- Newly exposed coup planned to turn the clock back to 1923
The Sledgehammer action plan suggested detaining dissidents at sport facilities such as the Burhan Felek Sports Complex and the Fenerbahçe Stadium and aimed to provoke chaos in the society through attacks blamed on al-Qaeda and the PKK.
The Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) hoped to take Turkey back to 1923, the time when the republic was proclaimed, after the staging of a coup d’état against the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government, the Taraf daily reported on Thursday.
According to the coup plan -- titled the Balyoz (Sledgehammer) Security Operation Plan -- all the key posts in the country, public and private, would be occupied by active and retired members of the military to “get rid of every single threat to the secular order of the state.”
“The plan will be based on an objective to clean up all state and public posts [of individuals suspected of posing a threat to the secular order of Turkey] and return Turkey to its dynamism of 1923. All the assets and financial resources of individuals and groups suspected of involvement in acts of reactionaryism will be confiscated, and necessary steps will be taken to freeze their financial resources abroad,” stated the document.
According to Taraf daily, with the Sledgehammer coup plot, which is believed to be a brainchild of retired Gen. Çetin Doğan, the military planned to bring the country back to the early days of the Republic by overthrowing the ruling AK Party government in 2003. The military allegedly planned to grant key posts the to military members and eliminate “threats to secularism”
The subversive document, the Sledgehammer Security Operation Plan, was drafted in 2003, shortly after the AK Party came to power. The masterminds of the plan were retired Gen. Çetin Doğan, the then-commander of the 1st Army, retired Former Air Forces Commander Gen. İbrahim Fırtına and retired Gen. Ergin Saygun.
Taraf claimed on Wednesday that the coup plan -- a nearly 5,000-page document -- was agreed at a military meeting attended by 162 active TSK members, including 29 generals. According to the plan, the military was to systematically foment chaos in society through violent acts that would lead to a military takeover.
A return to 1923 would mean almost paralyzing daily life in Turkey, according the plan. The document suggested that the armed forces would take full control of state institutions, private hospitals, drugs warehouses, customs houses and shopping centers after the military takeover. The headquarters of some newspapers would also be raided by the security forces.
“No rights or freedoms are absolute or limitless. When the case is the survival of the secular state, the right to inform the public and freedom of the press is not without limit, either. All written and visual press organs will be taken under control, and the publications of press organs that side with the AK Party will immediately be halted,” read the document.
The armed forces also planned to take into custody and then arrest at least 200,000 individuals accused of reactionary activities in İstanbul after the coup. The total number of detainees around Turkey was estimated to reach 16 million, the plan stated. According to the document, individuals who stood against the coup would be taken into custody and brought to large sports facilities for interrogation. Among those facilities were the Burhan Felek sports complex and Fenerbahçe Stadium. The suspects would be questioned by security forces there and then would be sent to prisons. If the prisons were unable to accommodate all the arrestees, then military barracks would temporarily be turned into jails.
The Sledgehammer action plan suggested detaining dissidents at sport facilities such as the Burhan Felek Sports Complex and the Fenerbahçe Stadium and aimed to provoke chaos in the society through attacks blamed on al-Qaeda and the PKK.
The coup plan stated its objective very clearly: “The AK Party government will immediately be thrown out of government and the existing structure of reactionaryism will be destroyed. A previously determined group will be swept to power, and the authority of secular state will be restored.” The plan also said all “official and unofficial patriots” would be used to overthrow the AK Party government. “Those who resist the detentions and arrests and those who resort to plunder and damage the national wealth will face the harshest practices of the armed forces,” noted the plan.
Among the “official patriots,” the document cited a long list of jurists, bureaucrats and civil servants who would cooperate with the TSK in the event of a military coup. Among the “unofficial patriots” were journalists and members of civil society organizations.
The document also revealed that all key state posts would be occupied by members of the military. “Members of the military will be responsible for the implementation of civil services until the state structure is restored. For this reason, all key state posts will be occupied by military staff. Those staff will be active members of the military. If they are not adequate in number to fill the state posts, then retired members of the military will be called to duty,” stated the coup plan.
The names of former Naval Forces Commander Adm. Özden Örnek -- the author of controversial diaries which revealed that four force commanders devised plans in 2004 to stage two military coups -- retired Brig. Gen. Süha Tanyeri and retired Col. Fikri Karadağ are also frequently mentioned in the plan.
Munitions buried underground part of coup plan
The mystery of the large caches of munitions that have been unearthed during excavations as part of the probe into Ergenekon, a criminal organization accused of working to topple the AK Party, is most probably related to the Sledgehammer coup plan.
