has only given Erdogan an excuse to purge the military and turn it into one that's entirely loyal to him. I guess he gets to become Sultan just like he wants.
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You seem to have missed the point, which was that any system dependent on the military overthrowing the government on a regular basis is A: not sustainable and B: would seem to not reflect the desires of the Turkish people.
I suppose you could argue they don't know what's good for them, but that really only answers one of those points.
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You seem to have missed the point, which was that any system dependent on the military overthrowing the government on a regular basis is A: not sustainable and B: would seem to not reflect the desires of the Turkish people.
Well, I suppose that if you codified the coups into a law, Discworld style, this could become an... interesting form of government. They could probably even sell tickets for them. :) However, you're right that the current system is actually kind of nuts. It seems like they'd really like to have a democracy, but those religious morons keep ruining everything by electing undemocratic candidates, so it needs an occasional coup to keep it democratic. If that's not crazy, I don't know what is.
The problem is that anything that would "reflect the desires of (the majority of) Turkish people" would not be a secular government. It would seem that they really don't know what's good for them. Erdogan is an example of a leader that they elected in a democratic way (at least the first time around) and look how he turned out. Ataturk understood the idea that Turkey needs to be dragged kicking and screaming into the modern age. They need a Sultan more than a president. More specifically, a Sultan who would continue what Ataturk started, despite initial popular resistance.
The above could be said of many Middle Eastern "democracies" (in monarchies, the royal family is usually progressive already. Depressingly enough, this includes Saudi Arabia), but Turkey is a strange example in which the progressive elements of the society, despite not having autocratic power, actually managed (at least until now) to keep things under control. This sounds like it could be a really good system in principle (democracy "moderated" by intellectuals), if it wasn't for the fact that it involves regular military coups...
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The problem is that anything that would "reflect the desires of (the majority of) Turkish people" would not be a secular government.
Again, only one of the points.
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What I'm seeing is a staged coup attempt to remove those opposing Erdogan. 6000 people arrested and the attempt happened two days ago? That's not possible by any means of policing work, these people were pre-determined to be arrested! We're looking live at the last opposing elements being removed from the weak democracy of Turkey, paving the way to the actual islamization of the nation. Death penalty is likely the result for many; I can't think of any nation on Earth who doesn't have death penalty under military law. 3000 people from judiciary alone(!), there ain't gonna be fair trials here!
I'm going to contact the Finnish External Affairs and ask them to provide assistance for the Turkish soldiers in need of asylum. That's pretty much all I can think to do.
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The problem is that anything that would "reflect the desires of (the majority of) Turkish people" would not be a secular government.
Again, only one of the points.
Sustainability is overrated. I guess we can say that an islamic theocracy is more "sustainable". Is it any good though?
I am really unconvinced by this criteria of "sustainability" here. People should decide to do what is good, not what is "sustainable". There's nothing more sustainable than the state of death, for example.
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well, it all depends on what you define as "good" for certain definitions of "good" an islamic theocracy is optimal, for instance the Islamist definition of "good". Me personally I would include sustainable as a necessary feature of a "good" end state.
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I won't debate the merits of total relativism with anyone seriously endorsing it, so I advise you to get off that stuff. It's poison, drop it.
Sustainability is good, I admit that, it's just not the "be all end all". The choices here aren't between paradise and hell, they are between a rock and a hard place. To say that a rock isn't as comfy as a pillow isn't really an argument for a "hard place", now is it?
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What I'm seeing is a staged coup attempt to remove those opposing Erdogan. 6000 people arrested and the attempt happened two days ago? That's not possible by any means of policing work, these people were pre-determined to be arrested! We're looking live at the last opposing elements being removed from the weak democracy of Turkey, paving the way to the actual islamization of the nation. Death penalty is likely the result for many; I can't think of any nation on Earth who doesn't have death penalty under military law. 3000 people from judiciary alone(!), there ain't gonna be fair trials here!
I'm going to contact the Finnish External Affairs and ask them to provide assistance for the Turkish soldiers in need of asylum. That's pretty much all I can think to do.
Turkey doesn't use capital punishment. But lifetime-sentence is definitely not a spa-hotel. One must spend 10 years in isolation to be granted any kind of contact with outside world and other prisoners. Death punishment was also abolished in the army, but now the politicians are discussing on restoring it.
