TERRORISM TRAGEDY IN THE US - TODAY IS THAT “TOMORROW”

           

Turkey has long been warning its friends and allies about tragedies of terrorism in this country. “Terrorism is a double-edged knife. Today it is hurting me, tomorrow it will be you who is suffering,” they prophesised. The writer of this article is truly too pained by the sufferings of the thousands of innocent American victims of the terrorist explosions in the World Trade Centre, New York and the Pentagon in Washington, but it is useful to recall certain facts for the success of President Bush’s fight ahead “against evil”. The President is correct in his diagnosis that this is a war between good versus evil and that it will take a long time to fight it out. He is in a position to purge the CIA from its evil sides that created Taliban, Usame Bin Laden and the PKK to make it a useful intelligence service for world peace. We Turks are with him in this fight, but it should be free of double standards.

The Pulse editor received some objections to his article of August 26^th, entitled “NSC meeting at a milestone on national security” (issue No: 46). Some readers found it unbelievable the claim that for the last three, four decades “a low intensity war” was going on between Turkey and the United States through the PKK terrorism in this country. Some thought the word, war, was too strong a claim even though the article was stressing the fact that it was the new unconventional war which military experts call “low intensity war,” quite different from the total war understanding of the first half of the last century.

NATO’s Strategic Concept includes terrorism as a threat requiring Article V

Hardly six weeks have since gone by and, starting with President Bush, everyone now is speaking of a war against terrorism. And, Wednesday (12^th) evening, the NATO Council in Brussels took a resolution, for the first time in its over five decades of existence, to set in motion Article V of the NATO Charter for treating an attack against a member as an attack against all members.

Actually, since 1994, Turkey has been knocking on the door of NATO at every ministerial council meeting urging the Alliance to include terrorism in the Strategic Concept. That is why Ankara was behind Washington at the NATO council meeting on Wednesday about linking Article V to terrorism when it was the United States that demanded it after last week’s tragedies in New York and Washington.

At the Washington summit of NATO in 1999 Turkey had already managed to include terrorism in the Strategic Concept, which sets out the basic objectives and security duties of the Alliance, as well as the means and ways of attaining these objectives. But this achievement on the part of Turkish diplomacy had not gone as far as NATO’s fight against terrorism by activating Article V.

PM Ecevit told a televised interview in Ankara, almost at the same time as the NATO resolution in Brussels on Wednesday, that the terrorist events in Turkey were being planned in the West. “We know it and the intelligence services of these countries should also know it,” he said in confirmation of Pulse’s ages old belief and reports.

A couple of days afterwards, Defence Minister Sabahattin Cakmakoglu (MHP-Kayseri) was even more outspoken and accused some NATO allies of harbouring terrorists against Turkey, above and beyond being passive about fighting against it. Both PM Ecevit and the other Government members are, however, careful about singling out the United States and stressing that it is more understanding and supportive of the Turkish case. They are reluctant to discuss if the western European allies can possibly harbour PKK and other Turkish terrorists without Washington’s subtle approval. The Turkish Government agrees with Washington that this is the day to look forward to save the world from this evil, rather than bring up the old stories.

So pursuant to this wise policy, Pulse will also refrain from turning to the past in this painful day of the civilized world, but will only recall that a day after the September 11^th tragedy in the United States, an Austrian tourist woman joined the two Turkish policemen who were killed in a terrorist suicide bomb attack in Istanbul. The terrorist in question was one of the hunger strikers in Turkish prisons that was released from prison under special amnesty arrangements.

These hunger strikes and terrorist activism in Turkey in general are planned and guided from certain centres in Western Europe - Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands even today.

May Turkey be dragged into military action in Central Asia or the Gulf?

As for arrangements about ESDI (European Security and defence Identity) using NATO facilities and forces without Turkey’s participation in the decision making stage, Ankara stresses that of the 16 trouble spots pinpointed by NATO as critical areas, 13-14 of them are around Turkey, in the Balkans, the Caucasus, the Middle East, the Gulf and the Turkic Republics. Now Central Asia has come forward among these critical areas with Taliban and Ben Laden in Afghanistan. Even though President Putin and Beijing have declared support of President Bush in his plans for military action ahead, they do not allow former Soviet bases in Afghanistan, primarily Kandahar, to be used by the American forces against Taliban.

About possible American military action against Iraq from Incirlik or other airbases in Turkey, especially those in Diyarbakir and Malatya, master disinformation pushers like Mehmet Ali Birand, using some retired Turkish ambassadors, have already begun to broadcast on their TV stations like CNN Turk that Turkey should stop trading with Iran, Iraq and its Arab neighbours and support President Bush in accordance with Article V. Let us hope that the American plans for this fight ahead will not be as unrealistic and double standard based as these misinformation mongers have begun to market.

Naturally, it should not be kept away from sight that Saddam’s Iraq or another official government may have been involved in the September 11^th terrorist outrage in America, even though no serious claims have been put forward in that direction so far. In that event, no one should have the privilege of getting away with such a crime that has caused so much human suffering for so many people, indeed the entire civilised world itself. uras@ada.net.tr - September 17^th, 2001