The plan read that munitions buried underground would be distributed to members of the military in accordance with the plan to stage the coup. Many types of munitions have been unearthed since the start of the Ergenekon probe in June 2007, when hand grenades were discovered at a house in İstanbul’s Ümraniye district.
Ergenekon is accused of intending to create chaos in the country by using the munitions, which would result in the overthrow of the government.
Ergenekon’s munitions are not restricted to those unearthed during excavations. Unidentified individuals have been abandoning weapons and munitions in isolated locations throughout the country since the discovery of munitions buried underground in 2007 after raids on Ergenekon suspects’ homes revealed maps and other evidence pointing to weapons caches.
The coup plan also suggested that public pressure on the AK Party would be increased through economic problems and a financial crisis.
“Economic operations to be carried out by friends of the TSK will drive the country into a financial bottleneck in the national and international arena. Massive protests and rallies will be organized against the AK Party government. Public opinion will be shaped in such a way that it will expect the armed forces to do the necessary [a coup] after news of acts of reactionaryism, student protests, soldiers killed in clashes, economic crisis and unsolved murders,” stated the document.
Simultaneous acts of violence by al-Qaeda, PKK
According to the subversive plan, bloody and shocking acts by al-Qaeda and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) would trigger massive protests by civil society groups and universities that would accuse the AK Party of failing to provide security for the people of Turkey.
The plan showed that the TSK was to use the terrorist acts not only as a “means” but also as a “guarantee” of achieving its objectives.
The massive protests would lead to the declaration of martial law in the country, which would topple the AK Party government. The plan has raised the question of whether the TSK had a hand in the simultaneous bombings in İstanbul in 2003 that killed more than 50 people and injured as many as 700. The bombings targeted the HSBC Bank headquarters and a nearby synagogue. Al-Qaeda terrorists claimed responsibility for the attacks.
Gov’t would be replaced by ‘National Agreement Government’
The Sledgehammer coup plan also mentioned the TSK’s plans to establish an administration that would replace the AK Party government.
The existing government would be replaced by a “National Agreement Government,” which would include a large number of active and retired members of the military. Taraf announced that it would make the names of those members of the military public in today’s edition of the newspaper.
“The vacant positions [in the Cabinet] will be occupied by our fellow soldiers. Our retired colleagues will take over state posts and bureaucratic positions after the overthrow of the AK Party government. … All civil servants who are known to support movements of reactionaryism and separatist activities and who are known to be implicated in corrupt activities will be replaced, with no exceptions, by retired or active military staff who are trustworthy and loyal to contemporary values,” noted the document.
The document also suggested that the police force was to be brought under the control of the military, that the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) would be restructured and that the new organization would be headed by an army general on active duty.
The coup plan in addition aimed to replace the recitation of the call to prayer (adhan) in Arabic with the Turkish version: “All gains of the republic, which have been eroded till now, will be restored once again. The adhan will be recited in Turkish and the damage to Turkish culture caused by Arabs and Kurds will be repaired.”
The call to prayer was first recited in Turkish in 1932 upon a circular by the Directorate of Religious Affairs and continued through 1950. The adhan returned to its original version after the Democrat Party’s (DP) victory in the 1950 general elections.
21 January 2010, Thursday
TODAY’S ZAMAN İSTANBULLink
Also:
- ...The plan aimed to kill dozens of young visitors to the Rahmi M. Koç Museum in İstanbul and assassinate Turkey's prominent non-Muslim figures, all the while putting the blame for the killings on the AK Party. The desired result was an increase in internal and external pressure on the party, leading to diminishing public support for the government.
...The indictment puts forward several pieces of evidence for a frightening planned act of terror of the junta nested within the Naval Forces Command against young students visiting the Koç Museum. According to the plan, several blocks of TNT and other explosives placed at the bottom of a submarine exhibited at the museum would be detonated while a large group of students was visiting the museum.
...[A] letter sent to the prosecutor’s office by an unidentified individual claimed that the explosives placed in the submarine aimed at killing 200-300 young visitors at the museum as part of the Cage Operation Action Plan to instigate chaos in society.
The claims in the letter came as evidence of a plan mentioned on a DVD seized during a police search at the office of retired Maj. Bektaş. The plan urged an increase in the number of young students visiting the museum so that the planned explosion would foment greater chaos in society. “Materials to be planted at the museum have reached operators. We should increase the number of visitors to the museum. C.G. will tell us when the visitor numbers at the museum are at their highest. We should increase publicity and activities [about the museum] in schools. Students are the most important elements of this project. We should confirm the day of the operation,” read the plan.