But I agree. That thing looks staged as hell. It reminds me of Stalin's methods, the great purge he made in army in 30's. Removed all kind of opposition (and those being only suspected) in army and also in public administration, etc. Many ordinary citizens got caught by the blast as well.
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I am really unconvinced by this criteria of "sustainability" here. People should decide to do what is good, not what is "sustainable". There's nothing more sustainable than the state of death, for example.
This argument would carry more weight if we were talking about corporations, perhaps. But a government is a different matter. An unstable government is a government that engages in unpredictable behavior with its neighbors, that is explicitly concerned with survival rather than anything else, that cannot afford to care for its citizens because it has to care for itself. Regular coups or collapsing governments are disastrous to a country and its citizens at a scope that mere natural disasters can only dream of; look only to post-colonial Africa or Latin America in the 20th century for examples.
Stability of government is very much a prerequisite for a nation to advance the standard of living and allow prosperity among its citizens. I'm not terribly fond of the Iranian government's behaviors and nature, but it has done a great deal to bring healthcare and even some measure of prosperity to its citizens in the last twenty years because it has achieved a measure of stability through its legislature's actions. The Saudi government is contemptible but it's done much for the standard of living among Saudi citizens because it has achieved stability through rigorous vetting of its successor candidates and ironclad succession laws eliminating power struggles among the House of Saud. North Korea's government has wobbled on the edge of a knife for the last twenty-five years, and the results have been ruinous for the average North Korean.
Do I particularly want an Islamic Republic of Turkey? No. Do I think that it would be a preferable alternative to the chaos of Turkish politics for the last several decades? I'm not sure. Do I think that a sustainable, stable government rather than repeated coups is better for the people of Turkey? Certainly. If Ataturk created something that his people did not want a part of, if he pushed too hard and too far and too fast, and it's been held in place by military force since then, then it's only going to be harder to make any progress towards what you or I would regard as "right" when the whole thing collapses finally. You can't fake it until you make it government either.
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You're assuming some things in your reasoning. One, that theocracy will "collapse finally". There's historical precedent to say that it may well not collapse at all. It may well be that a theocratic authoritarian quasi-totalitarian government is quite stable and "sustainable". After all, all it can promise is a life of material misery but spiritual wonders (and if you yourself are not experiencing spiritual wonders, you're probably an atheist and should be executed anyway). Such a "state" is perfectly sustainable, especially if the people having the most children are the least secularly schooled. I'm not saying this is the case, I'm saying you are assuming the opposite is true, without much justification.
Two, you're assuming that Ataturk's scheme was to push "too hard and too far and too fast".
Three, you're assuming that the problem was this authoritarian secularist push, and not any other factors coming in. Like, say, demographics. Or external factors, like, say, the Iraq war, the Syrian war, ISIS, the refugee crisis, etc. Or like, say, the coming to prominence of a singular character that is behaving quite like a Sultan and able to destroy any democratic institutions and culture that Turkey still had.
That kind of authoritarian asshole is probably even more "unsustainable" than a coup (and I think you agree with me here), but given how Putin has survived and thrived for so many years now (and given the alternative that is Syria), it's probably not out of his reach to be able to destroy the entire democratic edifice and build his own dictatorship before he gets ousted or killed.
So I don't see anywhere here a prospect for "sustainability", unless we are talking about the Afghanistization of the country (Turkey doesn't have, contrary to Iran, oil or gas - at least on relevant levels). Thus the choice isn't really between "sustainability" and "chaos". It's between religious totalitarianism and authoritarian secularism. I'm not really enamored to any of those, but without hesitation, I'll pick the latter.
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whether it was staged or not, it is being used quite effectively.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/turkey-coup-could-threaten-countrys-nato-membership-john-kerry-warns-a7142491.html
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I am honestly not convinced it was staged. But what does seem likely to me, especially in light of the current purges, is that this was an attempt by the military to preempt a purge that was being prepared.
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I am honestly not convinced it was staged. But what does seem likely to me, especially in light of the current purges, is that this was an attempt by the military to preempt a purge that was being prepared.
That does not seem likely to me, actually. I'd really expect it to be a lot bigger then. This thing was over in less then a night.
