Editorial comment:
The Sultan is trying a different method. After collaborating with ISIS and making Russia his sworn enemy, Erdogan ended up in an undesirable land where everybody around him was his enemy. Even Washington abandoned him in the end. He is now trying a new path. His popularity at home had become very low and so he fakes a coup. And he is not doing a very good job at it either. He needs the support of Russia and, above all, he needs the support of his people. So stir things up. Make them feel afraid and insecure and they will look for protection from their sultan, be he ever so unpopular because of his late bizarre politics. A false flag coup has been the solution of many dilemmas in history. - SON
Hell Hath No Fury Like a Teflon Sultan
By Pepe Escobar
Sputnik News
When Turkish
President/aspiring Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan landed at Istanbul’s
Ataturk airport early Saturday morning, he declared the attempted coup
against his government a failure, and a “gift from God.”
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Erdogan Blames Gulenist Network, Calls on Public to Fight in Public Squares |
God apparently uses Face Time. It was via that iconic iPhone footage
from an undisclosed location shown live on CNN Turk by a bewildered
female anchor that Erdogan managed to call his legion of followers
to hit the streets, unleash People Power and defeat the military faction
that had taken over state TV and proclaimed to be in charge.
So God does work in mysterious mobile ways. Erdogan’s call was heeded
even by young Turks who had fiercely protested against him in Gezi
Park; were tear-gassed or water-cannoned by his police; think the AKP
governing party is disgusting; but would support them against a “fascist
military coup.” Not to mention that virtually every mosque
across Turkey relayed Erdogan’s call.
Ankara’s official version is that the coup was perpetrated by a small
military faction remote-controlled by exiled-in-Pennsylvania cleric
Fethullah Gulen, himself a CIA asset. As much as responsibility remains
debatable, what’s clear is the coup was a Turk remix of The Three
Stooges; the actual stooges in fact may have been the already detained
2nd Army Commander Gen. Adem Huduti; 3rd Army Commander Erdal Ozturk;
and former Chief of Air Staff Akin Ozturk.
As over-excited former CIA ops were blaring on US networks – and they
do know a thing or two about regime change — rule number one in a coup
is to aim at, and isolate, the head of the snake. Yet the wily Turkish
snake, in this case, was nowhere to be seen. Not to mention that no top
generals sounding convincingly patriotic went on the TRT state network
to fully explain the reasons for the coup.
(Erdogan) love is in the air
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Turkish Public Broadcaster Under Heavy Gunfire From Helicopters |
The coup plotters did aim at the intel services – whose top positions
are at Istanbul’s airport, the presidential palace in Ankara and
near the ministries. They used Cobra helicopters – with pilots trained
in the US – against these targets. They also aimed at the army’s high
command – which for the past 8 years is designated by Erdogan and is not
trusted by many a mid-ranking officer.
As they occupied the Bosphorus bridges in Istanbul they seemed to be
in touch with military police – which is spread out all over Turkey and
have a solid esprit de corps. But in the end they did not have the
numbers – and the necessary preparation. All key ministries seemed to be
communicating among themselves as the plot developed, as well as the
intel services. And as far as Turkish police as a whole is concerned,
they are now a sort of AKP pretorian guard.
Meanwhile, Erdogan’s Gulfstream 4, flight number TK8456, took
off from Bodrum’s airport at 1:43 A.M. and flew for hours over Turkey’s
northwest with its transponder on, undisturbed. It was from the
presidential plane, while still landed, that Erdogan had gone on Face
Time, and then, on the air, managed to control the countercoup. The
plane never left Turkish airspace – and was totally visible to civil and
military radars. The coup plotters’ F-16s could have easily tracked
and/or incinerated it. Instead they sent military choppers to bomb the
presidential abode in Bodrum a long time after he had left the building.
The head of the snake must have been 100% sure that to board his
plane and stay on Turkish airspace was as safe as eating a baklava.
What’s even more startling is that the Gulfstream managed to land
in Istanbul in absolute safety in the early hours of Saturday morning –
despite the prevailing notion that the airport was occupied by the
“rebels”.
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Turkey Detains Several Incirlik Air Base Servicemen on Coup Attempt Links |
In Ankara, the “rebels” used a mechanized division and two commandos.
Around Istanbul there was a whole army; the 3rd command is actually
integrated with NATO’s rapid reaction forces. They supplied the Leopards
positioned in Istanbul’s key spots – which by the way did not open
fire.
And yet the two key armies positioned in the Syrian and Iranian
borders remained on “wait and see” mode. And then, at 2 A.M., the
command of the also key 7th army based in Diyarbakir – in charge
of fighting the PKK guerrillas – proclaimed his loyalty to Erdogan. That
was the exact, crucial moment when Prime Minister Binali Yildırım
announced a no-fly zone over Ankara.
