Whichever ledgers you rummage through

Yeni Şafak · YASİN AKTAY - Whichever ledgers you leaf through

A bankrupt merchant leafs through his old ledgers; perhaps a receivable will turn up, and even if it does not save the situation, it offers some consolation. Those who commit great crimes in hope of a great gain, if they are not caught by the scruff of the neck, build themselves a whole world with that gain, but if they are caught, they lose even the bulgur at home. For those who commit the crime of a coup, the situation is far graver. All coups contain within them the whole of the crimes, but if they succeed, all of these crimes are wiped away. This is always the greatest bait that tempts one greedily into a coup. However immoral a crime may be, and however much it may contain of the whole of immoral crimes, those who carry out coups can present all their crimes and lies as strategic intelligence, as cleverly taken steps, and themselves as heroes.

The great majority of rulers known as heroes and saviors in many parts of the world are in essence thieves, liars, traitors and immoral figures, precisely because they are coup-makers. But these traits are not known, because their coups succeeded and they are the ones who write all of history retrospectively. Perhaps now and then someone writes, shamefacedly, fearfully and hesitantly, about the realities behind the events, but that is the logic of the matter anyway.

In cases of failed coups, on the other hand, the matter is quite tragic for the coup-makers. Their treachery, crimes, lies and greed come out in all their nakedness. They have no word to say and no argument with which to defend themselves. For everything is plain and evident.

On 15 July too the coup-plotters were caught red-handed; with their wickedness and all the preparations they had made for a long time hidden from everyone, they tried to seize the fate of a country and were caught by the scruff of the neck. Everyone saw and knew what they had done. In the early period, indeed for a long time, no one close to or far from the coup-plotters even opened his mouth. In the very first days there was not even a statement from the FETÖ camp rejecting responsibility for the coup attributed to them. On the night of 15 July the ringleaders of FETÖ were even openly calling on the people not to go out into the streets and to surrender to the coup.

But once some time passed since the event, it came to be a matter of ordinary defense, and defense began to cling with great hope to the slightest piece of evidence, argument or coincidence it could grasp. This is always the most normal state of the defense side in criminal trials.

Even the man caught red-handed with the weapon with which he had just committed the murder in front of everyone asked for his lawyer at that moment. Those who heard him asked, "In your state, what can your lawyer do for you?" And he said, "Truly, that is exactly what I am wondering: in my state, how can a lawyer defend me?"

I suppose that in the early period the 15 July coup-plotters did not even wonder how they could be defended in that state. Because they were sure of their coup, and because they would write the past themselves after the coup anyway, they had made no preparations whatever. But once a little time passed, they set about showing what great inventions intelligence can produce as to how such a situation might be defended.

"Controlled coup" became the defense argument they clung to most. Yet even if all reason and the lived realities were set aside and this control thesis were given a moment's hearing, at most it would show that the side subjected to the coup, that is, the government, knew in advance of those attempting the coup and had made its preparations. It does not acquit those who made the vile attempt at a coup. In the end, the treachery of the coup was lived there in its plainest form.

The FETÖists, who from time to time leaf through old ledgers for this controlled coup, recently raised a connection as a great sensation, as though they had obtained a major piece of evidence. What was it? During the President's connection to CNN Türk that night, Nuh Yılmaz's telephone call came through on Hande Fırat's phone. As though it were a new discovery and a connection worth brewing tea over, the FETÖists and CHP supporters seized on this information with great hope. If Nuh Yılmaz called Hande Fırat that night, or had spoken the day before, it supposedly shows that everything was known in advance and that everything was planned; a magnificent inference. Its equivalent is the reasoning of "Write it down, girl! The fleas whose three legs were torn off do not respond to the command 'jump' because they cannot hear."

That night, personally, both before reaching the Grand National Assembly and after arriving there, I myself called a great many television channels and wanted to be connected.

Forgive me, but what could be more natural than for those subjected to a coup to mobilize all their means that night in order to resist and take precautions?

Some of the television channels I called I managed to get on, and others I did not. I also called CNN Türk and joined the broadcast, and said that the coup-plotters would "go as they came."

Now here is a new riddle for you: did I say this outcome, that they would go as they came, because I knew it in advance, or did I say it out of the will to resist within me and my faith that we would win?

I think I was the last person to connect to CNN Türk before the coup-plotters raided it and cut the broadcast, and my words were cut off by the coup-plotters' raid.

As Omar Mukhtar says to the Italian officer who, on the strength of a Roman-era coin found in Libya, laid claim to Libyan land: "You can find plenty of these coins in our deserts; they are buried there. Do not think that by showing coins that no longer circulate around here you can buy a homeland."

By clinging to such bald connections you can neither change the fact that 15 July was a treacherous coup nor diminish the epic of the nation that stood against it.