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There was an essay on medium about that here (https://medium.com/@thegrugq/cyberpower-crushes-coup-b247f3cca780#.5dox73832). Bottom line: The coup failed because the military did not manage to get communications under control and was unable or unwilling to capture or kill Erdogan in the first hour or two of the coup. Military coups, it turns out, are fragile things; pulling them off successfully requires taking control of the media and keeping the government to be deposed away from communications channels at all costs until the populace has quieted down a bit.
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It struck me as someone inexperienced leading a charge that they thought others would follow. Yes it seemed weird to me that they captured the radio and TV stations almost immediately but did not follow up with any sort of broadcasted message. This allowed the dialogue to shift pretty quickly to, well, anything else.
I think what may have happened was that this was brewing, and maybe one or two commanders were goaded into launching the attack pre-emptively. Maybe they were led to believe they were holding a larger hand than they did.
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You're assuming some things in your reasoning. One, that theocracy will "collapse finally".
Two, you're assuming that Ataturk's scheme was to push "too hard and too far and too fast".
Three, you're assuming that the problem was this authoritarian secularist push, and not any other factors coming in.
All dead wrong.
The eventual collapse referred to here was the collapse of the Kemalist democratic state, not a notional theocracy. The longer it limped along and the forces against it were able to refine their game plan, the further and harder it would fail and the harder it would be to claw back, while the forces for it apparently sat on their hands failing to address the structural problems that caused the lack of equilibrium requiring the military to step in repeatedly.
It was manifestly just that as evidenced by the fact the military has had to stage coups every twenty to ten years to keep it in place and this process has finally been ineffective. Ataturk's plan never reached a self-sustaining condition but required outside force to be applied at semi-regular intervals to keep its political system going.
On the contrary, I am assuming nothing else but other factors, though ones nowhere near as proximate in time as you are. The current push and the failed coup are the result of activity that has been going on in Turkey for generations, where no one arrested the basic process that brought us successful coups beforehand and made it so they were not required to hold things together. Eventually, by the law of averages, one of these coups would fail and the Kemalist state would fail with it. That is where we are now.
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Ataturk is spinning in his grave so fast they could power the entire country by hooking him to a generator.
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It struck me as someone inexperienced leading a charge that they thought others would follow. Yes it seemed weird to me that they captured the radio and TV stations almost immediately but did not follow up with any sort of broadcasted message. This allowed the dialogue to shift pretty quickly to, well, anything else.
I think what may have happened was that this was brewing, and maybe one or two commanders were goaded into launching the attack pre-emptively. Maybe they were led to believe they were holding a larger hand than they did.
They did broadcast a message though. The problem was that there were a lot of communications channels that they didn't take over; not only were modern messaging apps like SnapChat still online (allowing Erdogan to spread his messages), those messages were rebroadcast using the public announce system every Mosque has.
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You're assuming some things in your reasoning. One, that theocracy will "collapse finally".
Two, you're assuming that Ataturk's scheme was to push "too hard and too far and too fast".
Three, you're assuming that the problem was this authoritarian secularist push, and not any other factors coming in.
All dead wrong.
The eventual collapse referred to here was the collapse of the Kemalist democratic state, not a notional theocracy. The longer it limped along and the forces against it were able to refine their game plan, the further and harder it would fail and the harder it would be to claw back, while the forces for it apparently sat on their hands failing to address the structural problems that caused the lack of equilibrium requiring the military to step in repeatedly.
It was manifestly just that as evidenced by the fact the military has had to stage coups every twenty to ten years to keep it in place and this process has finally been ineffective. Ataturk's plan never reached a self-sustaining condition but required outside force to be applied at semi-regular intervals to keep its political system going.
On the contrary, I am assuming nothing else but other factors, though ones nowhere near as proximate in time as you are. The current push and the failed coup are the result of activity that has been going on in Turkey for generations, where no one arrested the basic process that brought us successful coups beforehand and made it so they were not required to hold things together. Eventually, by the law of averages, one of these coups would fail and the Kemalist state would fail with it. That is where we are now.
Gotcha, makes sense.
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Thus the choice isn't really between "sustainability" and "chaos". It's between religious totalitarianism and authoritarian secularism. I'm not really enamored to any of those, but without hesitation, I'll pick the latter.
