THE ARMY IS BEATEN: WHY THE U.S. SHOULD HAIL THE ISLAMISTS
By Owen Matthews
Newsweek
March 15, 2010
The political logic should be simple. The arrest of a shadowy group
of generals for allegedly plotting a bloody coup should be a victory
for justice. The end of military meddling in politics should be a
victory for democracy. And greater democracy should make a country
more liberal and more pro-European.
Except that in Turkey, political logic doesn’t always follow simple
patterns. Yes, last week’s arrests of dozens of Army officers on
charges of plotting bombings and murders are a win for civilian
prosecutors over the once untouchable military. More important,
the arrests also mark the quiet demise of the military as a decisive
force in Turkish politics for the first time in centuries. That’s a
vital step in Turkey’s road to becoming a mature democracy.
But the paradox is that a more democratic Turkey doesn’t necessarily
mean one that is more pro-European or more pro-American. And with the
last major obstacle to the ruling AK Party’s power gone, Turkey’s
conservative prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, will be free to
implement his vision of a more Islamic Turkey. More democracy, then,
doesn’t necessarily lead to more liberalism, either.
The first victim of the new order may be Europe. Ever since they came
to power in 2002, AK Party leaders have used EU membership as a shield
to defend their reform programs against attacks from ultrasecularists
in the military and the judiciary. Notionally, the military was in
favor of joining Europe, so the AK Party railroaded through most of
its most radical changes under the EU’s banner. Downscaling the powers
of the military-dominated National Security Council, banning the death
penalty, scrapping some restrictions on free speech, allowing Kurdish
language rights–all were in the Copenhagen criteria set by the EU.
But now that the AK Party’s main rival, the military, has been shown
to be a paper tiger, there’s not much utility for Erdogan & Co. in
pushing the European project any further.
That’s terrible timing for Europe. Support within the EU for further
expansion is fading fast. A looming crisis over Cyprus threatens to
create further animosity on both sides as EU members Greece and Greek
Cyprus threaten to block Ankara’s accession bid. Add to that various
tin-eared EU initiatives, like trying to get the conservative Turks
to allow gay marriage, and you have a recipe for trouble. Turks are
also angry because of the EU’s many unfulfilled promises over opening
Cyprus’s ports to international trade. The AK Party’s win over the
Army could well prove to be the EU’s serious loss.
It also raises a tough question for Washington: does the U.S. want
Middle East allies who are less democratic but more friendly, or more
democratic but more hostile to America? During the Cold War, when
the military was in charge, Turkey fell into the first camp. Now it
makes sense for Washington to choose democracy–even if the outcomes
aren’t, as George W. Bush found in Iraq, always pro-Western. Cutting
the Army’s dead hand from politics will allow Turkey to define
secularism democratically and to deal openly with issues like the
demands of the Kurdish minority for autonomy. That choice should be
particularly easy now, as evidence presented by Turkish prosecutors
suggest that the self-declared guardians of Turkey’s secular order
plotted heinous crimes in order to destabilize the AK Party, possibly
including the bombing of the British Consulate in Istanbul in 2003.
If Turkey becomes more anti-Western, that’s probably inevitable. A
storm of popular anger is brewing over the EU’s undeclared rejection
of Turkish membership, even as the accession process continues, and
over moves in the U.S. Congress to recognize the massacres of Ottoman
Armenians in 1915 as a genocide. If the vote goes ahead, expect Turks
to retaliate, perhaps by refusing to support U.S. sanctions against
Iran in the U.N. Security Council.
Turks have made it clear repeatedly at the ballot box that they
endorse the AK Party’s vision of a less-rigorously secular country.
Ordinary Turks aren’t huge fans of the U.S., either. But it’s also
clear that Turkey under the AK Party will remain a Western ally, and
NATO will remain Ankara’s most important strategic partner. How do
we know? The AK Party says so, and it has no real options. There’s
no rival alliance, not with Iran, the Arab world, or Russia, which
could possibly rival the clout Turkey has, with the second-largest
Army in NATO. In the short term, Turkey will likely sour on the EU
and have a loud row with the U.S. over Armenia. In the long term,
the downfall of the Army will make Turkey a stronger democracy and
a more stable and mature partner. So the world would be wise to side
with the AK Party, not seek a return of the discredited generals.