Egypt Should Employ the ‘Turkish Solution’
What just happened in Egypt? Let’s call it the Turkish Solution.
The First World War did not end neatly in the Middle East — or anywhere else. The Ottoman Empire quit fighting a week before the armistice on the Western Front, and two weeks later the capital at Istanbul was occupied by Entente troops. But that was hardly the end of it.
There were two different peace treaties. First came the Treaty of Sèvres, which chopped up the Ottoman Empire about as neatly (and completely) as the European powers had carved up Africa 45 years prior. But Sèvres was never ratified by the Turkish parliament, as the Brits had dissolved it already. And anyway, Mustafa Kemal Pasha wasn’t having it, and set up his own post-Ottoman government in Ankara.
Naturally, that led to more fighting — the Turkish War of Independence. This time the Turks won. The resulting Treaty of Lausanne was much more generous, and gave Turkey the borders it still has today. (OK, except for Iskenderun, but that was a trifle.)
Mustafa Kemal Pasha also changed his name to Kemal Atatürk (“father of the Turks”) and went about modernizing and westernizing his new country as quickly as he dared — and gave us the Turkey we know today. Or at least the Turkey we knew up until a few years ago, before Atatürk’s westernization gave way to a sort of creeping Islamization.
Atatürk was an idealist. He knew Turkey needed a democratic republic if it was to become western and modern. But he was also a realist, who knew that the Turks were not fully ready for the responsibilities of self-governance. So Atatürk gave the military a special role, one that would make us here in the West rightly aghast. Put simply: When the civilian government became too corrupt or strayed from the overarching goal of westernization, the guys with guns would show up and set things right. After an appropriate time (determined by the army, of course) the army would stand down and civilian politicians would resume power.
It was never pretty, but it mostly worked.
Poor analogy. Turkey in 1920 was underdeveloped with great potential for economic expansion. Egypt’s real problem is that western food aid has allowed the population to expand way beyond it’s ability to feed it self. They can’t eat ballots. This problem is not going away. Of course Obama could ask Congress to repeal the 10% ethanol mandate and eliminate ethanol subsidies to bring down food prices but he is not going to risk loosing Iowa and Ohio in 2012. (I am assuming Indiana is already gone).
So is Ohio.
The US could also stop driving up the price of wheat,
and everything else, by inflating the dollar; Likely ?
” Turkey in 1920 was underdeveloped with great potential for economic expansion.”
Quite right, further more in 1920 the rest of the Islamic world in proximity, were under the “guidance” of European powers. They were about to be at war with Greece. In short Islam didn’t have much credibility as a national system capable of commanding respect from the rest of the world.
Since by the time a full century has passed Turkey will very likely be an extremely Islamic state (altho considerably less openly than Iran) I wouldn’t describe “The Turkish Model” as a success.
Knowing what we now know about “Islamic Democracy” you may count me among those who is “entirely comfortable with Turkey’s occasional military coups,”. May they and Egypt have many more helpful adjustments by their militaries.
After weeks of analysts trying to get it right. I believe this one finally achieved it.
The United States has no say what happens in Egypt, and for good reason.
We have been supporting an avaricious tyrannical regime, because it served US foreign interests without regard for what it did to its people.
We sent Billions upon Billions, most sitting in offshore accounts, real estate, commercial interests held by the Mubarak Family and businesses worldwide, while its people live in abject poverty. The estimates are 50 Billion in Cash and assets belonging to the conglomerate Hosni Mubarek set up with US agency assistance.
For some unknown reason American policy selects and supports dictators, Shahs, Tyrants, Despots, and regimes that oppress its own people. Then we wring our hands and wonder where it all went wrong.
The US government has built no loyalty with Egypt, US foreign policy supported and expanded a regime that worsened the life of its People. This will rightly come back to haunt us.
Mundus Vult Decipi
Out here in the real world, away from Never-Neverland, 90% of the planet’s governments are run by some sort of dictator, kleptocrat, despot, thugarch or caudillo. You have to deal with the world as it is, not as one would wish it to be.
