The Times: Forest fires exposed the failure of Erdogan’s Regime

Forest fires in Turkey have exposed the weaknesses of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s regime, the British Times newspaper said.

According to a report by the newspaper, when the wildfires that swept the Marmaris Peninsula reached the resort town of Turunc last month, “Bülent Jensch” ran like all the men in his village, putting out flames.

“Bulent assumed that professionals would soon join him, but despite the arrival of firefighters and gendarmes, the army has not arrived.”

For over a week, men and boys carried water containers to put out the fire and used water cannons to keep the fire out of their homes.

On the fourth day of the fires, two Navy ships were sent to Turunc Bay, where they waited on standby. In return, local residents were left to fight the fires alongside the firefighters, who suffered so much stress that they took turns sleeping on the roadsides.

“For Bulent, 48, who completed his two-year compulsory military service in the 1990s, it was shocking.”

He said: “We all served in the army, but for the first time the army wasn’t here for us. If the inhabitants of Turunc weren’t there, I would have been burnt. Why didn’t the soldiers help us? Azerbaijan sent 500 troops. Why didn’t our soldiers exist?”.

This is one of several questions about the government’s response to fires across the country, the Times reported, noting that the fires in Turkey have revealed the extent to which state institutions, including the once-powerful army, seem to be hollowing out in the five years since the failed coup attempt in summer 2016.

According to the paper, the fires also revealed that Erdogan’s foreign policy, which is increasingly based on anti-Western sentiment, has left him unwilling or unable to ask traditional allies for support in crises.

Former officers told The Times that the dismissals and Erdogan’s widening deployment of troops abroad in Syria, Iraq, Libya, and Azerbaijan had left the military unable to respond to a natural disaster at home.

Moreover, the prospect of soldiers leaving their barracks may still concern the President, despite his purges among them.

A former officer added: “Erdogan doesn’t want soldiers to interfere. It’s not a short-term fear, it’s a 40-year-old fear of Turkish Islamists. He does not want the army to gain the love and respect of the people.”

According to the Turkish Defense Ministry, 20612 members of the army were expelled after the failed coup attempt, and the judicial and administrative trials and investigations of 3 thousand and 560 military personnel are ongoing.