Among the stories I neglected because of the focus on the debt ceiling debate is the continuing slide of Turkey, once a secular pro-Western country which also maintained good relations with Israel.
As I have noted since January 2009, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been slowly destroying Turkey’s secular foundation, and has turned Turkey into an agitator against U.S. foreign policy and against Israel. There have been signs recently that Turkey was moving away from its disruptive policy towards the U.S., but Erdogan’s verbal attacks on Israel have barely diminished.
Most recently, the entire Turkish military senior staff resigned in protest over a witch hunt being carried out against secular military officers by Erdogan’s political party. Claire Berlinski notes:
As you’ve all by now heard, Turkey’s Chief of the General Staff and the Commanders of the Army, Navy and Air Force resigned. This is unprecedented in the history of the Turkish Republic. In a way, I’m surprised it took them so
long: For years, hundreds of their colleagues have been locked up, without conviction, on incoherent charges of “coup-plotting.” Given that this is apparently going to go on forever, what exactly can you do but resign?
Just thought you’d want to know..
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Comments
Well, if he is going to continually accuse you, you might as well actually do it for the good of Turkey and the world.
Spent a couple of days in Turkey on a historically-themed tour earlier this year. Istanbul is incredible, at least from a historically-minded point of view. No problem from the people — they were, if anything, friendly and welcoming — though there was a bomb set by a Kurdish group in the “new city” while we were there.
But I did get the feeling that this was close to the end of when I would feel comfortable going to Turkey, and these resignations seal that feeling.