The fact that the US supports pro-Western authoritarians/dictators rather than establishing democracies has been a frequent criticism for at least 30 years. Unfortunately, when the US finally listened to those criticisms and attempted to create democracies in the cases of Afghantistan and Iraq, the US was held in blistering contempt anyway. It seems to be a case of “damned if you do, damned if you don’t”….
Problem is, “democracy” won’t work when a majority of the voting public wants to vote in a totalitarian system. Liberty is considered to be wrong under shari’a law. That’s exactly why you get “one man, one vote, one time” in countries with a substantial Muslim population.
It does no good to expose people to liberty in any way other than by our own example. People have to decide on their own that they want liberty and then claim it for themselves.
You are 100% right, some people, and cultures, just dont “get it” no matter how much you try to show them the light….
All you have to do is consider how many times in your life you’ve heard of a priest or nun being robbed or killed…..robbed and killed by someone they would have bent over backward to “save”.
Some people, and some cultures, will never peacefully co-exist, no matter WHAT that silly bumper-sticker says
Alex;
We give money to Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq. The rest of the world’s dictators are self supporting.
May I point out the the US allied with Stalin to defeat Hitler. That doesn’t make us responsible for the gulags. You deal with the governments that exist, regardless of your personal opinion.
ALL HAIL THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC ON THE NILE
On the 32nd anniversary of the Iranian Revolution, one of the most deadly and terrifying in history, Hosni Mubarak went the way of Iran’s tragic Shah as Egypt begins it’s transformation into the Islamic Republic on the Nile. The only walls crumbling are those that divide Mosque and State as a new and more horrible tyranny takes shape arising from a people who hate America, the West and Israel’s Jews and want Sharia law to guide their fate. The Gazaization of Egypt is now underway as the Brotherhood of Evil works its way into power joining with Hamas, Hezbollah and fascist Iran in an alliance of unholy terror.
Dear Apollo,
I have to ask: do you have any friends?
Hollywood
Tons.
Hey Hollywood,
Go back to making your silly movies.
The Grownups are tallking about reality here
Apollo is smart enough to know Mars is the God of War…
No happy endings to any tale that has Mohammed as a character…
Read a book someday
“Also like Turkey, Egypt’s army is the most westernized and secularized institution in the country. So if Egypt tips more West than East, the army will certainly be involved to a degree we would never tolerate here.”
Although true, it may not mean much in the long run. Look at where Turkey is today. The army has lost its grip on that country and now it’s just about in the Islamist camp, a good ally of Iran and now an almost outright enemy of Israel and the United States (which is even more ironic since Turkey is part of NATO). Also, Turkey had a horrible history of slaughtering people under Kemal Atatürk. The Turkish destruction of the western-like city of Smyrna in 1922 is a deplorable example of what happens when Turkish nationalism goes crazy. I’m not a big fan of Turkey or much of its past, so before we start hoping that Egypt starts resembling Turkey we may want to remember that Turkey was no real bonus when it was ruled by military dictators. Now we are headed for an Islamist takeover in Turkey and that’s not looking too great, either.
True, a military takeover is preferable to an Islamist takeover, but be careful what you wish for. The army may just take over completely and just put another general in power. That could start a civil war and I’m sure that countries like Iran and Syria would only be too happy to supply money and weapons to the people who want to usher in an Islamic state headed by the Muslim Brotherhood. Sad to think that the best option we can hope for in Egypt is a military dictatorship that will sit on any Islamic revolt.
This is also even more puzzling given the fact that for 30 years now there has been a huge western influence in Egypt, especially with the army. Many Egyptians have gone to western universities, have lived in western countries, and have worked for western corporations. Yet we still have A LOT of Egyptians like Mohamed Atta, the leader of the 9/11 attack, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermined of 9/11 and the guy who sawed-off Daniel Pearl’s head, and of course, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin-Laden’s No. 2 man. All of them Egyptians and all of them members of the Muslim Brotherhood. And were there many protests in Egypt condemning the actions of these men? I didn’t hear much. In fact, the Muslim Brotherhood is stronger today than it has ever been. So much for Western “influence” in that country.
