ABSTRACT
Before 1999: the misfit between European standards and Turkey’s CMR In order to understand the main elements of the misfit between the abovementioned European norms and Turkey’s CMR, it is necessary first to analyze the nature and ideology of the “guardianship” role of the military in Turkish politics. As Jenkins argues, the military has always considered itself as the guardian and guarantor of the domestic stability and territorial integrity of the Turkish Republic because it played such an important role in establishing the new state during the Independence War. The backbone of the Turkish military’s ideology is its Kemalist legacy and its view of itself as the “mystical embodiment of the Turkish nation” (Jenkins 2007, p. 354), characterized as defending the secular and democratic pillars of the Republic and securing its integrity. On this basis, the Turkish military has intervened in politics, both directly and indirectly, whenever it considered that the vital interests of the state were being endangered by the political elite or that its democratic and secular character or integral and unitary structure were threatened. According to the military, Turkey’s two major internal threats have been Kurdish separatism and the rise of political Islam. Despite having these characteristics, however, it is important to note that the military has almost always supported Turkey’s accession to the EU, since it considers this objective to be a crucial step towards Westernization, which is a central element of Kemalist ideology. The autonomous role of the Turkish military based on this historical guardianship role has been reflected in the institutional set-up of CMR.
