[MonkeyClub]

Yep, you’re right, and I’d say your two extra points are spot on. I’m not a Turk myself, but I have Turkish friends who’re perhaps more on the secular/modernist side, hence my potential bias.

Re: the 2016 coup, I’m still not certain that it was a “legitimate” one, ie not sure that Erdogan wasn’t aware of it in its infancy, and decided to allow it to go through.

As others have said, coups are embedded within Turkish democratic history in one sense (though a coup still cannot be a democratic device), so maybe Erdogan has the political acumen to plan ahead including potential coup attempts.

His utilization of the 2016 coup to strengthen his control was astounding in its speed and accuracy. Perhaps this is what enabled western media to think of it as a planned event on the part of the government?

[kaanski]

With the precedent for coups in Turkey I don’t think there’s that much planning involved for the strengthening of control afterwards. Erdogan purged the army ruthlessly and declared a state of emergency, pretty par for the course after an attempted coup.

He definitely widened the net of his purge and take out some political enemies, but I don’t think Erdogan reacting fairly predictably to an attempted coup is proof that he knew of it before hand, or planned it.

[SlickNixon]

>Erdogan wasn’t aware of it in its infancy, and decided to allow it to go through

It's not impossible, but when you go through the details (e.g. how much everything, including Erdogan's early morning nationally broadcast FaceTime(!)[0], hinged on Türksat remaining operational) it's clear how huge of a gamble that would be on his part.

[0] https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/7/16/erdogan-resorts-to-...