In line with the letters and the plan found on the DVD, prosecutors started to monitor the phone conversations of suspected naval officers and discovered that the Cage plan had been put into operation.Link
- ...The plotters reportedly hired hit men to kill leading liberal intellectuals, including acclaimed writer, Orhan Pamuk, and may have murdered a prominent Armenian-Turkish journalist and three Christians. They also oppose Turkey’s entry into the EU as a threat to `Turkishness.’
What makes this case particularly interesting is that Ergenekon may well be linked to Gladio, a secret, far right underground group created in the 1950’s by the US and NATO during the Cold War as a `stay behind’ guerillas to resist Soviet invasion or Communist takeovers. Gladio had a network of agents and caches of arms across Europe with secret links to NATO intelligence services.
Gladio staged numerous bombing attacks and assassinations during the 1970’s and 80’s in a effort to promote far right coups in Italy, Belgium, and Turkey, where it remains active.
A cell was even recently uncovered in Switzerland. In Italy, Gladio members played a key role in the P2 Masonic Lodge intrigue and the Vatican’s Banco Ambrosiano scandal that led to the murder of banker Roberto Calvi.
The Ergenekon plot is one facet of the intense struggle between Erdogan’s Islamist-lite reformists and Turkey’s 510,000-man armed forces which sees itself as defender of the anti-religious, westernized secular state created in the 1930’s by Ataturk, founder of modern Turkey.
Turkey’s generals are also allied to the deeply entrenched secularist oligarchy of business barons, judges, university rectors, media groups, and the security services that has made Ataturk’s memory and anti-religious values into a state philosophy.
Turkey’s rightwing generals have overthrown three governments and ousted a fourth. The Turkish military establishment is traditionally close to the US and Israel, with whom it’s had extensive military, arms and intelligence dealings.
Until PM Erdogan’s election, the military was Turkey’s real government behind a thin façade of squabbling elected politicians, a fact lost on western observers who used to urge Turkey’s “democratic” political model on the Muslim world. ...
Link
And:
PressTV: Mossad Role in Turkey Coup Revealed
Also this:
- According to a report in The Jerusalem Post (http://www.hr-action.org/archive1/990225tjp1.html) [most of the links here no longer work -- Alice], intelligence cooperation between the Mossad and the Turkish security service, MIT, "was enshrined in a 12-clause agreement that was signed during a 1993 visit to Israel by then-Turkish foreign minister Hikmat Chetin".
Soon after, according to the London-based newsletter Foreign Report, a large Mossad operation was established in Turkey, with Mossad agents based in both Istanbul and Ankara.
In 2003, there was a major bombing attack in istanbul.
The Turkish Top Military Brass met Paul Wolfowitz one day before the Istanbul Attacks (http://globalresearch.ca/articles/ANA311A.html)
The two Istanbul attacks respectively on the HSBC in the financial district and on the British Consulate were, according to media reports "timed to coincide with President George Bush's state visit to London."
The attacks took place one day following the completion of the annual Turkish-US Joint Defense Group meeting (17-19 November 2003).
The British Consul General Roger Short, was killed by the bomb as he was entering the consulate building. Press reports confirmed that he had cancelled an appointment at the last minute and "if he had gone to his appointment, he would have been alive"
The attacks create conditions for Turkey's participation in the war on terrorism.
The attacks serve to strengthen the Anglo-American military axis and the legitimacy of Bush's "War on terrorism."
The Istanbul bombings also serve to uphold the shaky legitimacy of Prime Minister Tony Blair in the face of mounting political opposition to Britain's' participation in the US led war.
"A Turkish daily close to the ruling justice and development party quoted Turkish intelligence sources as saying that the Mossad had established the organization that launched the two attacks on 15th November, 2003." http://www.mediareviewnet.com/Zionist%2 ... blasts.htm
...The Middle East Report concluded in 1998 that probably the greatest strategic move in the Clinton post-Cold War years is what could be called "The Ankara Pact"—an alliance between the US, Turkey, and Israel that essentially circumvents and bottles up the Arab countries.
In 1998, Israeli, Turkish and American military forces engaged in exercises in the Mediterranean, according to Reuters and Agencie France Press.
"[These exercises] signal to the radical states in the region that there is a strong alliance between Israel, Turkey and the United States which they must fear."
Reports also indicated that the CIA and Pentagon intelligence organizations had regularly chaired meetings of Turkish and Israeli officers in Tel Aviv for years.
Link
