Grey Wolves

This article is about the Turkish political group. For the animal, see Gray Wolf. For the death industrial music group, see The Grey Wolves.

Grey Wolves (Turkish: Bozkurtlar) or Idealist Youth (Turkish: Ülkücü Gençlik) is the youth organization of the Turkish Nationalist Movement Party (Turkish: Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi, MHP)[1] They are named after Asena, a legendary ancient female wolf that led captive Turks to freedom. Their formal name in Turkish is ülkücüler (idealists) and Ülkücü Hareket (The Idealist Movement), inspired from 19th Century Turkish writer Ziya Gökalp later developed by 20th century writer Nihal Atsız (who was, incidentally, a high school teacher of Alparslan Türkeş) and Italian fascist Giovanni Gentile's "Actual Idealism" theory as a pseudo-philosophical reference. Ülkü Ocakları (Forges of Ideal), the proper platform of Grey Wolves, denies any "direct" links with MHP and presents itself as an independent youth organisation. Their female supporters are called Asena. When loudly acclaimed while visiting an İstanbul synagogue in 1992, Alparslan Türkeş referred to the gatherers, with some humor, as the "Grey Wolves of Moses". According to Turkish authorities, the organization carried out 694 murders from 1974–1980.[2] It is banned in Kazakhstan.[3]

Contents

History

Foundation and ideology

The Grey Wolves were founded as the youth organization of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) created by Alparslan Türkeş in 1969.[4] A significant pillar of the MHP's ideology is the dream of creating the Turan, the "Great Turkish Empire", including all Turkic peoples mainly in the successor Central Asian countries of the former Soviet Union as well as the Caucasus and the Uygurs' homeland of East Turkestan found in the Xinjiang province of Northwestern China.

The Grey Wolves also rally around Pan-Turkic Causes including: the economic isolation and territorial integrity of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus; the Armenian military occupation[5] of Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding areas, and the subsequent displacement of Azeri civilians; the assimilation campaigns and suppression of the Iraqi Turkmens in Kirkuk and adjacent regions in Northern Iraq by the Kurdistan Regional Government; and the suppression of Uygur culture and Chinese colonization of Eastern Turkestan. The Grey Wolves are also known to be supporters of Azeri activists that campaign for greater cultural rights in Iran.

They have also been known to support non-Turkic people whom they consider to have kinship with Turkish people. It is for this reason that Grey Wolves have supported the Chechen Independence Struggle, the KLA-led Albanian movement in Kosovo, and the Bosniaks' resistance in the Bosnian War.

Role in 1980 military coup

At the time of the military coup of September 12, 1980, led by general Kenan Evren (who was also the leader of Counter-Guerrilla)[6] there were some 1,700 Grey Wolves organizations, with about 200,000 registered members and a million sympathisers. Grey Wolves, also known as Commandos conducted assassinations against left-wing intellectuals and academics in Turkey. The torturing and killing of many left-wing partisans and sympathisers are among their crimes. Grey Wolves, besides assassinations and bombings, also participated in massacres of minority community members in Çorum and Maraş. However, after being useful for Kenan Evren's strategy of tension, the leader of the Counter-Guerrilla turned president outlawed the MHP and the Grey Wolves. Just like Hitler did to SA. Colonel Türkeş and other Grey Wolves were arrested. In its indictment of the MHP in May 1981, the Turkish military government charged 220 members of the MHP and its affiliates for 694 murders.[7] However, imprisoned Grey Wolves members were offered amnesty if they accepted to fight the Kurdish separatism and the PKK,[8] and ASALA ("Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia").

The Grey Wolves then lost many of its core cadres to the neo-liberal Motherland Party or various vestiges of the Islamist movement. In 1983, the Nationalist Task Party ("Milliyetçi Çalışma Partisi", MÇP) was founded as a successor to the MHP; as of 1992 it is again known as the MHP.

Role in Kurdish affairs

The MHP is strongly opposed to Kurdish separatists, namely the militant PKK, although they nevertheless do have some Kurdish supporters, who are called Bozkürtler or "Grey Kurds".

The paramilitary wing of the Grey Wolves have been utilized by the Turkish intelligence services to assassinate PKK leaders.[4] The fact that Counter-Guerrilla had engaged in torture was confirmed by Talat Turhan, a former Turkish colonel.[6]

Activities to date

On a global scale, the Grey Wolves are suspected to have been responsible for numerous political assassinations and disappearances of Turkish and Kurdish human rights activists, and are known to have ties with the Turkish mafia.[9] The Grey Wolves have also raised funds for Chechen guerrilla separatists, whom they consider their brothers.[10]

In 1996 the Grey Wolves were brought in great numbers to resist a peaceful protest against the occupation of Cyprus by Greek Cypriot members of the Cypriot Motorcycle association. As a result, the violent beating perpetuated by members of the group Tasos Isaac was brutally murdered. The activities were captured.[11]

In 2004, the Grey Wolves successfully prevented the screening of Atom Egoyan's Ararat in Turkey, a film about the Armenian Genocide.[12][13][14][15]

Since 2004 Grey Wolves and Islamist Nizam-ı Alem members waged a war against Christianity in Turkey. Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was also assassinated by a Grey Wolf sympathizer (Ogün Samast) at Istanbul in 2007. Another young Grey Wolf assassinated Father Andrea Santoro; a Catholic Priest; at Trabzon in 2006. A group of Grey Wolves conducted an inhuman torture and killing party; against Bible publishing firm members in Malatya, torturing and killing 3 innocent people.