Id pick the latter, too. But the people want the former. Thats why any secular* government in muslim world is inherently unstable and may be unsustainable in the long term. The natural state of muslim world is to live under something like Taliban or even ISIS. Regimes such as those would be brutal, regressive, but very stable and sustainable.
*secular relatively speaking, compared to western democracies it may not be secular at all.
Now Turkey is located in the midlle between western and muslim world so it is not quite as backwards, but their natural state is still quite a bit more regressive than what Ataturks Turkey was, which was an anomaly. This coup (staged or not) and the reaction towards it could be the process of them returning to this more natural, stable state, just like a a ball rolling down a hill. It will just go on on its own, unless an outside intervention happens (which most likely will not).
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Secular government can work in Middle East if it takes the populace by the throat. See all the dictators who, for all their flaws, were remarkably secular (Saddam Hussein comes to mind). Or legitimate kings, for that matter (well, except the Saudis). Hussein was only deposed when US got involved, other secular dictators managed to last quite long as well and kingdoms in the region are the most stable countries in there (that's despite being mostly old-timey absolute monarchies, which can be prone to an occasional succession crisis). It's just that the unwashed masses want religious totalitarianism (unsurprising, seeing as they don't have much to turn to besides religion) and letting them decide will always lead to it.
The "natural state" of every human is savagery and superstitiousness. Only when satisfying basic needs is reasonably easy and certain can a higher culture develop and attempts at scientific understanding of the world may be undertaken. The Middle East has been a war-torn, unstable mess for a better part of the previous century and the Ottomans weren't kind to it, either. Thus it devolved into the basic state and never really got a chance to evolve back into civilized one. The only difference is that Islam took place of primordial, naturally created superstitions. This is simply what constant warring and scarce resources do to a society. The worst thing is, it takes a while (multiple generations) for a society to "grow out" of this state, which I think most people don't realize. They will only act like us after a few generations of living in a well-supplied, stable and lawful society. There are ways to speed up the process (extensive secular and scientific education, dispersion and forced integration with a more advanced society, among others), but even then, it should be expected to take a while.
The worst thing is, despite their primitive mindset, those people still have access to modern weapons, which are so devastating that they're stifling them more than pushing them forward. Were they throwing sticks and stones, they'd sooner or later develop on their own (just like every other civilization did, we all started from this level). With AKs and RPGs, they have no way of gaining advantage by improving their weapons, not to mention combat is too lethal, not dependent enough on skill and too much on luck. It's a vicious cycle and the "civilized world" is doing exactly nothing to get them out of it, instead alternating between neglect and oppression. It's no coincidence that the most progressive places in the Middle East are monarchies (which is the only form of government that was available to most civilizations at this stage).
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Yeah whatever Dragon.
Meanwhile, Erdogan seems to be doing things exactly right, if the purpose is to send Turkey into the depths of medieval hell:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-07-20/erdogan-says-turkey-will-impose-3-month-state-of-emergency-iqvcohtq
A state of emergency took effect in Turkey as the government pursues those responsible for a failed weekend coup, and top officials sought to reassure investors after stocks fell and the lira hit a record low.
(...)
Thousands of army officers, judges and prosecutors have been detained since the attempted putsch by a faction of the armed forces collapsed on Saturday, leaving almost 250 people dead after a night of aerial bombardment and street battles. A wider purge is under way that encompasses universities, schools and the civil service.
(https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/iwh64FzwK9SA/v2/-1x-1.png)
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Private schooling, the birthplace of coups.
Gotta admit that's a new one.
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There's nothing more dangerous than education.
If you're an authoritarian asshole.
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Private schooling, the birthplace of coups.
Gotta admit that's a new one.
Not really, subverting the educational system was pretty much always one of the priorities of any dictator who lasted for any decent length of time. Children need to learn about how glorious the glorious leader is, after all. Private schools are harder to control, so they have to go (other dictators simply never allowed them to become a thing in first place).
In general, it looks like Erdogan has taken a few pages from Stalin's book. That looks depressingly like Stalin-era USSR. Well, if that's so, I hope he dies like Stalin as well.
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Nihil novi
Best way to steer the society is to take control over the education. It will be faaar better to have Qur'anic schools teaching boys when they can lash their wives then a private schools where people may learn suspicious things :rolleyes:.
