Too bad he didn’t mention one of Kemal Atatürk’s better ideas.
He not only had to deal with Islamists, but also with communists, sponsored in large part by the Soviet Union, Turkey and Russia having long seen each other as enemies.
In any event, during his reign, the communists had become a powerful and dangerous faction in Turkey. So Atatürk felt obliged to host a peace conference with all the communist leaders aboard his luxury yacht.
Unfortunately, due to a scheduling error, he was personally late for attending the peace conference. This turned out to be a very good thing for him, as due to an unexpected and catastrophic mechanical failure of some type, the entire yacht was blown into little pieces.
Along with the entire communist leadership cadre.
This effectively ended the organized communist movement in Turkey for many, many years. Such a tragic accident.
On one final note, Atatürk died fairly young, because of cirrhosis of the liver due to heavy alcohol consumption. Yet in his time did much to modernize Turkey, and it is a shame that the Islamists have come as far as they have in their efforts to reverse this evolution.
I didn’t know that about the yacht. Great story - thanks.