One hundred years grazing
Ankara does not leave the idea of a chastity belt
Pan-Turkism remains the political and ideological basis of Turkey’s foreign and domestic policy. In a country above 20, non-governmental and secular organizations that directly or indirectly advocate the creation of a belt of countries that are friendly and supported by Ankara. It includes at least 20 flags.
After the collapse of the USSR, Pan-Turkism is served along with neo-Ottomanism, which rests on history and the experience of the Ottoman Ports. It is about the promotion of social and state structure, which most effectively provides, as they continue to believe in Turkey, Turkic unity.
“According to the Kars Treaty, in the event of a threat to national security, Turkey has the right to send troops into Ajaria.”
It is noteworthy that the national government since September 2014 was headed by Ahmed Davutoglu - the main ideologist of Pan-Turkism in the country. By the way, he was previously Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Neo-Ottoman interpretation by Mr. Davutoglu of Pan-Turkism includes not so much nostalgia as promotion of the idea of the “usefulness” of the Ottoman Empire, which, as the ideologue reminds, extends from the Adriatic and North Africa to the Dnieper and the Caspian basin.
During his visit to the self-proclaimed “Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus”, Davutoglu, being Minister of Foreign Affairs, commented as follows: “The past century has become the page that we turned over. Now we will establish new connections between Sarajevo and Damascus, between Benghazi and Batumi. We will do it in a peaceful way, not fighting with anyone, respecting borders. This is our strength ... 110 years ago, Yemen and Skopje, Batumi and Benghazi were part of the same country - the Ottoman Empire. Speaking about this, we call upon ourselves the fire of accusations of neo-Ottomanism, but why, then, those who united all of Europe are not called unedited? ”
Many experts believe that this passage Davutoglu, albeit concise, signifies the preservation of Ankara’s adherence to the concept of Pan-Turkism, according to which all peoples speaking Turkic languages are one nation. And therefore must unite with the rule of Turkey. This may be a federative, confederative entity, or at least a political-economic bloc under the auspices of Ankara.
Late to be with Batumi
The Georgia Times expert (Tbilisi) Ramaz Sakvarelidze said: “The idea of pan-Turkism may well overlap with the idea of Islamic fundamentalism, and this is dangerous not only for Georgia. Many want to change the map of political spheres of influence, and the same Turkey has long shown increased attention to the Caucasus. But Europe itself does not know how to reduce the danger of Pan-Turkism. ”
The analyst of the same edition, Niko Chiatdze, has a more specific opinion. He believes that the mentioned “message” by Davutoglu is a transparent hint that Ankara, forming a “Turkic analogue of the European Union”, intends in this way to acquire the status of a great power, with which it will be necessary to reckon with everything.
The mention by Mr. Davutoglu of Batumi is very significant. Recall that Adjara, dominated by the Muslim population, has been part of the Russian Empire since 1879, and belongs to Georgia under the Treaty of Kars. According to this document, Turkey has the right to send troops to Ajaria in the event of a threat to national security.
The strategic importance of the port of Batumi, through which oil and products of its processing were exported even before the First World War, coupled with the deep water and vastness of its quays, has long attracted Ankara. In 1918 – 1920, Batum was periodically occupied by Turkey. It was he who was designated among the first objects of the plans of the Anglo-Turkish military invasion of the USSR in 1940 and intervention on the German side in 1941 – 1943. Moreover, Azerbaijani oil today is partially exported by the same route.
Georgian media now say: “The financial and economic expansion of Turkey has reached colossal proportions. All new facilities in Adjara were built by the Turks and are their property. The Turks are buying up land and building their objects, probably in the hope that soon they can be realized as residential apartments for compatriots. Today thousands of Turks are registered in Batumi. There have never been so many Turks in the whole of Adjara when it was part of the Ottoman Empire. ” By the way, the term of the Treaty of Kars expires in 23.
In Adjara, Ankara has the most systemic effect after 1991. But the infiltration of Pan-Turkist and pro-Turkish organizations in the USSR began at the end of the 20. And with 1987 – 1989, Pan-Turkist, including Islamist structures, many of which were secretly created in the USSR regions in 70 and even earlier, sharply increased their activity, established new branches and began to receive legal status. This is not only about the North Caucasus, Azerbaijan, Ajaria, but also about the Volga region, Yakutia, Altai, Crimea.