Links to intelligence and organised crime

Numerous sources show that the MHP and the Grey Wolves had ties to the Turkish mafia, to the Turkish intelligence services as well as to the CIA and other intelligence agencies. Former military public attorney and member of the Turkish Supreme Court Emin Değer has established that the Grey Wolves collaborated with the counter-insurgency governmental forces, as well as the close ties between these state security forces and the CIA.[16][17][18] Indeed, Martin A. Lee also wrote that the para-military wing of the Grey Wolves were covertly supported by the CIA, which worked with the Gladio network,[4] while a December 5, 1990 article by the Swiss Neue Zürcher Zeitung stated that the Counter-Guerrilla had their headquarters in the building of the US DIA military secret service.[19] Le Monde diplomatique wrote that "the CIA used proponents of the Greater Turkey to stir up anti-sovietic passions at the heart of Turkish Muslim minorities in the Soviet Union".[16] Thus, in 1992, colonel Türkes went to newly-independent Azerbaijan, where he was acclaimed as a hero. He supported Grey Wolves sympathiser Abülfaz Elçibay's candidacy to the presidency. Once elected, Elçibay chose as ministry of Interior İsgandar Hamidov, a member of the Grey Wolves who plead for the creation of a Greater Turkey which would include northern Iran and extend itself to Siberia, India and China. Hamidov resigned in April 1993 after having threatened Armenia with a nuclear strike.[16]

According to Daniele Ganser, a researcher at the ETH Zürich University, the founder of the Grey Wolves, Alparslan Türkeş was a member of Counter-Guerrilla, the Turkish branch of Gladio, a stay-behind NATO anticommunist paramilitary organization which was supposed to prepare networks for guerrilla warfare in case of a Soviet invasion.[6] Le Monde diplomatique confirms that the Grey Wolves were infiltrated and manipulated by Gladio, and that important Grey Wolves member Abdullah Çatlı had worked with Gladio. According to the same article, Abdullah Çatlı met with Italian international terrorist Stefano Delle Chiaie, who, apart of taking part in Italy' strategy of tension, also maintained links with Pinochet's DINA and participated in the Argentinian dirty war.[20] However, in Italy, Greece, and Turkey, Gladio supported a strategy of tension (strategia della tensione in Italian) which used false flags terrorist attacks in order to discredit the communist movement.[21][22]

Grey Wolves outside of Turkey

Republic of Azerbaijan

The Grey Wolves are believed to have provided support to Azeri forces fighting Armenians during the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The Grey Wolves Party still functions in Azerbaijan, although its name has been changed to the Azerbaijan National Democrat Party.[23][24]

Europe

The Grey Wolves in western Europe today were originally sent there at the end of the 1970s and the early 1980s to infiltrate Turkish immigrant workers. Their task was to combat Turkish left-wingers who had left Turkey because of harsh state repression but, later also focused on Kurds. As a result, the Grey Wolves stepped up their activities in the Netherlands by founding the TFN, Turkish Federation of Holland, in 1995. The latter now has around 56 local units and an estimated membership of 30,000.

Italy

According to investigative reporter Lucy Komisar, the 1981 attempt on Pope John Paul II's life by Grey Wolves member Mehmet Ali Ağca may have been related to Gladio. Ali Ağca would in this case have been manipulated by NATO's clandestine structure, in an attempt to fuel again Italy's strategy of tension, which last big event was the 1980 Bologna massacre. Komissar underlines the fact that Ali Ağca had worked with Abdullah Çatlı in the January 1, 1979 murder of Abdi İpekçi, the editor of left-wing newspaper Milliyet. "Çatlı then reportedly helped organize Ağca's escape from an Istanbul military prison, and some have suggested Catli was even involved in the Pope's assassination attempt" reports Lucy Komisar, adding that at the scene of the Mercedes-Benz crash where Çatlı died, he was found with a passport under the name of "Mehmet Özbay" - an alias also used by Mehmet Ali Ağca.[25]

