I recently had a conversation with a senior Turkish official dealing with intelligence affairs. He confirmed that plans to establish such a new unit would most likely yield only superficial results and that the government was going to pull the rug out from under its own feet with this move.
This was because, he said, the Gendarmerie General Command (JGK), which operates under the Interior Ministry in theory but actually takes orders from the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) had agreed to merge its intelligence-gathering operations with the police if this unit was set up. Taking into consideration the deeply rooted rivalry between police intelligence, affiliated with the government, and the JGK, acting upon orders from the TSK, the JGK's consent to merge intelligence operations was strange and hints that the new counterterrorism unit would serve the continuation of the activities of the deep state, the official said.
Secondly, he said, the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) did not object to the potential handover of its internal intelligence-gathering operations to this unit, pending its creation. MİT might have had a plan to weaken police intelligence operations by handing over its internal intelligence-gathering functions to this new unit.
He also argued that the first act the appointed head of this unit would undertake would be to dissolve the Police Department Intelligence Directorate so that the deep state would be able to continue its activities aimed at undermining democratization efforts.
His analysis of MİT was also interesting, as it hinted that there has been a division between pro-coup and anti-coup MİT personnel, as has been the case with the TSK.
Statements made to interrogators by İbrahim Şahin, a former acting chief of the Police Special Operations Directorate who was arrested last week following his detention over alleged links to the Ergenekon terror organization, appear to confirm what this senior Turkish official told me.
Most of the country's dailies yesterday carried Şahin's statements to investigators on their front pages. He told investigators that 7th Army Corps Commander Gen. Bekir Kalyoncu and Gen. Metin (He did not provide this general's last name) from the General Staff had told him that he was going to be appointed as the undersecretary of this new counterterrorism unit and that he should make the necessary preparations, such as listing the names of around 300 police officers from the Special Operations Unit to operate under this new unit.
If Şahin's revelations turn out to be true during the later phases of the ongoing Ergenekon investigation, they will certainly confirm the assertions of the Turkish intelligence official I spoke with recently.
Şahin's revelations may also explain the reasons behind the government's delay in formally setting up the new counterterrorism unit even though its creation was announced more than four months ago.
Apparently the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) was warned beforehand about the motives behind the counterterrorism unit and its links with Ergenekon, and this may have prompted the government to not formally announce its creation.
Şahin's name has been familiar to the Turkish public since a court sentenced him to six years in jail in early 2000 on charges of setting up a gang to commit crimes during the investigation into the Susurluk incident, a traffic accident in the district of Susurluk in Balıkesir province that revealed for the first time ties between the state and criminal gangs.
In relation to the detentions made as part of the 10th wave of Ergenekon operations last week, three retired senior generals were released over the weekend, while others, including Professor Yalçın Küçük, were formally arrested.
It is possible that those three former generals were released because investigators failed to find enough evidence to arrest them. But the fact that their release followed separate meetings between Chief of General Staff Gen. İlker Başbuğ, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and President Abdullah Gül late last week and that those meetings took place upon Gen. Başbuğ's request raises suspicions that their release came at Gen. Başbuğ's request.
The illegal acts attributed to the Ergenekon terror organization can only be halted through a political leadership that will courageously implement democratic reforms, including -- first and foremost -- the total replacement of the existing Constitution, which stands as a serious obstacle in the way of democracy and the supremacy of the rule of law. This will also remove, among other things, suspicions about the release of the three retired generals.
