Grey Wolves are also popular in Germany. There are serious reports that they make efforts to infiltrate politics / army / police forces. It's simple: These are fascists.
Erdogan is a dangerous man. He once recited an Islamic poem including the lines [0]:
> "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers..."
I am sure Germany has to be very careful in dealings with Erdogan, since Germany has such a large amount of Turkish migrants and thus they could quite easily destabilise the country.
A few years ago in The Netherlands the Turkish people started large scale protests due to a Turkish minister being denied entry. The Turkish people clearly identified themselves as Turks first and foremost, since they were carrying the Turkish flags during their protests [1].
Turkey maintains a strong kind of grip on its Turkish citizens abroad using state-funded Diyanet mosques [2] and allowing dual citizenship [3] - children born from Turkish countries living in a foreign country receive the Turkish citizenship by default.
Gray Wolves and ultranationalists predate Erdoğan and his own movement. The two have been at odds with one another but - being the clever politician that he is - he has allowed himself recently with those ultranationalists.
For a while Erdoğan brought in reforms for Turkey's Kurdish population, far beyond what any previous Turkish government, including the ultrasecular ones, had done. Of course he turned his back on them in the end and went back to what comes natural in Turkey, which is to vilify Kurds, Armenians, Greeks and pretty much everyone else.
I think the world is progressively realising that islamists are taking over the muslim world. What is unhelpful is that many confuse islamists and jihadists, which are a tiny fraction of islamists. Erdogan is a muslim brother.
You can do the exercise (I did) of going through every muslim country on the map, from Morocco to Indonesia, and lookup the recent political history of that country on wikipedia. In every single of these countries, no exception, either:
- the Islamists are in power or one of the largest political parties (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Marocco, Turkey, Pakistan, etc)
- the Islamists were one of the largest political forces but have been banned (doesn't mean they are not present) (Jordan, Algeria, etc)
- the Islamists are one of main the parties to a civil war (Libya, Syria, Yemen, etc)
I don't know what can be done in the west. I see this as a kind of repeat of communism. It's an idea which time has come. You don't get people to change their mind by force. They need to experience why it sucks before turning against the idea (in that respect Iran is probably leading the way, where the islamists seem to increasingly lose support of the population). And it doesn't mean it's a homogenous block (neither was communism).
> You can do the exercise (I did) of going through every muslim country on the map, from Morocco to Indonesia, and lookup the recent political history of that country on wikipedia. In every single of these countries, no exception, either:
> - the Islamists are in power or one of the largest political parties
Do you consider Central Asian countries muslim ones? (At least until very recently) these countries (especially, Uzb.) brutally supressed any Islamic attempt at gaining any sort of power. I read elsewhere Uzb. now is trying to "liberalize" its politics with respect to "religious freedom" among others.
I think the right word is "infiltrate". Not just army and police, but sports clubs, refugee centers, city halls, everything.
It is the long arm of Ankara and if they were Russians or North Koreans, they would have been proscribed by the German authorities a long time ago. Unfortunately, their dangerousness was not recognized early enough, so they were allowed to expand. What to do with this cancer now, that is the question.
They are trouble in Turkey too, key institutions in the country are often a battleground of infiltration between sects and just before the Gulenists, the dominant force in the police was the Grey Wolves. Since the exodus of the Gulenists, the rumors are that Grey Wolves are back in town.
Whoever wins, it usually results of abusing their position for political and financial gains and we learn about what happened after the institution changes hands(For example, only after the battle between Erdogan and the Gulenists, evidence came into light of the police involvement of the assassination of an Armenian Journalist, probably intended as a political manipulation).
Germany should be very careful, having loyalty to an external charismatic leader and acting as an organisation within an organisation is unfortunately commonplace among Turks. They are not majority but tend to be the more passionate ones.
They seem to have at least some influence in the Turkish community in Sweden as well. The former Swedish minister for housing Mehmet Kaplan was ousted for having association with them.
I get what you're saying but on an important topic, let's keep HN a place to have more valuable conversations. I let myself make snarky comments on some topics to be honest but for sensitive political matter it would be better not to play this way.
While I understand that this is a sarcastic comment, I actually think that diversity is our greatest strength.
Others seem to wonder how we could thrive despite people speaking out against the state, the concept of traditional families being put in question by sexual freedom and other liberal ideas, I think we thrive because of them. We do not put invisible societal cages around people, we encourage them to be what they are and let them realize their full potential while elsewhere, people are doing busywork to do as society expects them to do. (This is exaggerated - of course there are also a lot of things that societally unacceptable here but it does not seem as limiting as elsewhere.)
They are certainly not a minority in Europe, where this happened, and which is the context of the message I was replying to.
They may not be a minority on certain French suburbs, maybe on the place where this happened? They are obviously not a minority on the very street where the described "hunt" is taking place.
Along the nested hierarchy of subsets of Europe that are in question, "France" may be the sole level at which they can be bona-fide called a minority.
