Turkey: Military chiefs resign en masse

[Gerald]

The chief of the Turkish armed forces, Isik Kosaner, has resigned along with the army, navy and air force heads.

The reasons were not immediately clear but there has been a history of tension between the secularist military and the governing AK party in recent years.

Gen Kosaner had met PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan a number of times recently.

The meetings came ahead of next week's Supreme Military Council which will decide on promotions, and some reports suggested major disagreements.

It appears the senior military figures wanted to go ahead with scheduled annual promotions for some of the officers implicated in an alleged 2003 coup plot, but that the government had refused.

Gen Kosaner said he was resigning "as he saw it as necessary", the Anatolia agency reported.

The government says the commanders have asked to retire.

There is speculation Gen Necdet Ozel, head of the gendarmerie paramilitary force, may replace Gen Kosaner.
'Sledgehammer'

Gen Kosaner and his senior commanders quit hours after a court charged 22 suspects, including several generals and officers, with carrying out an internet campaign to undermine the government.

This case is the latest element of the so-called "Sledgehammer" conspiracy - a coup plan allegedly presented at an army seminar in 2003.

Seventeen generals and admirals currently in line for promotion were among those jailed in the Sledgehammer prosecutions. Altogether nearly 200 officers were charged with conspiracy.

Twenty-eight servicemen will go on trial next month.

Gen Kosaner was appointed overall head of the Turkish armed forces just a year ago.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14346325


Note: 29 July 2011 Last updated at 18:19 GMT

[Skybird]

With huge numbers of fundamentalists, by call of AKP key advisors, join the armed forces' for career in higher ranks, and eroding the army's constitutional role by taking it over from within that way, a continuing process of bleedout of high officers from all branches of the armed forces deletesa even the last hope to stop the fundamentalisation of Turkey and its backward course to pre-Kemalistic times. But when a fundamentalistic Islamic party with an extremely fundamentalist chief takes over a traditionally Islamic country - what else is to be expected anyway?

The EU does not consider Turkey as what it is. It considers Turkey as what it dreams it to be in its fairy-tale dreams. In other words, the EU is not adressing Turkey when talking with it, but the EU is fostering itzs own illusions, and deals wqith its own hallucinations instead.

Meanwhile, Erdoghan has called out a 6 months ice age in which Turkey refuses to talk with the EU since the EU will be headed ("presidency") by EU-member Greek Zyprus, and this diplomatic all out affront should tell even the last fool behind the hill what hour the churchbell has rung.

Forget Turkey. It is a lost cause. Germany has more experiences with relations and interactions with Turkey than any other EU nation - and Turkey means nothing but trouble and interference for us. Granted, the German state is dumb and spineless enough to swallow it time and time and time again, but still.

[Jimbuna]

The big positive factor for having Turkey as a Nato member was the fact it was the only country with a natura/physical border with Russia...I'm not so sure that is so important now.

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by jimbuna

The big positive factor for having Turkey as a Nato member was the fact it was the only country with a natura/physical border with Russia...

[Highbury]

Maybe Jimbuna should have said a border that was not an arctic passage for much of the year

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by Highbury

Maybe Jimbuna should have said a border that was not an arctic passage for much of the year

As opposed to a mountainous terrain that stopped the German Army in '43?

[Stealhead]

Well Turkey was very valuable to NATO(truly the US) during the Cold War because it allowed us to fly all manner of ELINT and other types of near border penetration observation missions against the USSR .I know for sure of this my step father flew on many of these missions and other times he listened in on Soviet networks from bases in Turkey.

In modern times it is again a useful staging area to the US military.Also Turkey is part of ISAF so they are useful for that reason and also they share a border with Iran and Iraq.

They have their share of problems though like the PKK if I had a penny for every time all of Insurlick AB got locked down thanks to the PKK the many times I did TDYs there I'd rich.Also talking to Turkish soldiers and airmen that I knew on base they have lots of political problems and the officer corps seems weak the enlisted men seem pretty professional all things considered based on what I saw which was not a very large portion of the Turkish military.

Then there is the whole thing of they and Greece not seeing eye to eye well I guess they do see eye to eye but not very well.

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by Stealhead

Well Turkey was very valuable to NATO(truly the US) during the Cold War because it allowed us to fly all manner of ELINT and other types of near border penetration observation missions against the USSR .I know for sure of this my step father flew on many of these missions and other times he listened in on Soviet networks from bases in Turkey.

Not to mention some submarine recon of the area where the Soviets had all their major shipyards courtesy of the Turkish Navy..

[Stealhead]

True in deed I did not really think of the naval value.Also still very important they control the entrance to the Black Sea. From what I saw of Turkish citizens it seemed to me that most of them where much more concerned about daily life than anything else.

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

I'm normally against military having say in politics, but in case of Turkey I would rather see military in charge than Mr. Erdogan.

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by Highbury

Maybe Jimbuna should have said a border that was not an arctic passage for much of the year

I stand corrected I should have said largest in the eastern sector

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by jimbuna

I stand corrected I should have said largest in the eastern sector

If you consider the Caucasus Mountains the Eastern Sector of the USSR I don't think I want to know what you consider the Kamchatka Peninsula!

[Jimbuna]

The NATO eastern sector

[Gerald]

The government in Turkey will on Monday start appointing new commanders of the armed forces at a four-day annual military promotions meeting.

It will be the first time a civilian government decides who commands the various armed forces in Turkey.

It follows last week's resignations of the chief of the Turkish armed forces and army, navy and air force heads.

The officials were furious about the arrests of senior officers accused of plotting to undermine the government.
War of words

The military and the governing AK party have for the past two years been engaged in a war of words over allegations that parts of the military had been plotting a coup.

The BBC's correspondent in Turkey, Jonathan Head, says the contest between the armed forces and the party of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, which has its roots in political Islam, has now come to a head and Mr Erdogan has won.

He says Mr Erdogan and his ally, President Abdullah Gul, now insist they will have the final say over who commands the military.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14362538


Note: Update Record,1 August 2011 Last updated at 09:07 GMT