CONTEMPORARY EURASIA VOLUME VII (1, 2) Contemporary-Eurasia-3new | Page 46

CONTEMPORARY EURASIA
Theories on civil-military relations in Turkey
Turkey can be described as a classic case of struggle for the civilian
government to exercise and maintain control of the military. Koonings
and Kruijt mention Turkey as an example of the birthright principle of
the military’s intervention in civilian life. That is, the military participat-
ed in the creation of the Turkish Republic, Kemal Ataturk was a military
man himself. For that reason the military took upon itself the role of the
guardian of the principles and ideology promoted by Ataturk, namely Ke-
malism and secularism. Perlmutter calls this kind of guardianship by the
military praetorian. Sarigil calls it the popular praetorian military, hint-
ing at the popularity of the Turkish military and armed forces among the
public. 15 This type of militaries tend to be involved in the political life of
the state extensively, however, they act as guardians of the political re-
gime, their actions are more covert than overt and they do not aim to set
up a military regime. Nirufel Narli also emphasizes the Turkish military’s
“role of the army as the defender of Kemalism”. 16 Tanel Demirel also ar-
gues that CMR should not be regarded as separate entities and should be
examined in line with the interactions that take place between those two
entities. He argues that it is not only the failure of civilians that the im-
balance in CMR in Turkey is towards the military, but the military is not
ready to accept the supremacy of civilian authorities due to its perception
of itself as the ultimate guardian of the state. He also mentions that Turk-
ish offi cers did not have extreme praetorian tendencies as they did not
favor long-term military control. 17 The autonomy of the Turkish military
played a crucial role in impeding civilian control over the offi cer corps.
Umit Cizre Sakallioglu points out that one of the important features of the
Turkish military autonomy is that it accepts the legitimacy of democracy
as well as civilian rule. It followed a refi ned concept of autonomy accord-
ing to which it exercised control over politicians based on its own ideas.
The author infers that the Turkish army is not praetorian as it has not tried
to undermine democracy or eliminate civilian authority. The main justi-
fi cation for the military’s ability to infl uence political decision making is
based on its guardianship role of the national interest. 18
Nasser Momayezi claims that men of military background not only
established the Turkish Republic but also chose the path that the newly
15
16
17
18
Zeki Sarigil, “Civil-military relations beyond dichotomy: With special reference to Tur-
key,” Turkish Studies 12, no. 2 (2011): 265-278.
Nirufel Narli, “Civil-military relations in Turkey,” Turkish Studies 1, no. 1 (2000): 107-127
Tanel Demirel,”Soldiers and civilians: the dilemma of Turkish democracy,” Middle Eastern
Studies 40, no. 1 (2004): 127.
Umit Sakallioglu, “The anatomy of the Turkish military’s political autonomy,” Comparative
politics 29, no. 2 (1997): 153.
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