Many such groups have been transformed for accelerated legalization into trade, construction, manufacturing companies of Turkey. Or they acted and, it seems, continue their “work” under the roof of companies and seemingly humanitarian organizations that rushed to Russia and in general to post-Soviet Eurasia since 1990 – 1992. Judging by the separatist actions in the North Caucasus, for the time being there is no reason to assume that absolutely all organizations of the Pan-Turkist profile have been identified by the competent authorities and neutralized.
Anti-Soviet Socialist Republic
At the end of 20 - the beginning of 30 - among the Tatar and Bashkir communists, not without a hint from Turkish emissaries, the project of education in Central Russia of the “Socialist Republic of Turan”, which also included the Chuvash ASSR, was popular. And in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan at that time there was a secret group "Irk". She considered the whole of Turkestan as an education independent of Russia - the future “Turan state”. This structure had connections with Great Britain and Turkey.
In Azerbaijan, Dagestan, Karachay-Cherkessia, Chechen-Ingushetia, in the middle of 30, secret departments of the Council of the Confederation of the Caucasus, illegal in the USSR, founded in Turkey by immigrants from the mentioned regions at the end of 20's, were created. Quite a few members of this underground survived the war years, survived deportations to Kazakhstan and Central Asia, and then returned to their homelands.
After the sudden death of Stalin, the pressure on Pan-Turkism began to weaken. Moreover, some party-state leaders directly or indirectly supported relevant attitudes in society, which in fact was a guarantee for the preservation of pro-Turkish groups in the USSR.
Perhaps the most striking example is synchronism in lobbying and a kind of saving Pan-Turkism. In September, 1967, during the days when the then head of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, Veli Akhundov, was in Constance (Romania), where he met with the Turkish ambassador to that country, the party leadership of the Tatar ASSR addressed Moscow with a proposal to unite autonomy with Bashkiria and "create a Tatar-Bashkir Soviet Union" Republic as part of the USSR. That is the idea of the end of 20-x not sunk into oblivion.
A clear answer was given to the question of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee on the rationale of this proposal: “The Turkic peoples in this region want to unite just like the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia.” That is, already in those years, the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict was provoked by the Jesuit.
Obviously, the Kazan initiative was not passed, but the party leadership of Azerbaijan, Bashkiria and Tataria was replaced only at the end of the 60-x and the beginning of the 70-s. Is it any wonder the survivability of the Pan-Turkic projects in the now former USSR?
Border conversion courses
As for the financial and economic support of exporting such ideas to the disintegrating Soviet Union, back in 1990, Turkey actually approved an indefinite program for the development of political, economic and cultural ties with Turkic-speaking countries and territories of the USSR. Many Turkish media noted at that time that the Soviet empire was about to collapse and that “alien cosmopolitan influence” was affirmed in the republics and autonomies culturally ethnically related or close to Turkey. To implement the program from 1990 to 2010 in Turkey, over 60 financial-industrial structures and organizations of humanitarian cooperation were created in Turkey. Their “daughters”, branches appeared in Azerbaijan, Ajaria, Gagauzia, in all countries of Central Asia, as well as in the Crimea and Tatarstan, Bashkiria and Chuvashia, the Gorno-Altai Republic and Tuva, Yakutia and Khakassia, in the republics of the North Caucasus (except North Ossetia ). In Turkey, free courses were organized for media workers, educational and scientific institutions from these countries and regions. Listeners are taught not only Turkish, but also - mainly in the Pan-Turkic interpretation - the political and economic history of the Ottoman Empire and Turkey.
For employees of economic departments from the same countries and regions, 1989 – 1991 has organized training courses in the management of industries, enterprises and financial institutions that are used in Turkey. Actively training and retraining of military-technical personnel for the Turkic republics of the ex-USSR. Recreation areas for children and young people from the same place are organized.
