What should this coup dream be put down to?

We do not know who is spreading the rumors of a coup in Turkey or who is taking them seriously, but the subject has suddenly become something everyone is obliged to talk about. When asked, the President said he found the matter absurd, but that in any case those who have a coup in mind should not forget July 15.

Indeed, July 15 is a real turning point in Turkey's history of coups. The high sensitivity that has formed among the Turkish people regarding coups has been a slap that rings in the memory of every would-be coup plotter from now on, one they will never forget. It has been proclaimed to the whole world that a situation that would legitimize or justify a coup in Turkey has not arisen again and cannot arise.

This has also been an achievement that has placed civil-military relations in Turkey on a healthy footing from which there is no return to the past. The level reached by civic consciousness in Turkey has also ensured that the military is integrated in a healthy relationship with the nation. By protecting the elected government, democracy and the state against the coup plotters, the people showed the whole world an unparalleled model of state-nation-democracy integration, in an epic stand.

A nation that owns its army and its state, rather than an army or a state that owns the nation, has matured in all its organs and grown stronger.

That the military today will not, or cannot, stage a coup is not a sign that it is weaker. On the contrary, today the Turkish Armed Forces are stronger than at any time in the history of the Republic and, in terms of capacity and capability, have risen to the ranks of the world's notable armies.

Today the TSK impresses with its capabilities, which instill confidence in friends and fear in enemies, both in its fight against terror inside the country and in its operations abroad. And it owes this to the fact that it now focuses on its own proper job and no longer takes on tasks that are not its business while neglecting its real work.

Soldiers whose sole preoccupation is interfering in politics through coups destroy their ability to fight. A significant portion of the armies in the Middle East are deployed not against their countries' enemies but against their own peoples, so their fighting capability is extremely limited. For their aim is not to protect their country against external enemies; they have no concern or occupation other than protecting, against their own peoples or against other military junta formations, the regime they have seized and on which they feed as a social stratum or clique.

That is why they seek external support in order to continue their existence against their own peoples. Conflict and tension with their own peoples become their true area of expertise. Because they are not at peace with their own peoples, and because they think the real threat will come to them from their own peoples, they build a very intense and ruthless intelligence and security-control system.

Regimes of this kind, unfortunately, are also more preferable for their Western allies, who never relinquish their apostleship of democracy. In the Islamic world, working with such coup plotters rather than with a democratic regime is always more acceptable to them, because they get them to do what they want more easily.

In Turkey, too, unfortunately, the coup plotters were cadres with whom it was easier to work. Because they came to power against the people, they obtained the legitimacy and political support they needed from outside, from their mandators. Had a July 15 achieved its aim, God forbid, could that coup ever have been accepted by the Turkish people?

The war capacity of the TSK, in which those coup plotters were present, was also low, because the treason that covered the structure like a tumor was drawing the army away from its real job and making it fail at its real job. That is why for decades it was reduced to bombing mountains and rocks in the name of fighting terror, and it could not provide a backing for a Turkey aspiring to a truly deterrent or game-making role in any of the issues around us.

Yet only one month after July 15, from the moment it had rid itself of the treason within, to some extent, Turkey was able to undertake a very successful Euphrates Shield operation. Subsequently it carried on with the Olive Branch and Peace Spring operations. As a deterrent force in Qatar and Libya, it was effective in changing all the balances. Inside the country, in a manner watched with admiration by the whole world, and without causing any civilian loss or rights violation, it removed terror from the country's agenda.

All of this has been possible largely because the idea of a coup has left the soldiers' minds and because the military has focused on doing its real job in the best way. At the same time, the TSK has thereby reached the strongest state it can be in, and a maturity in which it is most strongly integrated with its nation.

Now, there is no occasion to take coup rumors seriously with regard to the TSK, which stands at the center of the achievements of a Turkey that has accomplished such great successes in so short a time. But then, perhaps it is precisely from this inappropriateness that something is being targeted. With the coup rumor, someone is trying to plant this inappropriate idea in people's minds. Thus they hope to remind the military once more of this bad habit that it has now left behind.

Just look, they have already managed to bring the subject onto the agenda of the famous American think tank, the Rand Corporation. Now that this inappropriate subject is being discussed at this level in that organization, back in Turkey the subject will be taken a little more seriously. Thus a situation worse than the actual occurrence will arise.

What kind of calculation is this? At most it could be the calculation of bankrupt merchants. It could also be an empty dream seen, and desired to come true, by those who have lost hope in the situation in Turkey.