The bottom line is, I’m not too optimistic about Egypt’s future. If the best we can hope for is a military dictatorship based in nationalism (in the Nasser model) rather than another Islamic theocracy run by mullahs, that ain’t much of a choice. We may have to come to grips with the fact that democracy just does not work in that part of the world, which means that that part of the world will be in constant conflict and turmoil for years, if not generations, to come.
Correct and
P.S. We will be drawn into the coming Islamist nightmare in the middle east of that we can be assured.
Turks are a blood-thirsty and violent people. They were thus under the Ottomans (see ‘Balkans’), and remained so under Attaturk (see Armenians), and will be tomorrow under whatever mullahs are running things then. If you can’t see that there are real differences among peoples, you will never be able to understand either history or current events. Because it is Leftist ideology that all peoples (and all individuals) are the same, Americans seem to be blind to obvious differences. Being unable to see the facts is never a good basis for foreign policy or domestic politics.
Jacobite;
Europeans spent half of the last century slaughtering each other by the tens of millions. If anything, it is Europeans that have set the bar on murderous violence.
A reminder, Steve, that the Turkish Solution included the slaughter of millions of Christians, both Armenian and Greek, the displacement of thousands of Christians and a hostile attitude towards anything Christian that goes on to this day.
The Armenian Genocide took place during the war, under Ottoman auspices. Atatürk and the “Turkish Solution” came years later.
The Greek Population Transfer of 1923 (Turks were forcibly removed from postwar Greece, as well) was agreed to, and rather brutally enforced. by both Ankara and Athens.
…and misinformed as well; Smyrna (now Izmir) was burned to the ground and all Greeks were thrown out of Asia minor under conditions that today we call “genocides” – none of that too place in Greece, from where Turks left. Read and learn before you post nonsense.
Izmir — Smyrna, if you insist — was the base from which Greece launched an invasion of Anatolia proper, with the goal of tossing Atatürk out of Ankara. And of seizing who-knows-what-else along the way.
The Greeks lost. And typically, the loser loses territory, too, as a reminder of why one doesn’t start wars. Poland took all of Germany east of the Oder-Neisse Line without so much as a Thank You Ma’am in 1945, and the resulting transfer of Germans to the west was a horrible thing.
But you still don’t see many people calling for Germany to regain Silesia and Pomerania. Well, not many people who don’t carry swastikas.
The Greeks were on the winning side of WWI, and gained territory at the expense of the Ottoman. But on the losing side of their war with Turkey, and paid the price.
Deal with it.
Is this supposed to be an answer to my point?
As to your new point, about “Greece losing the war against Turkey” in the 1922-23 expedition, you’re again misinformed and not well read: Greece was drawn into this war by Britain and France, powers which abandoned Greece halfway through the expedition, thus THEY’re primarily responsible for the consequences of losing the war. Besides, the Turks are responsible for what the atrocities they committed in Smyrna. Again, read and learn before you post.
Turks have genocidal blood in their hands no matter what they and their agents say or deny.
Poor Greece — sucked into a war of territorial expansion through no fault of it’s own.
Meanwhile, UR, I answered your question pretty thoroughly for a blog comment. You, however, didn’t address any of my points, you merely reiterated your previous ones.
My point was and has to do with the attrocities and barbarism committed by “Ataturk” and his hords against the residents of Smyrna, that he ordered burned to the ground.
You don’t address this, for obvious reasons, islam lover.
Reply to S. Green, post of Feb 13 @3:42pm
Your statement:
“Poor Greece — sucked into a war of territorial expansion through no fault of it’s own.”
is misleading on a number of fronts: (i) as pointed out by a previous poster, Greece was dragged into this war against Turkey in 1919 by England and France. (ii) In 1922, and while the Greek Army was advancing towards Ankara sweeping the Turkish Army, England and France not only pulled the rug under Greece, but turned against it and assisted the Turks. (iii) Greece was not attempting to “territorially expand” as you claim but instead to liberate lands it held for millennia before the Turks invaded these lands in the 7th century AD. These lands, the Aegean coastal area of Asia Minor and especially the city of Smyrna (Izmir), were still inhabited at the beginning of the 20th century overwhelmingly by Christian ethnic Greeks, speaking Greek. Now, these are the facts, you can paint them anyway you wish, but “facts are sticky things.”
