Turkey: EU’s Trojan Horse?

by Geoff Dickson

09 Apr, 2009

This article first appeared in Australian Islamist Monitor

Everyone knows the famous story of how the Greeks captured the city of Troy using the decoy of a wooden horse in which soldiers had been hidden. Helen, the wife of the king of Sparta had been captured by Paris of Troy and taken to Troy.  Following ten years of siege, the Greeks used the deception of a wooden horse to take the city. Today the tables might be reversing as Turkey strives to be admitted to the EU and could well prove to be a “Trojan Horse” to secular Europe. Recent events show that Turkey is moving away from the secular state formed by Ataturk in 1923 when he abolished the Caliphate, ending the Ottoman Islamic empire.

It is useful to reflect on what the EU might inherit inside the Trojan Horse that is Turkey today.
 

Turkey in Profile

For decades, Turkey has been a cornerstone of NATO, essential to the defense of Europe and America’s most underrated ally. But that stature and relationship have eroded.

 

Compared to the Turkey of the 1970s and 1980s, today’s Turkey is far less committed to democracy and secular government.

Turkey – Quick Facts

Turkey is often called "the cradle of civilization," as it has been home to a rich variety of tribes and nations of people since 6500 B.C.

The Republic of Turkey was founded in 1923 by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, replacing the dynastic and theocratic Ottoman system, with its Sultanate and Caliphate. The Republic is based on a secular democratic, pluralist and parliamentary system.
In 1945 Turkey joined the UN and became a member of NATO in 1952.
 

Turkey occupied the northern portion of Cyprus in 1974 to prevent a Greek takeover of the island; relations between the two countries remain strained.

 

Periodic military offensives against Kurdish separatists have dislocated part of the population in southeast Turkey and have drawn international condemnation. ^[1]

Current population is estimated at over 70 million of which 99% are muslim, with Christians, Bahai and Jews making up the balance.

 

Turkey currently has a secular government that wants Sharia, and a Judiciary and Military that are pro-western and secular. However, the Prime Minister, Recep Erdogan has been quietly moving to stack the judiciary and military with pro-Sharia people.

Profile of Prime Minister Recep Erdogan

The world and the EU in particular should take notice of  recent comments made by Erdogan who makes it very clear the secular state is incompatible with Turkey’s future and has made some interesting claims. Recently he stormed out of a meeting with Israeli president Shimon Peres at Davos over the conflict in Gaza, and has called for Hamas to be recognized as a legitimate organization.

Consider these recent statements:

“Erdogan: a Muslim can’t be secular”

The people, he suggested, wanted Islamic law: “But the fact is that 99% of the people of this country are Muslims. You cannot be both secular and a Muslim! You will either be a Muslim, or secular!..For them to exist together is not a possibility! Therefore, it is not possible for a person who says ‘I am a Muslim’ to go on and say ‘I am secular too.’ And why is that? Because Allah, the creator of the Muslim, has absolute power and rule!”. ^[2]

“Erdogan: there is no such thing as a moderate muslim”
ANKARA - Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan rejected attempts to call Turkey the representative of moderate Islam. “It is unacceptable for us to agree with such a definition. Turkey has never been a country to represent such a concept. Moreover, Islam cannot be classified as moderate or not,” Erdoğan said, speaking at Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies late Thursday.^[3]

“Erdogan: Islam means Jihad”
“The minarets are our bayonets, the domes [of the mosques] our helmets, the mosques our barracks." ^[4]

Bayonets, helmets, barracks? Sounds threatening to me!

“Erdogan: Assimilation is a crime”
A crowd of 16,000 expatriate Turks cheered Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan at a vast indoor auditorium in Germany on Sunday as he told them to resist assimilation into the West.

The political rally by Germany’s biggest ethnic minority upset German politicians, who objected to a major public event on German soil being advertised on posters in Turkish only.

Erdogan indirectly addressed those concerns, saying it was right for Turkish immigrants to learn German and other languages so they could integrate, but wrong to abandon their Turkish heritage and assimilate.

“Assimilation is a crime against humanity,” he told the crowd. Many Turks had travelled from France, Belgium and the Netherlands to hear his hour-long address in the shiny venue, the Koelnarena. ^[5]

Listen to the deafening silence from the multiculturalists!

