Therefore, this article couldn’t be written in light of what was voiced and decided at this summit, expected to produce a stern warning to all sides involved in the escalation of PKK terrorism or to put on the agenda a bill that would make it possible for a military operation to be carried out in northern Iraq. The speculation circulating before the summit was focused on a cross-border operation, or even the imposition of emergency rule or martial law. It should undoubtedly be fully discussed whether the imposition of emergency rule or the declaration of martial law would benefit or harm the interests of the country in the process of general elections.
Before anything else, we should strongly emphasize that a counterterrorism struggle can not be waged with military methods alone. It is certain that a solution to the Kurdish problem, and the terrorism that is escalating by the exploitation of this problem, can not be found only by looking through the perspective of security. The antidote to terrorism and separatism is economic and social projects to be developed alongside all civil instruments, with political solutions having the priority.
If you want to root out terrorism, the first thing that should be done is to eradicate the atmosphere and the ground from which terrorism stems. And the road to this is making all democratic channels, where nonviolent thoughts and expectations can freely be expressed, wide open. What should primarily be discussed with regard to taking precautions against terrorism is the right to representation being the first and foremost issue, and social and economic projects focusing political interest and expectations on unity by raising all rights and liberties to universal standards. It must be well appreciated by now that trying to kill mosquitoes one by one, what’s more with a sledgehammer, instead of draining the marshland, hasn’t produced any solution in the quarter-century-long history of the painful experience of terrorism.
If we are going to be faced with terrorism despite all the political and social measures taken, we have to wage this struggle with specialized anti-terror teams, since fighting terrorism necessitates expertise. And Turkey’s means are quite enough to form the kind of team that will duly see to this problem.
It is true that terrorism is strengthened by the help it gets from northern Iraq; however, this shouldn’t be enough to have Turkey carry out a military operation into northern Iraq, an operation whose outcome can never be predicted. What should be done first of all is to take measures against terrorism inside the country. Ultimately, terrorism has been hitting us on Turkish soil, not in northern Iraq. And diplomacy and politics should be employed to eliminate the northern Iraqi support of terrorism. Turkey, in these fields, has more than enough tools at its disposal. A direct intervention should be regarded as the last option.
This last option shouldn’t even be mentioned in this election atmosphere. Since this option is being considered these days, the issues of security and domestic politics and the issues of foreign policy and the fight against terrorism have gotten mixed up with one another. This political turmoil is also responsible for turning even the funerals of our martyrs into occasions for protest by impertinent and insolent groups. It’s through this atmosphere that some groups, like carrion crows, are bent on squeezing political gain out of the blessed blood of our martyrs. And unfortunately a great part of the media welcomes this infamy.
A Turkey that hasn’t held its general elections, formed its Parliament and government or elected its new president should act more calmly at this stage and limit the fight against terrorism to its own soil. And the rest should be totally up to the initiative of the new Parliament and government.
At this point, it seems impossible not to agree with what Dr. Sedat Laçiner, the president of the International Strategic Research Institute, said in an interview with Radikal daily on Monday. Stressing the importance of waging the struggle in the country prior to a cross-border operation, Laçiner says: “There are 35 terrorists on Mt. Gabar and 100 on Mt. Cudi. If you send expert soldiers educated on this field to those mountains instead of thousands of soldiers, you finish them off. Internal security cannot be established with the army. While you dispatch 10,000 soldiers there, the 50 terrorists will change their locations while whistling. Turkey is the only country carrying out a counterterrorism struggle with its army.”
Stating that it would delight the PKK the most in the event a military coup is staged or martial law declared, Laçiner notes, “… because these are the atmospheres feeding the PKK. The PKK will lose ground as Turkey grants more rights to Kurds. The PKK is trying to irreparably damage civil politics in Turkey with terrorist attacks. It wants to reverse Turkey’s EU and democratization process. Opposite poles feed one another in Turkey. Kurdish neo-nationalists and Turkish neo-nationalists support each other. Those wanting Turkey to go back to the period of terrorism say that ‘the Kurdish issue can only be resolved by arms; democratization is not a solution; a possible EU membership would be wrong; Turkey should retire into itself; Western democracy will divide the country.’”
This statement also belongs to Laçiner: “The source of the problem is not in northern Iraq; it is in Turkey. This is the terrorism of Turkey. Great mistakes have been made and people’s hopes were boosted. People think that terrorism will end if we carry out a cross-border operation. Until today, there have been 24 large operations into northern Iraq. The PKK couldn’t be rooted out because this is not the way to eliminate terrorism. Terrorism cannot be eliminated with the help of arms. A terrorist, namely a mosquito, cannot be killed with a sledgehammer.”