That meant Erdogan controlled the skies. And the game was over.
History does move in mysterious ways; the no-fly zone dreamed by Erdogan
for so long over Aleppo or the Syrian-Turkish border in the end
materialized over his own capital.
Round up the usual suspects
The US position was extremely ambiguous from the start. As the coup
took over, the American embassy in Turkey called it "Turkish uprising".
Secretary of State John Kerry, in Moscow to discuss Syria, also hedged
his bets. NATO was royally mute. Only when it became clear the coup was
in fact smashed President Obama and the “NATO allies” officially
proclaimed their “support for the democratically elected government”.
The Sultan went back to the game with a
vengeance. He immediately went live on CNN Turk demanding Washington
hands over Gulen even without any evidence he masterminded the coup. And
that came with an inbuilt threat; “If you want to keep access
to Incirlik air base you will have to give me Gulen”. It’s hard not
to be reminded of recent history – when the Cheney regime in 2001
demanded the Taliban hand Osama bin Laden over to the US
without offering proof he was responsible for 9/11.
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Kerry Blasts Turkey for Insinuating that Washington Plotted Coup of Erdogan |
So the number one eyebrow-raising possibility is a go; Erdogan’s intel
services knew a coup was brewing; and the wily Sultan let it happen
knowing it would fail as the plotters had very limited support. He also
arguably knew – in advance — even the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic
Party (HDP), whose members Erdogan is trying to expel from parliament,
would support the government in the name of democracy.
Two extra facts add to the credibility of this hypothesis. Earlier
last week Erdogan signed a bill giving soldiers immunity
from prosecution while taking part in domestic security ops – as in
anti-PKK; that spells out improved relations between the AKP government
and the army. And then Turkey’s top judicial body HSYK laid off no less
than 2,745 judges after an extraordinary meeting post-coup. This can
only mean the list was more than ready in advance.
The major, immediate post-coup geopolitical
consequence is that Erdogan now seems to have miraculously reconquered
his “strategic depth” – as former, sidelined Prime Minister Davutoglu
would have it. Not only externally – after the miserable collapse
of both his Middle East and Kurdish “policies” – but also internally.
For all practical purposes Erdogan now controls the Executive, the
Legislative and the Judiciary – and is taking no prisoners to purge the
military for good. Ladies and gentlemen, the Sultan is in da house.
This means the neo-Ottoman project is still on – but now
under massive tactical reorientation. The real “enemy” now is Syrian
Kurds – not Russia and Israel (and not ISIS/ISIL/Daesh; but they never
were in the first place). Erdogan is going after the YPG, which for him
is a mere extension of the PKK. His order of the day is to prevent
by all means an autonomous state entity in northeast Syria – a
"Kurdistan" set up like a second Israel supported by the US. For that he
needs some sort of entente cordiale with Damascus – as in insisting
that Syria must preserve its territorial integrity. And that also means,
of course, renewed dialogue with Russia.
So what's the CIA been up to?
Needless to add Ankara and Washington are now on a certified
collision course. If there is an Empire of Chaos hidden hand in the coup
– no smoking gun yet — that certainly comes from the Beltway neocon/CIA
axis, not the lame duck Obama administration. For the moment Erdogan’s
leverage only amounts to access to Incirlik. But his paranoia is
ballooning; for him Washington is doubly suspicious because they harbor
Gulen and support the YPG. Hell hath no fury as an underestimated Sultan as well. For all his
recent geopolitical follies, Erdogan’s simultaneous ballet
of reconnecting with Israel and Russia is eminently pragmatic. He knows
he needs Russia for the Turkish Stream and to build nuclear plants; and
he needs Israeli gas to consolidate Turkey’s role as a key East-West
energy crossroads.
When we learn, crucially, that Iran supported Turkey's "brave defense
of democracy", as tweeted by Foreign Minister Zarif, it’s clear how
Erdogan, in a mater of only a few weeks, reconfigured the whole regional
picture. And that spells out Eurasia integration and Turkey deeply
connected to the New Silk Roads – not NATO. No wonder the Beltway –
for whom, overwhelmingly, Erdogan is the proverbial “erratic and
unreliable ally” — is freaking out. That dream of Turkish colonels
under direct CIA orders is over – at least for the foreseeable future.
So what about Europe? Yildirim already said that Turkey might
reinstate the death penalty – to be applied to the coup plotters. This
means, in essence, bye bye EU. And bye bye to the European Parliament
approving visa-free travel for Turks visiting Europe. Erdogan after all
already got what he wanted from chancellor Merkel; those 6 billion euros
to contain the refugee crisis that he essentially unleashed. Merkel bet
the farm on Erdogan. Now she’s talking to herself – while the Sultan is
able to dial God on Face Time.
Source: Sputnik
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