Gj Sultan.
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Not really,
No, you need private schools to train people who will actually fill important positions in your government's hierarchy that require some kind of skill, or you end up like Venezula.
Or you send those people abroad for study but that's arguably much more dangerous.
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Turkey doesn't use capital punishment. But lifetime-sentence is definitely not a spa-hotel. One must spend 10 years in isolation to be granted any kind of contact with outside world and other prisoners. Death punishment was also abolished in the army, but now the politicians are discussing on restoring it.
But I agree. That thing looks staged as hell. It reminds me of Stalin's methods, the great purge he made in army in 30's. Removed all kind of opposition (and those being only suspected) in army and also in public administration, etc. Many ordinary citizens got caught by the blast as well.
Yes I know that there's no capital punishment in the EU under peace time laws. However, many EU nations DO have capital punishment under the martial law (treason being one of them). I believe that the coup attempt would fall under the martial law jurisdiction (or at least it likely would be judged as such in Finland).
20 000 teachers suspected of the coup? Yeah, right! This play is directly out of Soviet Union's false flag operations manual. I also really have doubts about the army doing this badly if it really wanted to pull a coup; more likely is that some units have been goaded or ordered to this by their superiors. The first thing to ensure in a coup would be to kill Erdogan, and him being the president, the military should know his exact location all the time. They didn't, so that indicates only mid-level officers could possibly have been involved. But mid-level officers starting the coup is also unlikely in my opinion.
The question is, what will the EU do this time? Stand still, or make a choice to support either? Public comments from the external ministries seem to underline that the EU respects the democratic voting result, but whether that's actually rhetoric for internal EU politics, that we will have to see. I can't say I wouldn't feel disappointed with the EU on how it has handled Turkish coup attempt so far. Regardless of the democratic voting result, the question we have to ask is whether we believe Turkish people will be better the way they are headed now in years to come.
Interestingly this also reveals quite a bit of the EU commentary; comparing the noise we got from the refugee crisis and this, the EU has been markedly less vocal nor does the media show as many tragic and heart breaking pictures. Possibly because the EU feels things are not as clear as they were in the refugee crisis, but here I have to disagree. This is about as clear as it can get, and for the Eastern European nations in the EU, doing the right thing here would actually show the EU in a far better light.
The immediate result of this is that Turkey will not be in the negotiations table for joining the EU for a long long time. While this alone could be seen as a positive development, the downsides to the whole matter are the consequences of the regional geopolitics. Fracturing NATO and the EU at the same time are indeed bad news, and NATO really has to start looking for every option with Turkey. One worrying thing specifically is technology leak.
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The immediate result of this is that Turkey will not be in the negotiations table for joining the EU for a long long time. While this alone could be seen as a positive development, the downsides to the whole matter are the consequences of the regional geopolitics. Fracturing NATO and the EU at the same time are indeed bad news, and NATO really has to start looking for every option with Turkey. One worrying thing specifically is technology leak.
The negotiations for EU membership have been stalled for close to 20 years now. Even without this recent coup, even without Erdogan at the helm, Turkey wasn't going to become an EU member this generation.
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Erdogan has apparently declared State of Emergency (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/21/world/europe/turkey-erdogan-gulen.html?_r=0) that will last for three months.
Finnish media is reporting that Erdogan stated the the soldiers that shot down that Su-24 on Turkish border might have been part of the coup attempt.
Translation: This effectively means Martial Law and that Turkey is attempting to heal its relationship with Russia.
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Also, the european convention on human rights was suspended in Turkey. This is obviously good for
bitcoinTurkey, as british conservatives have called that thing an impediment to progress. We must therefore applaud Erdogan for taking decisive steps to Make Turkey Great Again.
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It's like watching a hyper slow motion movie of an atom bomb going off. You know what is going to happen but you just can't stop looking. Everything's predictable but you're still fascinated and surprised while watching it.
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Yeah. The worst thing is that there's no way to stop it, despite knowing what's gonna happen next. Those who would be able to either don't have the guts or a reason to interfere. But that's the modern times for ya.
No, you need private schools to train people who will actually fill important positions in your government's hierarchy that require some kind of skill, or you end up like Venezula.
