Monday, March 14, 2016

Well, Turkey Isn't Very Fun Right Now


Turkey used to be a sort of Muslim showpiece. It was a backwater country with gross prisons and a genocidal history. But at least they didn't cut people's heads off with swords and parade around wearing black chadors shouting "Death to America!" Islam was both quasi-suppressed and quasi-harnessed to prop up a very non-quasi nationalist ideology that emphasized "Turkishness."

Yeah, I know, I don't find that very attractive ether, but it seemed to work for a time. 

No more.

President Obama's best Muslim buddy, Turkish President Recep Erdoğan just took over the country's main opposition newspaper. And now, in the wake of today's terrorist car bombing in Ankara that killed thirty-four people, they have blocked Facebook and Twitter. I admit I have a fair amount of schadenfreude at that last part, given Mark Zuckerberg's record at sucking up to authoritarian governments and boosting Islamo-fascism in general.

Is the ban permanent? Probably not, but we'll see.

Who set off the car bomb? It could have been anyone--ISIS, the PKK or the government itself.

But the country is going to hell.

Did I mention that they are also fighting a very real civil war in the south-east, which includes the cleaning out and leveling of entire towns?

They're filtering Muslim fighters into Europe while asking for (and getting) ransom money to do it at a slightly slower rate.

They're supporting ISIS in various ways including helping them out financially via the efforts of Obama's best Muslim buddy's son, Bilal.  

And John Kasich--who 68% (or whatever) of all foreign policy analysts believe is the most qualified candidate to become president--thinks it's a shame that Turkey isn't yet in the European Union.

Kasich knows he mathematically can't win the Republican nomination, so he's obviously angling to become Sharia commissioner of Dearborn, Michigan. 

If Russia attacks, it's possible we'll come in on Turkey's side and inaugurate World War Three. That would not be a good thing.

So, here's a better idea: Russia invades from the east; we invade from the west. Okay, Turkey's currently a member of NATO. Cancel that the night before.

Putin gets Ankara. Trump gets Istanbul. That's fair.

We rename it Constantinople, partly so they have to add another verse to that song.

Hagia Sofia, that mosque/museum or whatever it is now, becomes Christian again. Christians built it and Christians were martyred in it. We owe it to them to take it back. 

Erdogan is flown to Guantanamo.

An interim occupation government is formed, composed of Armenians.

And Turkey goes back to being a backwater country, whose prime exports are candy and circus weightlifters.

8 comments:

  1. This is all part of the staged ww3 which will allow the antichrist to bring "peace". Syria is key. Because of the NATO connection, Russia will use it as an excuse to invade Europe. It should be a matter of months or even weeks.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm not sure about Kurdish "communists," too many professed Christians among them. And, whether Christian, Muslim or Communists, they all want their Independence. In all fairness, there was a Kurdistan long before there was a Turkey. Those nations over there were drawn on a map by European powers.

    Turkey has ever been a "problem child" and should never have been allowed into NATO. They're currently fighting Greece -- another NATO ally -- over Crete (and have been for years) and are now fighting the Kurds, America's allies in the fight against ISIS.

    Putin will never give up his only ally and puppet in the Middle East, so getting rid of Assad is not, and never was, an option. Both the current President, and the next one, need to wake up to that simple fact. However, if Putin invades -- or attacks -- Turkey and the U.S. does not honor its NATO commitment, what does that do to our other treaties?

    What happens with China, flexing its muscles in the South China Sea? The only thing holding them back is America's treaty to protect Japan and the Philippines. But, if America fails to protect a NATO ally, then nothing will hold China back and they'll start taking what they want by force. North Korean could quickly follow China's lead.

    The lack of a forceful President has made the world a more dangerous place.

    But Trump's not my guy . . . and I hope not the next President. But that's just my opinion and others disagree.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well, I doubt that the terrorist segment of the Kurdish Workers' Party contains many Christians, but point taken.

      Delete
    2. You're right. The World's Most Evil Optometrist is a fact of life. There's a reason
      "regime change" always ends in a fiasco. We should stop being reflexively oppositional to Russia and look for overlapping interests. Trump has not committed to boots on the ground for Gulf War III. Maybe it is by accident, but I find his willingness to break with other Republicans refreshing. (Gulf War I vet.) I doubt he would do stupid things like commit U.S. forces to the defense of TURKEY against Russia.

      Delete
  3. Thanks for the overview. Bears watching. I liked the former snarky title of this post, BTW.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Bear is indeed watching. What a charade that Turkey is in NATO. But the good news is that its Total Fertility Rate is going downhill, currently 2.06, slightly below replacement rate, much better than ours, but way below the overall Muslim rate of 3.1. Iran is much worse. These country-by-country trends are intriguing. So the worry that they are going to swamp us with babies is not bearing out, barring an invasion from Niger or some other African country where the high Muslim birthrates are less of a direct threat to the west.

      Delete
    2. Where do you get your stats, Bear? Not disputing, just asking.

      Delete