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Military Coup underway in Turkey against Islamist President – LIVE UPDATES

Military Coup underway in Turkey against Islamist President – LIVE UPDATES

As of morning (Saturday) in Turkey, coup appears to be faultering
Posted by Friday, July 15, 2016 at 04:29pm
https://twitter.com/CeylanWrites/status/754065030929317889/photo/1
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There was an attempted coup in Turkey on Friday.

Military officials backing the coup claimed initial success, but as events developed during the day Friday, the coup appeared to faulter and be on the verge of collapse.

We will have a full UPDATE at 10:30 a.m. Eastern on Saturday.

Here are the latest events on Friday. After returning to Istanbul airport, Erdogan appeared on television and proclaimed that he still was in control and the coup would fail:

Fighter jets shoot down helicopters with coup supporters:

Videos of detained coup soldiers are on social media:

Soldiers opening fire on people:

Erdogan gave an interview via FaceTime:

He may have tried to seek asylum in Germany:

Photo allegedly shows soldiers at state run TV:

Now reports that military officers took the military chief hostage:

Turkish armed forces have started releasing statements:

Military planes have flown low across Ankara with military personnel telling people to go home.

 

 

 



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Comments

Kondor77 | July 15, 2016 at 4:35 pm

The military has always been a secular force. Wait and see.

    SDN in reply to Kondor77. | July 15, 2016 at 6:40 pm

    Sounds like someone dusted off the Kemal Ataturk handbook. This used to be a regular feature of Turkish government. Islamists would get to a certain level and the military takes out the trash.

    PS: This is exactly the behavior required by our military’s oath to defend the Constitution (not the government) against domestic enemies. It should have happened with Obama by roughly July 4 2009.

    Sanddog in reply to Kondor77. | July 15, 2016 at 7:46 pm

    They’ve positioned themselves as defenders of the Turkish constitution and a secular government for the last 50+ years. People love to blather on and on about democracy but we’ve seen “democracy” in action in the middle east and it’s nothing more than mob rule with zero protections for minority religions or opinions.

MAB | July 15, 2016 at 4:52 pm

Egypt redux?

Ragspierre | July 15, 2016 at 5:02 pm

I’ll go out on a limb here and say that looks pretty coup-ish.

Humphrey's Executor | July 15, 2016 at 5:09 pm

Good, hope its successful. Erdoğan took the country in an Islamic fundamentalist direction.

RodFC | July 15, 2016 at 5:22 pm

Hard to tell whether it’s good or bad. if it’s more radical Islamic elements then good. If not then bad.

secondwind | July 15, 2016 at 5:34 pm

Godspeed to the Turkish people. They’ve been a good Allie in the past.

Andy | July 15, 2016 at 5:44 pm

Was it a youtube video?

Ragspierre | July 15, 2016 at 5:48 pm

The Turkish military…like the Egyptian…has a strong British history and culture, and they were steeped in the Atta-boy-turk (sorry, couldn’t resist) tradition of Westernization.

    Doug Wright in reply to Ragspierre. | July 15, 2016 at 8:24 pm

    The good old boys in Corlu might not forgive you, yet the LI crowd will. Back in the day, Ataturk will highly revered and to smear his name in any form would have been unforgivable; not safe at any time.

    Still a Texan Good Ol Boy could be forgiven for his lack of worldly awareness. 😉

C. Lashown | July 15, 2016 at 6:01 pm

The best thing that could happen for Turkey, and now they can follow Egypt’s example. A quick speedy trial and then prison or death. You can bet that the Globalists will whine about this though, but perhaps democracy will win this time around. Members of Western culturals should find this coupe encouraging, IMO. First Egypt, then England and now Turkey… Who knows what Obama’s future will be?

artys | July 15, 2016 at 6:02 pm

I don’t think Barry is going to like this. First he loses Morsi, then Putin takes over Syria, then Bibi wins, then the Brexit, now maybe Reccep goes. He’ll definitely throw one of his tantrums.

georgfelis | July 15, 2016 at 6:45 pm

The Islamists who have been so happy to inflict their poison on the country over the last few years are now in exposed positions where they will have to run in order to keep promoting their violent oppression of others.

Guess who I expect to offer them amnesty. Hint: he has a phone and a pen.

tom swift | July 15, 2016 at 6:55 pm

I was a bit surprised when the army didn’t do this a couple of years ago, when Erdogan started aggressively retiring (presumably “unreliable”) officers.

Senator Bluto Blutarsky | July 15, 2016 at 7:19 pm

Any idea how this will play out at Incirlik? That’s primarily a foreign air base but the Turks do have units stationed there.

Anchovy | July 15, 2016 at 7:23 pm

For the sake of our President and news anchors nationwide, let’s hope they get someone in power that has an easier name to read from a teleprompter.

Sanddog | July 15, 2016 at 7:40 pm

I wonder what the final straw was for the military. They’ve tolerated a lot of crap from Edrogan and something must have triggered this. It seems to be very well coordinated, taking out Edrogan’s stooges in the military first and then going after the government.

Doug Wright | July 15, 2016 at 8:40 pm

Turkish high command, back in the day, almost exclusively, its Army, probably has had it with Erdogan. When he first got national power, he started to get rid of the military command that didn’t bow to his dictates. And, that has kind of continued. It was pointed out tonight that Erdogan was the one who negated our 4th ID going into Iraq via Turkey.

Erodgan is an Islamist first and foremost, the military is sworn to uphold Ataturk’s concept of a secular government for Turkey and Erdogan acts to overthrow that.

If the military gains control, Erodgan is going to be running for cover and el Obama probably will give it to him. Morsi was Egypt’s version of Erdogan and he was much beloved by our own Islamist Obama.

However, make no mistake, Turkish military is very nationalistic and that comes first before anything else in the traditional sense. So, this coup effort is balancing on a tight rope, very much so.

Yet, my guess is that the Islamist attacks on Ataturk National Airport became the tipping point, leading to this coup; more than the high command could accept.

    georgfelis in reply to Doug Wright. | July 16, 2016 at 12:16 am

    But…

    If this coup fails (as it looks like it might), Erdogan and his Islamist allies will wade through blood in retribution. Expect show trials, executions, and army officers vanishing, along with their families.

randian | July 15, 2016 at 8:48 pm

I’m surprised this is happening now given Erdogan’s purges of the military’s officers. I would have thought there was nobody left to resist.

LibraryGryffon | July 16, 2016 at 1:15 am

It is my understanding that Erdogan isn’t chummy with the Gulenists in the army like he used to be, and they are the ones attempting to stage the coup. If that is correct, than the coup succeeding would actually push Turkey further away from a secular government since Gulen and his followers seem to want a more Islamic state.

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2013/1229/The-Gulen-movement-a-self-exiled-imam-challenges-Turkey-s-Erdogan

davod | July 16, 2016 at 9:03 am

The accusations are that this is a military coup by followers of Fethullah Gülen, an Islamist. If true, then I am not surprised that the coup failed. I doubt they had enough followers to accomplish the follow up required after the coup was started.

Unlike the supposed earlier coup objectives, this coup would not appear to be a a coup attempt to reinstall secular rule.

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