The coup attempt in Germany and a story of return to square one in Europe

"A coup, in this day and age, in Turkey?" it used to be said, before 27 April and indeed ever since 2002, when the AK Party came to power, in the face of coup possibilities that kept stirring. By "this day and age" was meant largely the distance Turkey had covered in its democratization process, but, more importantly, it was an important argument of the status quo forces' rhetoric of resistance to reform initiatives, back when the AK Party was still playing the opposition in power.

By saying that the coup threat, clearly felt and even voiced in the tutelary and condescending language displayed by some tutelary institutions and organizations, was nothing but a conspiracy theory, attempts were being made to cover up the exposed intentions of some initiatives and formations.

With the sentence "Would a coup happen in this day and age?", what was meant, in part, was that, in a situation where both the distance covered in Turkey's integration with Europe and the integration of Turkey's economy and society with the global economy and society had so developed, the sole addressee of a coup could no longer be a government inside Turkey. These discourses were also used effectively against the government's claim that the 17-25 December and Gezi processes were coups. The claim that the 17-25 December attempts were a coup was characterized as a conspiracy theory the government resorted to in order to eliminate these legal processes and escape responsibility for them. Anyway, a coup would not happen in this age, could not happen.

Those who dared to stage a coup in Turkey would also have dared to take on the whole world. So what would protect the Turkish people against a coup was no longer the people itself but, before anything else, Europe and the whole world. Was this a good guarantee? Was it enough? Was this sufficiently deterrent for those who would dare to stage a coup?

Of course we were no longer a country in which whoever seized a radio station or got up early in the night could carry out a coup, as the world had changed. But did this not depend on the coup plotters sharing a belief that the world had truly changed and that this world would not accept a coup? What if those who had dared to stage a coup were not that smart, not that knowledgeable and not that aware of the world's development?

Let us again recall the famous joke that can always be adapted to such situations. The one about the mental patient who is afraid of all chickens because he sees himself as a grain of millet. After fully recovering and leaving the hospital, he soon returns to the hospital running, fleeing from a chicken. He says, "You treated me, but do the chickens know I am not millet?"

A coup does not happen in this age, fine, but do the coup plotters know it?

If a guarantee that coups had become impossible was "this age," another guarantee was "EU and Turkey" relations. For EU countries a coup was the most unacceptable thing. Yet the EU called neither the Gezi events nor 17-25 December a coup, and would not. But all the conditions existed for calling 15 July a coup, and it did not call even that so. Though EU countries had already caused another disappointment by not calling the military interventions that stopped the Arab Revolutions coups either. But their refusal to call 15 July a coup, and moreover their sheltering all the perpetrators of that coup attempt, gave sufficient clues about the conditions, from their standpoint, of calling a coup a coup.

A coup that would not happen in this age was happening, and it could happen even in a country so integrated with European countries. This world has no guarantee against coups. And now, in the heart of Europe, which itself was thought of as a guarantee against coups, in Germany, the thing least expected is happening. A coup attempt is happening, and this attempt can be nabbed having covered a not insignificant distance.

An extreme-right organization called Reicsbürger with 21 thousand members has made a coup attempt with every detail thought through, aimed at re-establishing the German Empire of the 1800s. They had even thought of putting Prince Heinrich XIII in charge if they came to power. The action plans required as the basic condition of all coups had been thought through in every detail: the kidnapping of the President and ministers, the establishment of a shadow cabinet, the identification and preparation of the king to be put in charge, and so on.

Thank God German intelligence uncovered the event in time and, to prevent the coup attempt, raided 137 separate points and seized the organization's active members. Otherwise we cannot even imagine what a successful coup attempt, or one a few steps further along, would have set in motion in Germany and across Europe.

In much of Europe there is a growing discontent that does not at all approve of Europe's present course. This discontent is also accumulating a rancor that would squander all the accumulation achieved in the name of democracy, human rights, standardization, scientific spirit, institutionalization and so on in Europe. The possibilities and positive sides of the welfare state may awaken no concern in those who take part in or approve of the coup attempt about what they may lose. The desire for destructive change is the basic problem of all welfare states.

We too have relapsing sides, of course. This is the picture of history never ending at a level of reason. At the highest point of reason, man falls prey to whim and fancy, and everything returns to the beginning.