The Coup Cycle

Sometimes when a general loves his country very, very much, he has to do things the country might not like. All the general wants is what is best for his little baby and, like a stern but loving father, sometimes has to put a gun to his little cupcake’s head.

Yesterday was the 29^th anniversary of the 1980 coup d'état, where the military took control of the state on the grounds that the government had been unable to curb mass-violence between left and right wing organizations (which the military had been fuelling), then proceeded to detain, blacklist, torture (links Turkish) and kill hundreds of thousands of citizens including political party leaders and… wait, the story is too convoluted to explain without a flowchart. You can use this flowchart to explain pretty much all of Turkey’s coups.

Staging coups still the best way to impress one’s friends in Turkey

Since 1980 there have been stern warnings, like the military dissolving the ruling party in 1997 because it was going through a “religious phase” and an e-coup in 2007 when the army finally figured out how to get that dang computer to work, but the people have been far less tolerant of an outright coup.

Turks may still have yet to confront the generals of 1980 but at least we have learned that sometimes, an army can love too much.