Journalists, the armed forces and democracy

The andıç report system was first revealed 10 year ago. It was discovered that generals pressed managers to fire prominent and experienced journalists such as Cengiz Çandar, Mehmet Ali Birand and Mehmet Barlas. The excuse was that they were supporting the PKK terrorist organization. The real aim was to implement the February 28 process and to hush up those journalists who were against it. During the February 28 period, also known as the post-modern coup, generals strengthened their hand by taking control of politics and the media. Thanks to the wave of reactionaryism in the country, the generals directed everything from business to media, from politics to art. In the end Prime Minister Erbakan was forced to resign, and a coalition government supported by the military was formed. This intervention not only changed the political makeup of the country but also society’s “genetic” structure. It was in a sense a re-engineering of society. While the chaos continued, the generals announced that some newspapers would be subject to accreditation regulations. Press Council President Oktay Ekşi held a press conference to explain that such a practice would be wrong. Ekşi applied to the General Staff and asked what their criteria were for accreditation privileges. For years, the General Staff did not answer that question simply because their behavior had no legal or objective grounds. Some journalists were identified as “religious” by the February 28 coup leaders in what was certainly a wrong and discriminatory manner. This kind of criminal attitude had no truth because it was completely arbitrary. Based on a collection of suspicions, assumptions and mistrust, many supporters of the February 28 process began defamation campaigns against individuals and nonprofit organizations. Many journalists were victimized by illegal and unfair treatment.

The documents published in Nokta magazine show that the oppressive regulations implemented under the title of accreditation were limited not only to imaginary criminal allegations of being “Islamist” or “separatist.” Through the accreditation process, some even went further to categorize all journalists (actually all Turks) as being either pro-TSK or anti-TSK.

Was that the reality? Certainly not. Some people didn’t approve of the military’s actions, but they were not an enemy of the military. What could be more natural than this? To be an enemy of the army is one thing, and to be against actions that disrupt democracy is another. If every journalist was forced to say “Whatever the army does is right,” then how would democracy prevail in this country? Certainly, the military can make mistakes, and journalists can exercise their right to criticize this mistake. This doesn’t weaken the military. On the contrary, it will help military leaders make better decisions. This is actually one of the purposes of a functioning democracy.

The fact that the Ottoman Empire collapsed due to internal conflicts has solidified the Turkish military’s concept of “the enemy inside.” It is not just the military that suffers from this mentality. Turkish intellectuals and politicians, it seems, can’t free themselves from this “internal enemy” syndrome, either. Such andıç that have been issued in the name of the TSK are the clearest proof of this understanding. The military, which is responsible for defending the nation, has been more concerned with Turkey’s internal enemies than with external foes and has even set up intelligence services to locate their “enemies inside.” This has been the general reflex of not only the military but also the state. There is an important parallel between allowing different opinions to exist and the desire to escape paranoid emotions and building a more diverse society. As society changes and becomes more diverse, politicians and the military will need to adjust their relations accordingly.