This switch by the West, from a pro-Christian stand on the side of Greece to a pro-islamic stand on the side of Turkey, has been fatal (for the West) in the distant past; it is proving to be so also at present in the cases of Serbia, Greece and Cyprus. The West is cannibalizing its own, and pretty soon there won’t be much of a “West” left.
IMHO the transfer saved millions of lives in the long run. Made Greece much more homogeneous, but alas this lesson has been forgotten.
Ah yes TURKEY- swiftly drifting back into it’s roots– ISLAMIC fundamentalist- ignoring as much as possible the anti USA anti Isreal movements and orgs- while still trying to do business- they like your money not you —
as for the military losing power we again can blame stupid or naive EU for making it happen- by dangling EU entry and making that a CONDITION.
WE CAN ALSo ADD TO aTATURK’S CRIMES- THE kURDS- OCCUPATION OF THEIR LANDS opps capslock sorry- and the repressions of those people right down to making their very language a crime-denying them jobs and no civil rights (yet no human rights orgs cry for this real aparthied) (Turkey-Kurds still in a war , Kurdistan still occupied)- Cyprus also still occupied by Turks- it is GREECE
to the person who said -land won in war is that nation’s to KEEP- unless of course that nation is named Israel-
Hi Steve,
Excellent article. I believe in essence that the army’s takeover now is in fact the first steps in what you call the “Turkish Solution”. What people don’t seem to realize that democracy and freedom are not synonymous in Islamic countries. I know it’s a hard concept to swallow for westerners but that’s the simple fact.
Shalom,
Peter
The most effective ‘diplomatic’ link we have
is the associations between officers of the
US and Egyptian militaries, particularly those
in the Pentagon.
The most important point the US officers can
make is that the Turkish Solution is included
in the US Constitution, and has worked so well
that the power has never been used.
Stephen Green,
The “Turkish Solution” could be applied to many countries in the world.
Thank you for this excellent post that explains so much and clarifies how much of the world operates that most in the West seem unable to understand.
Atatürk, like Deng Xiaoping (in China), knew Turkey (or China) needed a democratic republic if it were to become western and modern. But he (Ataturk and Deng) were realists, who knew that the Turks (and Chinese) were not fully ready for the responsibilities of self-governance.
However, many of the under educated in West will always react with shock and disgust at anything that doesn’t reflect how most Western nations (especially America) deal with political problems and solutions since most seem incapable of understanding that most of the world’s people in the third and developing sector have never lived in a multi-party republic and many still live an existence similar to Europe’s middle ages with many peasants and a few landowners.
Many of these third world and developing countries are also collective cultures since having strong families and loyalty to a country’s leadership (hopefully a benign authoritarian government instead of a
malignant one) leads to continued modernization and eventual emergence as a developed nation with a large, educated middle class capable of understanding the complex issues that control the political operations of a multi party republic with regular elections.
What many in the West don’t seem to know is that it took time for Western cultures to evolve into multi-party republics that are not ruled by authoritarian governments and/or military juntas. I suspect the industrial revolution, which led to huge migrations from urban to rural areas had a lot to do with how the Western republics developed and evolved to be the political systems of today.
Even the United States in the 18th century had slavery, women were chattel, children could be sold into slavery/indentured servitude, education was not public or mandatory and only about 10% of the population (mostly white men that owned property) could vote, because the Founding Fathers realized that most people were not ready to take part in the republic that they created in the Constitution of the United States as Turkey, Egypt and countries such as China may also not ready to make that leap at this time.
Which brings up these questions—Are all the people eligible to vote in America and Europe today every ready to take part in the multi-party republican process? Could the answer to the first question explain why America’s Founding Fathers despised total democracy because of the danger of mob rule, which they warned us of?
I use China as an additional comparison since I write of China often and I saw comparisons to what you wrote, which explains a lot—even during Tiananmen Square in 1989 when Deng Xiaoping was caught on camera saying, “Of course we want China to be a democracy but the people are not ready yet.”
Thank you for this explanation, which goes a long way to explain much of what happens in the rest of the world outside the West.