Cyprus

The Grey Wolves went to Cyprus to support Turkish Cypriot protesters in 1996. The Grey Wolves were involved in attacks on Greek Cypriot properties and Greek Cypriot activists.[26]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Update to the UNHCR CDR Background Paper on Refugees and Asylum Seekers from Turkey - UNHCR movement founded by Alparslan Türkeş in 1969.
  2. ↑ Albert J. Jongman, Alex Peter Schmid, Political Terrorism: A New Guide to Actors, Authors, Concepts, Data Bases, Theories, & Literature, pp. 674
  3. ↑ "Kazakhstan Updates List Of Banned Terrorist Groups", Kazakhstan Today, Interfax-Kazakhstan, Radio Free Europe (2006-10-12). Retrieved on 2008-08-27. 
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Lee, Martin A (1999). The Beast Reawakens: Fascism's resurgence from Hitler's Spymasters to Today's Neo-Nazi Groups and Right Wing Extremists. Routledge. ISBN 0415925460. 
  5. ↑ Mr David Atkinson, United Kingdom, European Democrat Group, (Rapporteur) The conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region dealt with by the OSCE Minsk Conference, Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, 29 November 2004
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Daniele Ganser (2005). NATO's Secret Armies, Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe. London: Franck Cass. ISBN 0714685003. 
  7. ↑ Searchlight (magazine), No.47 (May 1979), pg. 6. Quoted by Edward Herman and Frank Brodhead in The Rise and Fall of the Bulgarian Connection. (New York: Sheridan Square, 1986), pg. 50.
  8. ↑ Former Grey Wolves member İbrahim Çiftçi speaking to Milliyet on 13 November 1996. "They have used and discarded us", Milliyet, Turkish Daily News (1996-11-14). Retrieved on 2008-10-22. 
  9. ↑ "Turkish Dirty War Revealed, but Papal Shooting Still Obscured," Martin A. Lee, Los Angeles Times, April 12, 1998.
  10. ↑ Isingor, Ali. "Istanbul: Gateway to a holy war", CNN (Italy). Retrieved on 2008-08-28. 
  11. ↑ "Greece condemns Turkish barbarity", Cyprus News Agency (1996-08-12). Retrieved on 2008-08-27. 
  12. ↑ "Egoyan award winning film not shown yet in Turkey", Toronto Star. Retrieved on 2006-05-06. 
  13. ↑ Sassounian, Harut (2004-01-15). "Gray Wolves Spoil Turkey's Publicity Ploy on Ararat". California Courier. ADL Ramgavar Azadagan France. Retrieved on 2008-08-27.
  14. ↑ Ülkü Ocaklari: Ararat Yayinlanamaz (Turkish)
  15. ↑ Ülkü Ocaklari: ARARAT'I Cesaretiniz Varsa Yayinlayin! (Turkish)
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 16.2 Lee, Martin A. Les liaisons dangereuses de la police turque," Le Monde diplomatique, March 1997 (French)
  17. ↑ The Double Standard: The Turkish State and Racist Violence (Chapter 13) in Racism in Europe (edited by Tore Bjorgo) (ISBN 0-312-12409-0)
  18. ↑ Maksudyan, Nazan (November 2005), "The Turkish Review of Anthropology and the Racist Face of Turkish Nationalism", Cultural Dynamics 17 (3): 291-322, doi:10.1177/0921374005061992 
  19. ↑ "NATO's Secret Armies: Chronology". Parallel History Project on Cooperative Security. ETH Zürich. Retrieved on 2008-08-27.
  20. ↑ Nezan, Kendal (1998 July). "Turkey's pivotal role in the international drug trade", Le Monde Diplomatique. 
  21. ↑ Official documents on ISN (hosted by ETH Zürich) concerning Gladio, including SIFAR (Italian military service) report on Gladio, extracts of former CIA director William Colby's memoirs, Italian prime minister Giulio Andreotti's public revelation to the Senate of the existence of Gladio in October 1990, Parliamentary investigation into the Swiss Defense Ministry, 1995 Italian parliamentary report on Terrorism, etc
  22. ↑ Secret Warfare: Operation Gladio and NATO's Stay-Behind Armies ETH Zürich research project on Gladio directed by Dr. Daniele Ganser. Many documents available in various languages, including Turkish articles; audio interviews of Ganser; Ganser's June 2005 article in The Whitehead Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations; Der Spiegel article, etc.
  23. ↑ Fuller, Liz (2003-06-23). AZERBAIJANI PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION CAMPAIGN GETS UNDER WAY. 6. Radio Free Europe. http://rfe.rferl.org/reports/caucasus-report/2003/06/23-260603.asp. Retrieved on 2008-08-27. 
  24. ↑ Fuller, Liz (2007-05-30). "Azerbaijan: Date For Presidential Ballot Confirmed", Radio Free Europe. Retrieved on 2008-08-27. 
  25. ↑ Komisar, Lucy. "The Assassins of a Pope". Retrieved on 2006-07-04.
  26. ↑ "TURKISH AUTHORITIES INCITED BUFFER ZONE VIOLENCE". Cyprus Newsletter. EMBASSY OF CYPRUS, WASHINGTON DC (September 1, 1996). Retrieved on 2008-08-27.

External links