Ankara’s total direct investment in the CIS countries, according to Webeconomy.ru and Turkish statistics, has more than tripled by the end of 2014, compared to 2000, to 15 billions of dollars. Moreover, the share of Turkic-speaking countries and territories in these investments increased over 1998 – 2014 years from 40 to 55 percent. The money is directed to industrial sectors, including the defense industry, to energy, transport infrastructure and food self-sufficiency projects. Leaders among the Turkic-speaking territories of the CIS in terms of investment from Turkey are now Azerbaijan (about 15%), Turkmenistan (approximately the same), Uzbekistan (10%), Kazakhstan (almost 10%), and also Tatarstan and Bashkiria (in 6%).
In fact, at the end of the 80s, a complex political, economic and ideological offensive of Turkey began, and in fact Pan-Turkism in many regions of the now-former USSR. What could not but lead to the growth of Ankara's political, economic and ideological influence in these territories. A characteristic feature: after the Second World War, the Pan-Turkic worldview abroad is being introduced without condemnation of Western political and ideological concepts, although they are still recognized as incapable of uniting the Turkic-speaking peoples and countries.
Such a metamorphosis is due to the fact that Turkey has been a NATO member since 1952. Since then, the main foreign policy objectives of other countries of the alliance and Ankara coincide at the official level. At the same time, materials of a pan-Turkic orientation still contain, although less provocative than before the middle of the 50's, attacks against the “colonial” policy of the Russian Empire and the USSR “to eradicate the national and cultural identity of the Turkic peoples and ethnic minorities traditional ties with the people of Turkey and its culture. ”
The practical activities of Pan-Turkist and pro-Turkish organizations in Russia and the CIS are far from officially declared. Because it includes activities that are usually qualified as interference in internal affairs. In Russia, over the past 15 years, the activities of the 15 order of such organizations and groups have been suspended or discontinued. Among them, for example, "Hizmet", "Nurdzhular", "Suleymandzhi", "Gray Wolves". But in the Turkic-speaking countries of the CIS, in Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine, such measures were taken much less.
For example, in 2008, the activities of the aforementioned “Nurcular” were banned in Russia. But its cells remained in the Turkic-speaking regions of the Russian Federation, albeit under different names. The total number of followers and sympathizers of “Nurdzhular” is estimated by experts of the special services at least four million people, and the main task of the organization is the propaganda of Pan-Turkic ideology and accelerated rapprochement with Turkey of other countries and territories. By the middle of 90's, Nurdzhular created over 30 schools in the Russian Federation, three language courses and even a university department. But only five years later, these educational institutions were redeveloped or closed in accordance with the decision of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation as inconsistent with the general orientation of the Russian education system. In Turkic-speaking countries of the CIS, from 1992 to 2003, up to one hundred educational institutions in Central Asia were opened by this organization or with its participation, including the university and 30 lyceums in Kazakhstan. Almost all of them continue to work.
Another example: the banned in the Russian Federation Pan-Turkist extremist organization Gray Wolves, created by Turkish intelligence (MIT) in the fall of 1948, participated (possibly still participating) in supporting terrorists and separatists in the North Caucasus republics, extremists in Adjara, Crimea, Central Asian countries.
At the end of 2015, Russia discontinued its cooperation with the International Organization of Turkic Culture (Turksei). On November 29, the Minister of Culture of the Russian Federation Vladimir Medinsky sent an order to the heads of the republics of Altai, Bashkortostan, Sakha (Yakutia), Tatarstan, Tyva and Khakassia about the immediate cessation of all contacts with Turkse.
The headquarters of the organization is in Ankara, and the main funding is provided by Turkey. The structure is based on 12 July 1993. The officially declared goal is cooperation for the preservation, development and transfer to future generations of common material and cultural monuments of the Turkic peoples. But this organization, according to the available data, was also engaged in related activities aimed at promoting Pan-Turkic views, towards a more active rapprochement of the participating countries and territories with Turkey.
In a word, Ankara's geopolitical aspirations are based, as before, on the pan-Turkic ideology. Moreover, it began to be actively introduced into politics and external propaganda even before the collapse of the USSR. Therefore, today complex, carefully verified countermeasures are required both in the regions of Russia and in the republics of the former USSR subject to Turkish influence.