This all worked very well for Turkey … until the EU started playing around with them. The EU forced Turkey to amend its Constitution in 2003 – to take supreme power away from the military. The EU made Turkey do this in order to be considered for EU membership, which the EU rightfully never intended to grant Turkey. Unfortunately, that supreme military power was the only thing that kept Turkey sane, and we have seen Turkey descend into the islamist abyss ever since, with Turkey now having shown itself to no longer be a strong NATO ally and moving very close to becoming an enemy of Israel (with whom Turkey had heretofore been a strong ally). Turkey was the main instigator in that Gaza flotilla idiocy.
The Euros, once again, have managed to totally screw things up. As I said, they were right to not want to accept Turkey into the EU, but they should not have messed around with Turkey while playing this game. But, the Euros can’t help themselves. They have to make a mess of every situation they are able to.
The military coup in Egypt is about the best outcome anyone could have expected, but things are going to deteriorate pretty badly from here.
Turkey slide into the Islamic abyss? Never been there have you? Granted I’ve only been the Western and Central parts of Turkey…and they are not the typical hard line Muslims. Turks are extremely proud of their secular heritage, consider the US a strong ally for standing with them against Soviet aggression, and for a supposed “Islamic Abyss”, the locals really like to drink. Out of all the Islamic countries I have been too, Turkey was the most laid back.
Though I agree with you, the EU has totally screwed them over. The biggest reason for that is that German has a very large Turkish population that is blamed for all the social problems. If Turkey were allowed to join the US, every other UN country would have to grant them the same rights and access. Germany and Greece have basically stood in their way. The funny thing, because Turkey has had to stand up on their own, their economy (which was the excuse for not letting them in) is doing much, MUCH better than a lot of EU countries right now.
I should get off my soap box here but if I can recommend to anyone seeking a fun, relatively cheap yet exotic vacation,you could do a lot worst than hitting up the western part of Turkey.
Turkey’s government is at the forefront of this slide. I’m not saying that Turkey is now an islamist nation, but it is rapidly moving that way. As to your idea that Turkey is a cool place to visit, that is true for some. You don’t have to go too far back to remember the reaction in Turkey – among the population – to Israel’s Gaza operation. It was insane. The Israelis used to love to vacation in Turkey. It was one of their favorite spots. That reaction by Turkey was an eye-opener for many Israelis, and it should have been for much of the world, too. Then there were those later NATO war games (which Turkey refused to allow Israel to participate in) which said a lot more, and none of it good.
As to the rest, Turkey has steadily been moving out of its close alliance with the West through NATO. Turkey is still a key NATO partner, but it is not a trustworthy one, though it’s still better than France, not that that is anything to instill confidence.
You’ve only seen the beginning of Turkey’s move – both politically and socially.
You may be enamoured with the Turks and turkey, “Lawrence of Turkey,” but the hard fact is that Turkey is the bully of the area. They still occupy by military force 40% of Cyprus and even the Turks on that Island are against your beloved Turkey.
The country called “Turkey” is a country built on at least three genosides (Armenians, Greeks and Kurds) and lays claims on lands stollen and invaded by islam seven centuries ago.
Their military (the real instrument of power in that country) is “secular” only on paper, since it consists mostly of islamists and secondarily of communists. The term “democracy” is unknown and appalling to the Turks, outside the elite and corrupt centers of Constantinople (Istanbul) and Ankara. As for the character called “Ataturk” history will record the devious behavior of that closet homosexual.
“genocide” sorry for the typo.
You funny! Best troll of the day! Good work!
Is that your response? Very “intelligent” counter-argument indeed, muslim lover.
If you’ve never lived there for any length of time, you’ve seen what they want a typical tourist to see when they visit Turkey. I lived there, worked there and learned their language (iki bucuk sene Ankarada gorev yaptim), just in case there’s any doubt. Even the secular Turks are deeply worried and nearly all those we met had plans to get out in the next five years, before Erdogan and his goons completely ruin a once staunch ally of the West.
I was stationed there while doing my military time.
And that, you think, makes you an expert on Turkey and islam?
Not at all KateB. It does however mean I was exposed to a lot more of the country and it’s people than what tourists are.
