The attempted military coup against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is perhaps the most important political event in Turkey of the past 16 years, and has fundamentally changed the country’s internal politics and external priorities. Ambassador James Jeffrey’s article, written for The Cipher Brief on July 19, explores some of those early changes and offers a prescient look at where the new Turkey might be headed.
Turks and the rest of the world avoided the worst when a military coup, organized by elements of Jandarma – the Turkish Gendarmerie – army armored units, and the air force against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his AK Party government, failed. But even if this strike against Turkey’s constitutional order was more successful, such a military move, unlike earlier Turkish military action against the civilian state, would not have mobilized the public. As seen in the immediate condemnation of the coup by the opposition political parties, and even anti-Erdogan elements of the media, the Turkish people overwhelmingly reject military rule. And Erdogan supporters, a large and well-organized element of the population, would have resisted to the end. Even had the rest of a military deeply antagonistic towards Erdogan thrown their lot in with the plotters, the result would have been not junta-imposed calm but civil war.
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