Pan-Turkism remains the political and ideological basis of Turkey’s foreign and domestic policy. In a country above 20, non-governmental and secular organizations that directly or indirectly advocate the creation of a belt of countries that are friendly and supported by Ankara. It includes at least 20 flags.
After the collapse of the USSR, Pan-Turkism is served along with neo-Ottomanism, which rests on history and the experience of the Ottoman Ports. It is about the promotion of social and state structure, which most effectively provides, as they continue to believe in Turkey, Turkic unity.
“According to the Kars Treaty, in the event of a threat to national security, Turkey has the right to send troops into Ajaria.”
It is noteworthy that the national government since September 2014 was headed by Ahmed Davutoglu - the main ideologist of Pan-Turkism in the country. By the way, he was previously Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Neo-Ottoman interpretation by Mr. Davutoglu of Pan-Turkism includes not so much nostalgia as promotion of the idea of the “usefulness” of the Ottoman Empire, which, as the ideologue reminds, extends from the Adriatic and North Africa to the Dnieper and the Caspian basin.
During his visit to the self-proclaimed “Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus”, Davutoglu, being Minister of Foreign Affairs, commented as follows: “The past century has become the page that we turned over. Now we will establish new connections between Sarajevo and Damascus, between Benghazi and Batumi. We will do it in a peaceful way, not fighting with anyone, respecting borders. This is our strength ... 110 years ago, Yemen and Skopje, Batumi and Benghazi were part of the same country - the Ottoman Empire. Speaking about this, we call upon ourselves the fire of accusations of neo-Ottomanism, but why, then, those who united all of Europe are not called unedited? ”
Many experts believe that this passage Davutoglu, albeit concise, signifies the preservation of Ankara’s adherence to the concept of Pan-Turkism, according to which all peoples speaking Turkic languages are one nation. And therefore must unite with the rule of Turkey. This may be a federative, confederative entity, or at least a political-economic bloc under the auspices of Ankara.
Late to be with Batumi
The Georgia Times expert (Tbilisi) Ramaz Sakvarelidze said: “The idea of pan-Turkism may well overlap with the idea of Islamic fundamentalism, and this is dangerous not only for Georgia. Many want to change the map of political spheres of influence, and the same Turkey has long shown increased attention to the Caucasus. But Europe itself does not know how to reduce the danger of Pan-Turkism. ”
The analyst of the same edition, Niko Chiatdze, has a more specific opinion. He believes that the mentioned “message” by Davutoglu is a transparent hint that Ankara, forming a “Turkic analogue of the European Union”, intends in this way to acquire the status of a great power, with which it will be necessary to reckon with everything.The mention by Mr. Davutoglu of Batumi is very significant. Recall that Adjara, dominated by the Muslim population, has been part of the Russian Empire since 1879, and belongs to Georgia under the Treaty of Kars. According to this document, Turkey has the right to send troops to Ajaria in the event of a threat to national security.
The strategic importance of the port of Batumi, through which oil and products of its processing were exported even before the First World War, coupled with the deep water and vastness of its quays, has long attracted Ankara. In 1918 – 1920, Batum was periodically occupied by Turkey. It was he who was designated among the first objects of the plans of the Anglo-Turkish military invasion of the USSR in 1940 and intervention on the German side in 1941 – 1943. Moreover, Azerbaijani oil today is partially exported by the same route.
Georgian media now say: “The financial and economic expansion of Turkey has reached colossal proportions. All new facilities in Adjara were built by the Turks and are their property. The Turks are buying up land and building their objects, probably in the hope that soon they can be realized as residential apartments for compatriots. Today thousands of Turks are registered in Batumi. There have never been so many Turks in the whole of Adjara when it was part of the Ottoman Empire. ” By the way, the term of the Treaty of Kars expires in 23.
In Adjara, Ankara has the most systemic effect after 1991. But the infiltration of Pan-Turkist and pro-Turkish organizations in the USSR began at the end of the 20. And with 1987 – 1989, Pan-Turkist, including Islamist structures, many of which were secretly created in the USSR regions in 70 and even earlier, sharply increased their activity, established new branches and began to receive legal status. This is not only about the North Caucasus, Azerbaijan, Ajaria, but also about the Volga region, Yakutia, Altai, Crimea.