Kate,
Being stationed overseas gives you a great opportunity to see several strada of a culture, over a long period of time (more than any vaction, acedemic or journalistic visit)…
You see, by being INVOLVED, the military/authoritairian side, its rules, and requirements of our forces, and its own power and influence, and how the general population contempts, loves or fears them.
You also get to mingle among the tourists sites, and see the “retail” side of the country and the economy, the face it WANTS to show the visitors.
Lastly, you get to see and know locals who work outside the tourist industry, the “regular” people, and how they live, and what they believe about “others”…
Take all three (often contradictory) samples, and you understand more than anyone who has only READ about the place.
Does that make you an EXPERT? well, I’ll take the opinion from any deployed soldier or airman over that of any Diplomat or Professor or Journalist, 9 times out of 10
@Diablo,
Sorry, anecdotal evidence doesn’t render one qualified to speak about anything, let alone a country called “Turkey.”
Anecdotal evidence only reveals your own biases at one point in time, and nothing else. The land you visited has been inhabited for thousands of years, and the people that live there now have been there for only the past six centuries. You meeting with a few of them for a brief time period gives you no great insight, knowledge or understanding. You only reveal the lenses through which you saw them.
My response to Diablo applies to “the root ’83″ as well (if they’re different individuals).
“Out of all the Islamic countries I have been too, Turkey was the most laid back”
Thats about as soothing as “Out of all the mass murderers I’ve interviewed, Ted Bundy was really handsome and nice”
Until they all completely reject the life of Mohammed, no peace can be had with them, only temporary lulls in the violence.
Islam has had a powerful revival over the last 50 years. It has come full circle in Iran were it has discredit itself, but still holds power. In Egypt the revival is strong and far from played out, far from discredited.
We will see more Islam, more pan-Arab-ism and a nuclear war with Israel.
Fortunately, the scheduled elections aren’t until this fall, so that gives Egypt over half a year to let the current passions calm down if the military sticks with the existing schedule. It also gives groups opposed to the radicalism of the Muslim Brotherhood a chance to organize their own political structures and (hopefully) determine their leaders — and hopefully ones who have decent communications skills, since odds are the outside media (al Jazeera and the western media that follows their lead covering Arab states) are going to be pushing the line that the Muslim Brotherhood is no different from your local Rotary Club line between now and whenever the election takes place.
It will. be interesting to see who the MSM blames when the Mideast blows up. My bet US Christians Jews and of course the Tea Parties.
Having served in Turkey in the late 70′s all I can say is at that time it was pro American, except for a small radical fringe. The most important thing I remember is being told to set my watch ahead 10 hours and my mind back a hundred years and you will survive. And it was one of the more modern countries in the area. I don’t think I would want to go back there today.
I’d like to ad an eight-year-old’s perspective. No, I’m not eight now – I’m nearly thirteen years older than that (yeah, well, and then some…). I remember going through the Gallipoli peninsular, where soldiers from my nation, Great Britain, along with soldiers from Australia and New Zealand, fought a grim campaign against the Ottomans, who were commanded by Turkey’s future leader, Mustafa Kemal.
We passed an army camp, where a senior officer was reviewing a platoon of soldiers. My father, an ex-Royal Marine of the WWII vintage, who had seen a bit of scrambled egg on hats in his time, reckoned that the inspecting officer was a full general. We waved from the car – and the general waved back and then the files-on-parade did, too.
Turkey’s military has been filleted by the current government there, so I am not sure that we’d get the same reception now. I suspect that the Turkish armed forces were more formidable, before they became islamised. My point is that Egypt’s army will be able to hold the line against the islamists only if they are both friendly and formidable, as the Turkish army was in the Seventies. I think that the Turkish army back then, while having numerous internal opponents, was recognised as the principal pillar supporting the state. I don’t think that it has that status now and I am not convinced that the Egyptian army, never remotely as capable as Turkey’s, has the ability to control Egypt, even for the brief period of transition to free elections. I hope I’m wrong.
And I know that any day now, the Preamble to their Constitution, the Quran, will be ratified. The media is being played like a bongo drum.