Issues with Turkey today

Abuse of Women
Four out of ten Turkish women are victims of physical abuse by their husbands and only a fraction report it to authorities, according to an official survey released today and published by daily Hurriyet website. The poll, conducted among 12,795 women in summer of 2008, found that 39% of those were "slapped, pushed, punched, choked, burnt or threatened or attacked with a weapon such as a knife or gun". Fifteen percent said they were victims of sexual abuse, described by the survey as being physically forced to have sex, having sex out of fear or being forced to engage in degrading or humiliating sexual acts. One in four women was injured as a result of physical or sexual violence. The poll, released by the governments office on the status of women, said that 48.5% of the victims did not tell anyone about the abuse while only 4% sought help from police and a mere one percent sought refuge in state-run shelters. (ANSAmed). ^[6]

Honour Killings
 

As Turkey cracks down on 'honour killings' (to please EU), women are now told to commit suicide. This family of sisters said there had been an honour killing in their  village, in one of the most patriarchal areas of Kurdish Turkey, and  they live in constant fear.

As a precondition to enter the EU, Turkey passed laws to criminalize honour killings, and as a result, suicides have increased. Why? Because the Turkish men now demand that the women kill themselves so that they don’t go to jail.

One young woman, Elif, claims that when she was 18 years old, her parents wanted to force her into marriage. When she refused, she claims her family told her that if she didn't marry him, she would have to kill herself. She says her father told her if he, or her brother, was forced to kill her they would go to prison so she should think of them and kill herself. ^[7]
 

Persecution of other faiths

In keeping with Islamic traditions, ethnic cleansing is underway. Not only are Christians threatened but property is being seized as the infidel cant own property.
 

The oldest Christian monastery, Mor Gabriel, is under threat. ^[8]

ISTANBUL, January 22 (Compass Direct News) – Syriac Christians in southeastern Turkey say a land dispute over the historic Mor Gabriel Monastery is part of a larger system of discrimination against the religious minority in this overwhelmingly Islamic country.

Muslim residents of southeastern Turkey dispute the boundary lines of an ancient Christian monastery dating to the fourth century as being unnecessarily large for the needs of a religious community. Islamic village leaders from Yayvantepe, Eglence and Candarli are attempting to confiscate one-third of the monastery’s property, claiming it was wrongfully appropriated and that they need it for their livestock.
 

First cousin marriages and fetching
A problem that Europe is having with Turkish immigrants is that not only don’t they assimilate, they don’t learn the language, and when they marry they “fetch” brides from Turkey, usually first cousins as is the Islamic practise.

Summary.
For the EU, these omens would not be encouraging, particularly as countries like Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden are having problems with Turkish immigrants not assimilating.

As a member of the EU, Turkey would not only cause a large migration of muslims into Europe, the culture and cohesion of Europe would definitely be threatened.

USA and President Obama
 

Of course, Obama has just embarked on a tour of Europe where he met the EU leaders and spent time with Gordon Brown. I am sure Gordon Brown thanked Obama for the movie DVD’s he was gifted.      

In Europe, Obama calls for EU acceptance of Turkey (5th April 2009)

PRAGUE (AP) — President Barack Obama is urging the European Union to accept Turkey as a member, saying it would be a positive sign to the Muslim world.

Obama spoke Sunday at a luncheon for leaders of the EU's 27 nations in Prague. He said the West should seek greater cooperation and closer ties with Islamic nations. He said letting Turkey into the EU would be an important sign of those efforts. ^[9]

Obama has also recently called for more Muslims to be in Government in the USA, making the same mistake as Tony Blair did in the UK after the July 2005 London bombings.

Conclusion
It is obvious that the pendulum in Turkey is swinging towards a theocratic Sharia state.
Human rights abuses in Turkey would definitely be a concern to the EU as well, as would be the fact that the lack of integration is encouraged by the Prime Minister Erdogan.
 

Allowing Turkey entry to the EU will open up the floodgates for muslims to migrate to old Europe and further undermine stability.
 

Could Turkey be a Trojan Horse for the EU?

---

References

1.  Profile on Turkey
2.  Turkey can’t be secular – Erdogan
3.  Islam is not moderate – Erdogan
4.  Islam means Jihad - Erdogan
5.  Assimilation is a crime for Islam – Erdogan
6.  Forty percent of Turkish women are abused (copy and paste the following link into your browser: http://www.ansamed.info/en/news/ME03.@AM55098.html. This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it)

7.  Honor Killings in Turkey
8.  Mor Gabriel under threat
9.  Obama calls for EU to accept Turkey

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Name: balam
Subject: Turkey
Date: Thursday April 09, 2009
Time: 03:05:49 -0400

