In the months preceding the March 12, 1971, and the Sept. 12, 1980, coups d’état, we were also unable to see the real picture as 10-30 of our youths were slain each day. We also didn’t see it, or couldn’t see it, when Uğur Mumcu, Abdi İpekçi and Çetin Emeç were killed.While efforts were under way to make secularists believe in a growing threat of “reactionaryism,” the conservative right was being made to believe that the communist threat was progressing step by step. Then the Alevi threat was staged for the Sunnis and vice versa. Incidents in Kahramanmaraş, Çorum and Sivas, provocations in İstanbul’s Gazi neighborhood -- they were all staged to prevent us from seeing the real picture. People were burned alive at the Madımak Hotel. Thousands of yet unsolved murders were committed in order to make us see this fake picture, to make it seem authentic. Now they want to bring Kurds and Turks in opposition to one another.
Just like the bloody murders of the past, bloody terrorist attacks are a trap to prevent us from seeing the real picture, to make us think that there’s a “Kurdish rebellion” under way. Yes, it’s a perfidious trap to target Kurds by causing nationalism to swell with the tears of mothers and the cries of grieving hearts. They’re even pushing us Turks to hesitate to say: “Stop -- Kurds are our brothers. This is a game -- if our fraternity ends, then it’s all over.” Instead of this, they want us to say: “All Kurds are members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party [PKK] who want to divide the nation. We won’t be fooled!” They want us to constrain this country and each other. In particular, a segment of the media continues to serve as the most effective tool ahead of each undemocratic intervention that this nation sees, a tool to show us what they want us to see…
The true picture is of the struggle to perpetuate the system of tutelage by blocking democratization in this country.
Yes, the Kurdish problem and PKK terrorism are intertwined. But the dirty and bloody structures within the state are also intertwined with terror. This is actually exactly what the Ergenekon trial tells us. Juntas within the military cannot rid themselves of their intolerance toward the civilian will.
But the worst is the corrosion of each institution, and the loss of trust in them in the struggle of tutelage and democracy. As an institution, the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) is corroding before our very eyes. The judiciary had never lost trust to this extent before, had never come to the point of being a tool for certain centers. And there’s also the media. We’ve taken up positions that make up enemy fronts. Those with a conscience in these institutions have come to be ashamed of their occupations.
If you look at the Ergenekon courts, you can see that the high judiciary’s desperate moves to protect the status quo show that this affair is in complete disorder. Swords have been drawn from their sheaths, and the law of the land no longer means anything here. The ruling to be issued by the Constitutional Court on the upcoming referendum package is pregnant with new debates and conflicts. And the ever-increasing political and societal tension is about to transform into a concussion of hatred, enmity and emotional lashes.
During times like these, tranquility, common sense and logic become as valuable as diamonds. If not, should the swords that have been drawn fail to be returned to their sheaths, then our country will be right in the middle of an absolute disaster.
We’re all on the same boat and there’s only one port at which we can dock: democracy. Yes, today the shore of happiness is clear: democratization.
It is only through democratization that we can solve the Kurdish problem, the Sunni-Alevi divide and the secular/non-secular polarization. Democratization is also the only force that can bring economic prosperity, tranquility and a modern, strong military.
Ergenekoners will abandon illegal structures using them as subcontractors. They’ll be left with no choice but to abandon them. No one else will stand in support of junta members, the guilty parties and those who committed murders. And nobody should.
We cannot postpone justice. And it’s not a solution to just say that what’s happened has happened and that it’s time to forget the past. The guilty parties must be brought to face justice so that no one will open the door to new transgressions again… Junta members must be brought to account so that new people aspiring to form juntas will not be in our military, will not be encouraged, protected or watched over.
The real picture isn’t of terrorist incidents, but the pangs of democratization.