Perhaps the greatest event in leadership in the history of government, never to be repeated, was the exceptional beginnings of the United States of America. The head of the victorious revolutionary army, was petitioned by vested interests to become king. Penultimate power was his for the taking. However George Washington said no, and went home. History is filled with tough guys, Mubarak, Ataturk, Stalin, or Hussein; some are better than others. All ruled by the gun.
George Washington was the largest distiller in the nation; he made good whiskey and lots of it. The first voting place was the local bar, and free drinks were to be had for voting correctly. People scrambled to establish a set of basic laws, to get going. However many voted yes while holding their nose, and immediately pressed for amendments. After a time, they were passed. The first amendment recognized the right to speak freely, assemble, and forbade a state religion; the second amendment recognized the right of citizens to bear arms.
Egypt has had 8,000 years of bloodshed and has not gotten it right yet. The US is losing the basics. We both need another George Washington, and self disciplined voters.
Ataturk is turning on his grave. All his reforms not only are being dismantlement piece by piece, his beloved army is turning on him. Soo much for Turkish Democracy/Model.
The biggest problem with the analogy is that the ‘Turkish solution’ is breaking down now, and the Islamists are taking over.
Had this happened even 20 years ago, a Turkish solution could have worked, now, not so much….
“Revolution is three missed meals away”
While the military control in Turkey and Egypt can certainly keep radical Islam at bay, the people have to eat every day. The Great Ethanol Scam has increased food costs and that has an immediate and devastating effect on the citizenry.
The USA exports many tons of food every day, but that tonnage is being diminished because of the far left’s insistence that we have to use corn to produce gasoline (instead of using crude oil which NO ONE can eat).
Well, I toured Turkey 2 years ago. Nice country, good food, and plenty of history to see. All was really, really good, until we went to Western Turkey. Coming out of a site, my room mate was a few steps ahead of me.
A Muslim lady, looked at my room mate from head to toe and just sneered at her (behind her back of course). Mind you the room mate had on long pants, a tee shirt with a long shirt over the top. It was positively the most creepy thing I witnessed.
If Egypt goes the turkish route it’s curtains for Israel, the EU and the West (not that it’s not already, as a result of the rampant on-going islamization due to the explosive influences of concomitant immigration and petrodollar-based corruption of western demographics, economics and politics.)
Fine, except that the muslim terrorists in Egypt know the Turkish example, too. So did the muslim terrorists in Iran. Look to the Iranian model. There will be assassinations in Eggypt and they will turn to executions as the muslim terrorists begin to take over, at first, limited areas and cities and, later, broad areas of the country.
Look for the muslim terrorists to officially oppose the muslim brotherhood and adopt a hope and change kind of name to further mislead the Kenyan. They’ll call themselves something like the “Movement for the Future of Egypt” or “Egyptian Patriots for Democracy for All.” The name is only to fool the incompetent boobs in Washington and will do nothing to slow the waves of assassinations and executions.
Mr. Green’s analysis is based on the past and doesn’t reflect the current state of affairs in ‘Turkiye’. I lived and worked there for 2 1/2 years (recently) and can, with a great deal of confidence, state that Erdogan has, in a few short years, undone most of what existed prior to the AK Party coming into power. They have deftly utilized the EU admissions process to effectively neuter the military (long the undisputed guardians of the ‘secular state’), install a new judiciary sympathetic to the islamic cause and take the government to new heights of corruption. The areas of the country that don’t normally vote for AK party members experience an influx of citizens ‘resettled’ from the easternmost reaches of Turkey. They are traditionally more religious and, combined with the freebies given them by the politicians, vote overwhelming for Erdogan’s goons. If you ever wanted to visit this historic country, you should do it soon; it won’t be a shadow of what is was in about 5 years.
Nowhere in this article does Steve Green approve of the “Turkish Solution” he just says that it is what is going to happen in Egypt. He describes it as “never pretty, but it works”, and I agree it is what is going to happen in Egypt.
I wonder if anyone sees the great victory here, even if Egypt ends up with one man, one vote, one time, they will have seen the promised land of Democracy. Putting Democracies in Iraq and Afghanistan has planted more flags of Democracy, seeds which are slowly growing and influencing all other nations in and out of the region. All nascent Democracies face drawbacks, but everyone in world now realizes if only subconsciously that Democracy is in their future. So let Egypt vote, if they fail, the whole world will watch them fail, and our goal of universal Democracy will be advanced, by one more vote. Every time we get a vote, we gain a victory, as they do what we want them to do, be Democratic.