Comment

Turkey should never be allowed into E.U.The prime minister of Turkey has openly stated that Turkey is a Moslem country.Hence you are either a Muslim or a secular.Being a secular,you have to tolerate non-Muslims and give them equal rights.That is not permissable in Islam.The soil of Islam does not have the right ingredients for democracy to take roots and grow.It is the absurd theology of an Immoral Beduine as desribed by Mustafa Kemal Ata-Turk.His definition of Islam.The Christian heritage of Europe can not afford the luxury of Islamic invasion of europe through Turkish Membership.Barak Husein has his own axe to grind.He wishes his Muslim brethren to take over Europe then America and then whole of civilised world.The un-civilised world is already under Islam.Obama Husein should first of all make Turkey leave North Cypress and let Kurds have their own homeland before lecturing Israel.If you evr let a camel"s head into a tent,you lose your tent.Beware of this dangerous Trojan horse before it is too late.Another piece of Eastern wisdom:ALL THE SNAKES ARE DANGEROUS,BUT THE ONE IN YOUR SLEEVE IS MOST DANGEROUS.

Name: Turkey, Islamists and threat of secular democracy
Subject: How to deal with it. Islamism
Date: Thursday April 09, 2009
Time: 06:39:48 -0400

Comment

Islam and secular democracy does not mix. So what are Muslims doing in Europe. We have to make Muslims leave their religion or send them to Saudi Arabia or Pakistan. Mosques are being used by Islamists to incite violence against non-Muslims. Europe should send Muslims back to Arabia and camel land

Name: Demsci
Subject: Islam and Democracy
Date: Sunday April 12, 2009
Time: 05:33:51 -0400

Comment

Yes, we could well be worried about Turkey and Turkish immigration. Erdogan himself says that you cannot be both secular and Islamic. Birth-rates in Turkey and other Islamic countries are higher than in many democratic states and migration is very one-sided and substantial. Whereas assimilation is rejected fiercely. However, democratically minded people, its leaders and organisations now have their wake-up-call. Let them go on the counter-offensive, to make most of the Islamic countries democratic. Turkey already is, and once this AKP-government slips, the Turkish opposition profits! As long as the Turkish military guard democracy, we are OK with Turkey. And we can use Turkey to spread democracy throughout the Islamic world. We also could make new city-states, for instance in Greenland, Alaska, Canada, and invite oppressed people from Islamic states into them, offering them freedom + good prospects but insisting on democratic rules through contracts. That way we weaken these dictatorial Islamic regimes, who just don't know how to give (most of) their people more than poverty and oppression. But many democratic states excel at providing freedom, prosperity and happiness! And if you don't believe that, why would you care one way or the other at all??? Once democracy is established over most Muslims the threat to democracy recedes.

Name: Demsci
Subject: Struggle between dictatorial and democratic states
Date: Sunday April 12, 2009
Time: 06:43:17 -0400

Comment

If we see the threat of Radical Islam we can view it as a struggle between dictatorial and democratic states, organisations and their leaders. The democratically governed and minded people, its states, organisations and leaders need to be woken up to this threat. The wake-up calls like those from this site are very important. But once they are woken up, let us look at what is happening and what can be done. There are 1,5 billion muslims (or less), there are 192 states (or more) and these muslims live in part under dictatorial and in part under democratic rule. The birth-rate of the former is higher than that of the latter group. But the migration is all from dictatorial countries to democratic ones. Now the danger is that these immigrant muslims will somehow create more dictatorial states on democratic territory. But the goal of the democratic states, organisations and leaders could be to increase the percentage of muslims living under democratic rule, not caring where they live, or originate from. With new city-states, on democratic territory somewhere, with democracy-binding contracts, they can increase this percentage. Land where people live is not so important. Places of origine, genes are even less important. We could eventually aim for the vast majority of the worlds muslims living under democratic rule. While just holding out for democracy in the already democratically ruled countries. What do you think that does to the mindset of the dictatorial Islamic leaders (NOT the democratic Islamic leaders)? When the muslims in droves, in majority, prefer or at least live under democratic rule? Are exposed to free speech, after being educated well enough? Their weak spots are that they cannot cultivate free affluent societies as well as democracies can. That their women (half of them!) are definitely better off in democratic states than in their dictatorial states. Their big advantages so far were indoctrinating while suppressing free speech, high birthrates, one-way migration (which however is a 2-way-sword). But we can expand free speech, education, all our democratic values over the people of the world, we have land, money. And many, many muslims can keep their faith AND be democratically governed, and eventually minded. So wake us up to our dangers, but to our possibilities as well.