Turkey redefines armed forces' duties

Turkey's parliament has amended an internal armed forces' regulation long relied on by the country's once-powerful generals as grounds for intervening in politics, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported Saturday, in a move that further strips the military of its political influence.

The military has wielded huge political power in the country, overthrowing four governments between 1960 and 1997 and issuing a warning against Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Islamic-rooted government as recently as 2007.

The generals have in the past pointed to an internal military regulation that stipulated the army's duty as watching over and protecting the Turkish republic, to justify army takeovers or stepping in whenever they felt uneasy over civilian leaders' policies.

In a midnight vote Friday, legislators voted to redefine the military's duty as: "defending the Turkish homeland against external threats and dangers, and maintaining and strengthening military powers to ensure deterrence."

They also emphasized the Turkish army's role in international peacekeeping missions, saying its tasks also included taking up any overseas duty assigned by parliament and helping secure international peace.

This is another reason the military decided to act in Egypt. They are very aware of what’s happened to the Turkish General Staff over the past decade; Islamist politicians have effectively neutered them, making it virtually impossible for the military to intervene and sustain Attaturk’s vision of a secular state.

Had Morsi remained in power, the Egyptian military faced a similar fate, but on a much faster timetable. They have no desire to become another Iran, knowing that Muslim despots have always viewed the Egyptian Army as useful cannon fodder. They could also see an Egyptian military increasingly dominated by the Islamists, who would create their own forces, based on the Iranian model. Under that system, the western-trained, “regular” military would grow increasingly marginalized—and irrelevant.

I still think the TGS still has at least one “coup” left in them, and they’re waiting for the right moment to act. Of course, the Islamists have been decimating the officer corps for more than 10 years, retiring hundreds of Colonels and Generals who worked with the U.S., or attended command and staff or war colleges here in the states. In their place, they are advancing officers who are much more “reliable,” both politically and religiously.

Egypt’s military saw their future in Turkey and Iran and wanted no part of it, for themselves and their nation.

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