What we keep hearing is that Islam is not so bad if it can be kept under control, and kept from expressing itself as it really is and really wants to be. In other words the less Islamic it is the better Islam is and the more tolerable it is.
Non-Muslims making excuses for Islam are reminiscent of an abused spouse making excuses for the abuser because she/he is afraid to stand up to the one doing the abusing. (He’s not SO bad if you give him a chance, you just have to get to know him…really …REALLY!!) Until the next time.
Trying to make an accommodation with Islam is a fools errand.
I don’t pretend to know where this will all end, because Islam has already been allowed to run amok. But it can’t be good.
Will the Copts be massacred first (Armenians) and then a nasty war with a neighbor Israel (Cyprus/Greece)?
What ails Egypt is the same thing that ails Turkey then and now, Islam. It’s a pox on humanity.
The Muslim Brotherhood and the AKP, 2 peas in a pod.
The author has simply not been paying attention to what has happened in Turkey during the past 10 years. Creeping Islamization,less rights for women and persecution as well as murders of Christians.
The 1st time we were in Turkey in 1987 the people were secular & really liked Americans and others from the West. You never heard of any radical islamic groups as the military kept a lid on ‘em. Now 1/2 of the women are in burkas, Turks hate the west and despise Americans. They have turned to Iran & in 10 yrs. will be a full Islamic Republic as soon as they get all of their radicals into the military & judicial system.
It is simply a matter of time till Egypt sinks into the Muslim Brotherhood abyss. I give them 3 years. Radical Islam is very popular in Egypt and the Muslim Brother has far more people in favor of it than any other party. The handwriting is on the wall & it’s too bad that the idiots in the State Dept. & CIA still have no clue. They just never will.
I’ve read the criticisms in other comments of this post and I disagree with what most say in regards to the intent that “I saw” in what Stephen Green wrote. In my opinion, most of these critical comments are shortsighted.
What I learned from the “Turkish Solution” (we could also call it the Gandhi solution) is that each country and the citizens of each country are responsible for the future and fate of that country and the US and the Western democracies of Europe should not meddle in the politics of other countries.
In today’s world with the Internet as an influence, literate people that are linked to the World Wide Web, even in China where the state’s attempt at censorship leaks like a bucket full of holes, the people will eventually learn of the choices of governance that exist and the options they have to choose from. In fact, hundreds of thousands (maybe millions) of mainland Chinese from the middle and upper middle class have attended universities in the West and carried what they learned back to China. Even most of the leaders of hina send their children to the West to earn higher educations, which has led to many changes in China since Mao’s death.
If Egyptians, Chinese, Iranians, etc., want to change and improve the lifestyles and politics of a country, it is up to those citizens to make those changes peacefully (Gandhi) or through a bloody revolution (Kemal Atatürk, Sun Yat-wen, Lenin, or George Washington).
The nation building the US is attempting in Afghanistan and Iraq is not the way to change the politics of another country. What the CIA attempted many times since World War II through assassinations of leaders such as the democratically elected leader of Iran, who was replaced with a dictator, The Shah of Iran, which then led to the Islamic revolution that became the Iran of today that hates the US is an example of what the chain of events caused by meddling turned into.
Another, historical example of the damage Western meddling caused globally is what the British Empire did while still ruling over a quarter of the earth’s people. When Britain gave up its empire after World War II, it left behind the mess we have in Burma, Africa, the Middle East, and the problems between India and Pakistan.
This same Western meddling led to the Korean Conflict and the Vietnam Wars fought by the French and the US. A case could also be made that World War II with Germany and Japan was due to meddling. For Japan, it was the US “forcing” Japan to open its doors to the world, which led to political changes in Japans government that brought on the deaths of everyone in the Pacific theater after Japan invaded China then later bombed Pearl Harbor.
Will American and the West’s other democracies ever stop meddling in the affairs and politics of other nations and allow time to offer solutions from within?