Well, where do you think Turkey is heading? :) If you look at how the government was under "dictators who lasted for any length of time", you'll see that it's exactly the point. Soviet Block was an exception, commies (after Stalin, at least) generally tended to keep their propaganda and ideology to history and economics lessons, respectively (also literature, to some extent), so their school system wasn't really that bad. Which is the whole reason they managed to keep their authoritarian state up and running for that long.
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Yeah. The worst thing is that there's no way to stop it, despite knowing what's gonna happen next. Those who would be able to either don't have the guts or a reason to interfere. But that's the modern times for ya.
No, you need private schools to train people who will actually fill important positions in your government's hierarchy that require some kind of skill, or you end up like Venezula.
Well, where do you think Turkey is heading? :) If you look at how the government was under "dictators who lasted for any length of time", you'll see that it's exactly the point. Soviet Block was an exception, commies (after Stalin, at least) generally tended to keep their propaganda and ideology to history and economics lessons, respectively (also literature, to some extent), so their school system wasn't really that bad. Which is the whole reason they managed to keep their authoritarian state up and running for that long.
There's a way to do something: contact the ministry of external affairs and let them know what you think.
Well, I wasn't part of the Soviet Union, but saw enough its effects in the history teaching and the societal studies. I let the Polish of the age to tell the story in more details, my understanding is that the Soviet System did not attempt to suppress scientific truths like those discovered in Physics, Mathematics or Biology, instead what it did was history revision and subverting a bunch of other societal areas. More dangerous things such as foreign languages were only taught for a select few, and those were constantly monitored by the assigned agents (which is what happens in China). And then there was always the arbitrary system of sending somebody to gulag if he looked funny.
The fact that Erdogan is targeting schools is not at all surprising and is exactly what most of the dictatorships have done to varying degrees. This isn't because of what the schools ARE, it's because of what the schools could be - in their minds.
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There's a way to do something: contact the ministry of external affairs and let them know what you think.
Well, that's not exactly likely to spur anyone into action. :) In this case, "something" needs to be backed with guns, and big ones at that. One disgruntled foreigner isn't gonna cut it. Now, if that foreigner was backed by a force capable of flattening Erdogan's recently purged army, it'd be a whole different talk... Indeed, if someone feels like conquering Turkey, he should get a move on. The purged officers were probably the best and brightest of Turkish military, leaving the country with incompetent lackeys in place of decent officers. Stalin himself nearly lost WWII that way (if Hitler wasn't even more of an idiot than Stalin, he could have won that one).
As for the Soviets, the gulags were only that bad during Stalin's time. Later on they generally needed a good reason to set you to Siberia. It's true that they taught Western languages (languages of friendly countries were not a problem and Russian was mandatory in places like Poland) on a "need to know" basis, but it wasn't as impossible as people make it out to be (though it tend to put you on the "watch list"). You could even go abroad to the Western countries (once again, Eastern Block was never a problem) if you gave them a good enough reason, though you did have to report in and give information on the country you visited once you got back. From what I heard from my parents and grandparents, post-Stalin USSR (and Poland, during that time), despite being authoritarian, wasn't that bad of a place. The commies' big problem (and the ultimate downfall) was an unworkable economic system.
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There's a way to do something: contact the ministry of external affairs and let them know what you think.
Well, that's not exactly likely to spur anyone into action. :) In this case, "something" needs to be backed with guns, and big ones at that. One disgruntled foreigner isn't gonna cut it. Now, if that foreigner was backed by a force capable of flattening Erdogan's recently purged army, it'd be a whole different talk... Indeed, if someone feels like conquering Turkey, he should get a move on. The purged officers were probably the best and brightest of Turkish military, leaving the country with incompetent lackeys in place of decent officers. Stalin himself nearly lost WWII that way (if Hitler wasn't even more of an idiot than Stalin, he could have won that one).
As for the Soviets, the gulags were only that bad during Stalin's time. Later on they generally needed a good reason to set you to Siberia. It's true that they taught Western languages (languages of friendly countries were not a problem and Russian was mandatory in places like Poland) on a "need to know" basis, but it wasn't as impossible as people make it out to be (though it tend to put you on the "watch list"). You could even go abroad to the Western countries (once again, Eastern Block was never a problem) if you gave them a good enough reason, though you did have to report in and give information on the country you visited once you got back. From what I heard from my parents and grandparents, post-Stalin USSR (and Poland, during that time), despite being authoritarian, wasn't that bad of a place. The commies' big problem (and the ultimate downfall) was an unworkable economic system.