Many such groups have been transformed for accelerated legalization into trade, construction, manufacturing companies of Turkey. Or they acted and, it seems, continue their “work” under the roof of companies and seemingly humanitarian organizations that rushed to Russia and in general to post-Soviet Eurasia since 1990 – 1992. Judging by the separatist actions in the North Caucasus, for the time being there is no reason to assume that absolutely all organizations of the Pan-Turkist profile have been identified by the competent authorities and neutralized.
Anti-Soviet Socialist Republic
At the end of 20 - the beginning of 30 - among the Tatar and Bashkir communists, not without a hint from Turkish emissaries, the project of education in Central Russia of the “Socialist Republic of Turan”, which also included the Chuvash ASSR, was popular. And in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan at that time there was a secret group "Irk". She considered the whole of Turkestan as an education independent of Russia - the future “Turan state”. This structure had connections with Great Britain and Turkey.
In Azerbaijan, Dagestan, Karachay-Cherkessia, Chechen-Ingushetia, in the middle of 30, secret departments of the Council of the Confederation of the Caucasus, illegal in the USSR, founded in Turkey by immigrants from the mentioned regions at the end of 20's, were created. Quite a few members of this underground survived the war years, survived deportations to Kazakhstan and Central Asia, and then returned to their homelands.
After the sudden death of Stalin, the pressure on Pan-Turkism began to weaken. Moreover, some party-state leaders directly or indirectly supported relevant attitudes in society, which in fact was a guarantee for the preservation of pro-Turkish groups in the USSR.
Perhaps the most striking example is synchronism in lobbying and a kind of saving Pan-Turkism. In September, 1967, during the days when the then head of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, Veli Akhundov, was in Constance (Romania), where he met with the Turkish ambassador to that country, the party leadership of the Tatar ASSR addressed Moscow with a proposal to unite autonomy with Bashkiria and "create a Tatar-Bashkir Soviet Union" Republic as part of the USSR. That is the idea of the end of 20-x not sunk into oblivion.
A clear answer was given to the question of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee on the rationale of this proposal: “The Turkic peoples in this region want to unite just like the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia.” That is, already in those years, the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict was provoked by the Jesuit.
Obviously, the Kazan initiative was not passed, but the party leadership of Azerbaijan, Bashkiria and Tataria was replaced only at the end of the 60-x and the beginning of the 70-s. Is it any wonder the survivability of the Pan-Turkic projects in the now former USSR?
Border conversion courses
As for the financial and economic support of exporting such ideas to the disintegrating Soviet Union, back in 1990, Turkey actually approved an indefinite program for the development of political, economic and cultural ties with Turkic-speaking countries and territories of the USSR. Many Turkish media noted at that time that the Soviet empire was about to collapse and that “alien cosmopolitan influence” was affirmed in the republics and autonomies culturally ethnically related or close to Turkey. To implement the program from 1990 to 2010 in Turkey, over 60 financial-industrial structures and organizations of humanitarian cooperation were created in Turkey. Their “daughters”, branches appeared in Azerbaijan, Ajaria, Gagauzia, in all countries of Central Asia, as well as in the Crimea and Tatarstan, Bashkiria and Chuvashia, the Gorno-Altai Republic and Tuva, Yakutia and Khakassia, in the republics of the North Caucasus (except North Ossetia ). In Turkey, free courses were organized for media workers, educational and scientific institutions from these countries and regions. Listeners are taught not only Turkish, but also - mainly in the Pan-Turkic interpretation - the political and economic history of the Ottoman Empire and Turkey.
For employees of economic departments from the same countries and regions, 1989 – 1991 has organized training courses in the management of industries, enterprises and financial institutions that are used in Turkey. Actively training and retraining of military-technical personnel for the Turkic republics of the ex-USSR. Recreation areas for children and young people from the same place are organized.
