This dark chain of relations has not been fully illuminated yet. The public, on the other hand, is indescribably ignorant about such issues because the media in this country has striven to cast a shadow on these issues and shadowy relations between different groups like a censor's filter. The reason was that there were businessmen in this criminal network, and media bosses and administrators were naturally a part of this network. Over time, politics in Turkey turned out to be a dual structure, one side of which was visible and the other invisible. Complex ties between these "two worlds" were long perceived as taboo. Society was disturbed by transparency as if it would make people feel ashamed and externalize the dirt deep inside.
The upper side of this dual structure prevented the deepening of an investigation into a criminal network pointed to by the Susurluk accident. The case was covered up with light punishments, and these punishments were rendered even lighter in time; however, something unexpected popped up at an unexpected time. An interview with a man named Abdülkadir Aygan, a former Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) member who later became an informant, was published in the Gündem daily. Aygan's answers to questions included all the details of a series of murders and described the exact location of the bodies of those murdered. The first reaction from the public was disbelief of Aygan's words. The "central" media, which reflected the debates on the "deep state" as efforts to attack the republic, disregarded these confessions. But the police accepted Aygan's remarks as a tip-off and discovered bodies in places that Aygan pointed out. But the media put this development on their back pages. They tried to create the impression that the findings through Aygan's statements did not belong to our world.
Finally, the incident of Aygan was sacrificed to the Turkish public's tendency to forget about crimes because this public doesn't want to hear about or see that the state commits crimes or is in close contact with criminal organizations even if it is fully aware of it. The public doesn't know how to behave toward the state in such a case. As it feels that it owes the state for its own identity, the public regards everything that threatens the state as a threat to itself and prefers to withdraw to its own private life and leave real politics to the state.
This is why a state-centered criminal network can maintain its existence so easily. And this is why those captured after committing murder are so sure that they will not get hurt and will be protected by the state.
The developments we are witnessing today serve as a critical threshold regarding the public's psychological dependence on the state. Tuncay Güney, who is currently residing in Canada, is like Aygan's post-modern version. He was looked down upon with his first statements and there were attempts to render what he said meaningless given his personality. When his statements were confirmed by other sources, they had to take him seriously. The importance of the information he gives becomes clearer when we realize that he is a man with years-long links with Ergenekon. But, what is weirder is that what he says is being reflected as if the incidents took place in a "normal" or "natural" atmosphere. Though it sounds odd to us, the reason is not the way Güney tells things but that the world of crime is perceived as truly "natural" in this country.
In the course of the Ergenekon investigation, many people were surprised by the relations between "esteemed" bureaucrats and people implicated in various crimes because the public is not aware of the "naturalness" of the world of crime; however, the world of crime in Turkey works like an alternative "market" given the feeling of ease that results from the state's protection and not being called to account. There are entrepreneurs, investors, producers and consumers in this market. This market has firms engaged in drug and arms smuggling and the organization of collection of money.
We can even say that these firms have become holdings. We have come to realize the existence of groups that cut the Ergenekon network vertically thanks to the information that has just emerged. At the top of these groups are entrepreneurs and directive-giving "esteemed" bureaucrats. Just below are investor businessmen and politicians who wish to increase their power. On the very bottom are "laborers," who have an operational ability. We can, of course, talk about professional producers/administrators between investors and laborers. Retired Brig. Gen. Levent Ersöz and İbrahim Şahin, former deputy chairman of the National Police Department's Special Operations Unit, belong to this group. Both are intelligence officers because intelligence serves as lubricant for this world of crime. In this way, they pave the way for blackmail and murders and realize a "predictable" production.
This alternative world is one of the fundamental qualities of the regime in Turkey. The public is for the first time face-to-face with a reality it cannot ignore. Now, it is time to confront.