With about half the country (or so) full of (civilian) Erdogan supporters who went to the streets yelling "Allahu Akbar", capturing tanks and lynching soldiers during the "coup", I wouldn't wanna be in the shoes of the poor sod who tries to invade there ... Syria 2.0 coming up if not worse.
There's already several reports of Alevites, Christians and other religious minorities being scared sh**less by the display of religious fanatism during that night, wondering when the progroms will start.
If he really does go full scale batsh** crazy Hitler style the force he could potentially field simply by arming fanatic civilians is actually rather scary in a nightmarish sort of way.
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Dictators don't usually arm the populace, quite the opposite, in fact.
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Dictators don't usually arm the populace, quite the opposite, in fact.
That aspect is not limited to dictators. Every state tends to keep the monopoly of violence. Erdogan is an exception because he does not have the monopoly of violence to begin with.
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With about half the country (or so) full of (civilian) Erdogan supporters who went to the streets yelling "Allahu Akbar", capturing tanks and lynching soldiers during the "coup", I wouldn't wanna be in the shoes of the poor sod who tries to invade there ... Syria 2.0 coming up if not worse.
Correct. The basic rule of military interventions is that you don't intervene a civil war.
The reason to contact external affairs ministry is more nuanced. Any intervening military action at this point is out of question (unless Turkey attempts to secure nukes in the NATO bases). The idea is to pressure the ministries that the general populace can already see through the "we respect the democracy" comments when Turkey is really on the path to a dictatorship and has gone Stalin all the way. This makes the current approach appear as a repeat of Chamberlain's policies, possibly causing the EU to reconsider its position and look towards the electoral.
First the EU could pressure Turkey to expel at least a part of the "conspirators" instead of executing them by letting these people in to asylum. Use whatever human reasons you can, they shouldn't have any problems figuring those out. While Erdogan will cry wolf about this, he is actually likely to let some people of the hook, which will then demonstrate that the Western powers will not approve everything Erdogan does, possibly sowing the seeds of a real coup with an exit strategy for the perpetrators as long as they behaved morally acceptably by the EU standards.
Furthermore, the EU could place an embargo on Turkey, and with sufficient electorate support behind this, the politicians could actually see this as a viable option instead of tyrannical EU forcing member states to damaging embargo as some see the trade restrictions with Russia. This is more unlikely, but it could happen given some time. Yes Erdogan will get closer with Russia, but he seems to have decided to go there anyways. The thing he has done it now could be a gamble to extort Western support to his government, or it could be an actual move.
However, Obama has already expressed his support for Erdogan, likely due to geopolitical interests of controlling Bospor and locking the Russian Black Sea fleet to Black Sea. I still see Erdogan shifting to the Russian side as possibility with enough probability that the USA support may not matter in the end anyways.
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TBH, I don't think EU could pressure Turkey into anything. Not at this point. With the US and Russia competing for Erdogan's support, the EU is no longer an important in that game. Indeed, should EU push Turkey away, Russia will be more than happy to pick up the slack. If Erdogan is anything like Stalin was, he wouldn't give much thought to foreign cries to spare the conspirators, either. Regardless of whether he wants to be closer to Russia or to US, he's not going to go easy on the opposition.
Sure, you don't want to intervene in the civil war, but considering everything, can we really say it's still a civil war? It seems like whatever opposition Erdogan had has been crushed already. Of course, there's still a matter of armed civilians in the streets. The military is still weak, though, and a foreign invasion at this point would probably be about no harder than the US invasion of Iraq, where the regular armed forces were quickly overrun. Pulling off an occupation after that could be though (and could very well turn into Iraq if botched), but if your goal wasn't to take over the whole country, but just take some of its territory, this could be workable from a purely military standpoint.
Indeed, I wonder how Kurds feature in all this. They've wanted their own state for quite a while and I don't think they're onboard with Erdogan's Islamic dictatorship. Not that they were ever big on Turkey in general. Considering how they were treated before the coup, it seems like they'd really want to kick Turks out and become independent before Erdogan starts sending them to concentration camps.