Ankara’s total direct investment in the CIS countries, according to Webeconomy.ru and Turkish statistics, has more than tripled by the end of 2014, compared to 2000, to 15 billions of dollars. Moreover, the share of Turkic-speaking countries and territories in these investments increased over 1998 – 2014 years from 40 to 55 percent. The money is directed to industrial sectors, including the defense industry, to energy, transport infrastructure and food self-sufficiency projects. Leaders among the Turkic-speaking territories of the CIS in terms of investment from Turkey are now Azerbaijan (about 15%), Turkmenistan (approximately the same), Uzbekistan (10%), Kazakhstan (almost 10%), and also Tatarstan and Bashkiria (in 6%).
In fact, at the end of the 80s, a complex political, economic and ideological offensive of Turkey began, and in fact Pan-Turkism in many regions of the now-former USSR. What could not but lead to the growth of Ankara's political, economic and ideological influence in these territories. A characteristic feature: after the Second World War, the Pan-Turkic worldview abroad is being introduced without condemnation of Western political and ideological concepts, although they are still recognized as incapable of uniting the Turkic-speaking peoples and countries.
Such a metamorphosis is due to the fact that Turkey has been a NATO member since 1952. Since then, the main foreign policy objectives of other countries of the alliance and Ankara coincide at the official level. At the same time, materials of a pan-Turkic orientation still contain, although less provocative than before the middle of the 50's, attacks against the “colonial” policy of the Russian Empire and the USSR “to eradicate the national and cultural identity of the Turkic peoples and ethnic minorities traditional ties with the people of Turkey and its culture. ”
The practical activities of Pan-Turkist and pro-Turkish organizations in Russia and the CIS are far from officially declared. Because it includes activities that are usually qualified as interference in internal affairs. In Russia, over the past 15 years, the activities of the 15 order of such organizations and groups have been suspended or discontinued. Among them, for example, "Hizmet", "Nurdzhular", "Suleymandzhi", "Gray Wolves". But in the Turkic-speaking countries of the CIS, in Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine, such measures were taken much less.
For example, in 2008, the activities of the aforementioned “Nurcular” were banned in Russia. But its cells remained in the Turkic-speaking regions of the Russian Federation, albeit under different names. The total number of followers and sympathizers of “Nurdzhular” is estimated by experts of the special services at least four million people, and the main task of the organization is the propaganda of Pan-Turkic ideology and accelerated rapprochement with Turkey of other countries and territories. By the middle of 90's, Nurdzhular created over 30 schools in the Russian Federation, three language courses and even a university department. But only five years later, these educational institutions were redeveloped or closed in accordance with the decision of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation as inconsistent with the general orientation of the Russian education system. In Turkic-speaking countries of the CIS, from 1992 to 2003, up to one hundred educational institutions in Central Asia were opened by this organization or with its participation, including the university and 30 lyceums in Kazakhstan. Almost all of them continue to work.
Another example: the banned in the Russian Federation Pan-Turkist extremist organization Gray Wolves, created by Turkish intelligence (MIT) in the fall of 1948, participated (possibly still participating) in supporting terrorists and separatists in the North Caucasus republics, extremists in Adjara, Crimea, Central Asian countries.
At the end of 2015, Russia discontinued its cooperation with the International Organization of Turkic Culture (Turksei). On November 29, the Minister of Culture of the Russian Federation Vladimir Medinsky sent an order to the heads of the republics of Altai, Bashkortostan, Sakha (Yakutia), Tatarstan, Tyva and Khakassia about the immediate cessation of all contacts with Turkse.
The headquarters of the organization is in Ankara, and the main funding is provided by Turkey. The structure is based on 12 July 1993. The officially declared goal is cooperation for the preservation, development and transfer to future generations of common material and cultural monuments of the Turkic peoples. But this organization, according to the available data, was also engaged in related activities aimed at promoting Pan-Turkic views, towards a more active rapprochement of the participating countries and territories with Turkey.
In a word, Ankara's geopolitical aspirations are based, as before, on the pan-Turkic ideology. Moreover, it began to be actively introduced into politics and external propaganda even before the collapse of the USSR. Therefore, today complex, carefully verified countermeasures are required both in the regions of Russia and in the republics of the former USSR subject to Turkish influence.
Information