Foreign Policy

The uprising in Turkey is being manipulated, and probably funded, by western interests. Here we go again.

"If Turkey supports the inclusion of Iran to the Geneva II conference, NATO’s little regime change and neoliberalization operation in Syria is doomed. Turkey is a big player in the Middle East. Their support can truly shift the power structure.
So let’s recap -
car bombing investigation reveals our mercenaries did it.
our mercenaries caught red-handed with sarin gas, Obama’s “red line game changer” in the making
Turkey at least appears to support the inclusion of Russia and Iran in next round of talks on Syria.
And suddenly, uprising."

As predicted, it's more about the Syrian war than anything.

More on Turkey.

"A month before the protests, laws restricting the sale and consumption of alcohol were put on the books: the state-owned Turkish Airways issued a new rule forbidding stewardesses from wearing red lipstick (other colors are presumably okay). And if you’re riding on the Ankara subway, and you find a sudden urge to kiss your Significant Other, forget it, bud – because closed circuit TV is watching you, and you’re busted."

That gets people motivated. The CIA gets them organized and funded.

"Another point of contention has been Turkey’s support to the Syrian Sunni jihadists waging a terrorist campaign in neighboring Syria. The upfront declarations by Syrian rebels that they want to create an Islamic state has provoked opposition to Erdogan’s “pro-American” (i.e. pro-jihadist) foreign policy, which has the Erdogan government providing the rebels with bases inside Turkey as well as arms and military training. This is seen by worried secularists as merely an extension of the AKP’s policies of increasing Islamization at home."

There's the war again.

"Integrate this with the news that the US has just sent a Patriot missile battery and a squadron of F-16 jet fighters to Jordan – where US “advisers” are training Syrian rebels – and it’s hard to escape the conclusion that Washington is readying itself to massively intervene in the Muslim world’s increasingly vicious religious civil war."

I'm sure that will work out well.

"This rebuilding of the old Ottoman barracks is important symbolically. Mustafa Kemal fought against both the Europeans and the Ottomans in the country’s war for independence: the defeated sultanate and the victorious Europeans had teamed up to divide traditionally Turkish lands and feast on the spoils of the Great War. The Kemalists raised an army, crushed the Ottomans, drove back the invading Greeks and Bulgarians, and – with aid from Soviet Russia – forced the Europeans to sign the Treaty of Lausanne, which recognized Turkish sovereignty. To rebuild the Ottoman barracks is to raise the banner of the Kemalists’ ancient enemies in the middle of Istanbul. No wonder they’re rioting."

Talk about a complex situation. It's folly to get involved in such things.

Threat from China being hyped.