Turkey isn't a country in Europe is what I'm trying to say. ~3% of Turkey is in Europe, the rest of it is in Asia (which gives Turkey its geopolitical importance), and it's political orientation has historically always been in Asia (which makes sense, given that the Turks didn't originate in Turkey, but conquered the area in the middle ages; they stem from central Asia).
"Russia is a country in Europe" is similarly weird, even though ~25% of the land (including their two major cities, and ~75% of the population iirc) is in Europe and historically, Russia was much more involved in Europe than Turkey.
In Europe is in Europe, and as well in Asia. I don't think the fraction is very relevant. And if history is important, the Ottoman empire has a history very much involved with the rest of Europe.
Think of Venn Diagrams, only part of Turkey is part of Europe. There's overlap, but one isn't inside the other. Turkey is, like Russia, considered a transcontinental country. They aren't "in" either continent, but part of them is.
> And if history is important, the Ottoman empire has a history very much involved with the rest of Europe.
As an adversary/attacker, yes. But that's not a reasonable foundation for declaring membership.
The EU(Germany)is so preoccupied with its economic ties with Turkey to understand that it's losing its strategic depth because of its inaction against it.
Right now, Turkey is at war with almost all its neighbors, it's crazy that we are still turning a blind eye to it
Turkey military is inside, without permission (thus what we call "invasion") on:
Cyprus, Syria, Lybia, sometimes in Iraq (they claim to be fighting kurds, invade, do their thing, and retreat), Greek waters
Turkey is also seemly helping Azerbaijan attack Armenia
They also are pissing off Egypt, France, Russia, orthodox christians worldwide and some other countries.
The only reason why they are not "at war" is because they are member of NATO, so everyone is waiting Turkey to declare war first, since they don't want USA into their ass.
Ok... as a Turkish guy who despises how the people in charge are destroying all the foreign relations I understand your point. But you don't need to exaggerate and say we are at war with all of our neighbors, there is no war, the situation is bad as it is.
Like it or not, people were literally burning their neighbors alive in Cyprus and entire west was watching. They've been in peace for 40 years now because of Turkish intervention. Cyprus war ended 46 years ago.
Turkey isn't fighting Armenia at all.
Iraq and Syria doesn't exist, they are broken beyond repair thanks to US and EU and Russia. It's the people that matters and there is a reson why we have 10 million Syrian refugees.
Europeans nowadays know a lot more about the ethnic cleansing tactics that were always well known to Turkey's neighbors. Every "peaceful intervention" by turkey resulted in massive ethnic cleansing, "without wars" and a simple count of any non-turkish population shows that.
It doesn't matter if one calls it "war" or not, ethnic cleansing is uncivil and barbaric, no matter where it takes place. It's true that Ethnically cleansed areas become much more peaceful, is the argument that we should have more of it?
> Like it or not, people were literally burning their neighbors alive in Cyprus and entire west was watching. They've been in peace for 40 years now because of Turkish intervention. Cyprus war ended 46 years ago.
"in peace" about as much as the Korean peninsula is at peace. Turkey is illegally occupying Northern Cyprus, and that's it. It's not at war with the actual Cyprus, but you can't pretend everything is even remotely fine.
Turks were brutally removed from most of the lands they brutally installed and settled themselves on. Population exchanges like after the Greco-Turkish war should have been done with all neighbors to avoid such nastiness in the future.
And as a Greek citizen I hope you guys can deal with your nationalist side and work with everyone around you. The situation in our borders is ridiculous right now.
They have been fighting in wars in Syria, Iraq, and now declare all out support for Azerbaijan. They are also being aggressive towards Greece regarding oil drilling. Not to mention they occupy Cyprus.
The only explanation I can find to why these organizations can grow openly at certain European countries while their neighbours prevent it, is that some people at intelligence and law enforcement agencies are enabling it, and maybe local politicians as well.
This is so true, we are seeing the very real results of woke culture going wrong & instituting the exact reverse issues of the ones it trying to solve. Another example of this exact problem: "Security guard avoided Manchester Arena bomber 'for fear of being called racist'".
Being fired is the least of concern for french people. Ghettos in big cities, off-limits communities and crime are settled reality. I have multiple french friends who chose to move outside of Paris for this.
I call bull. In pretty much every country in Europe as a politician on the right you can votes when pushing antiimmigration and islamophobia. The reason about not cracking down on the grey wolves is the weird relationship between Europe and Erdoğan.
It is also worth pointing out that the grey wolves have strong history of working with rightwing/fascist groups in Europe, which makes sense as they themselves are essentially fascists.
Look at the Rotherham scandal where police and politicians shielded "asian" rape gangs for years (allegedly) out of fear of being perceived as racist. Turkey's geo-political role in the US empire (and subsequent NATO membership) plays a role, but it's not the primary driver.
I know that many people like to construe the myth that police is somehow lax or in bed with "lefties, islamist" or afraid of being labelled racist, islamophobia or similar.
However the reality is that immigrants are disproportionately more subjects of police brutality and arbitrary harassment, and there is plenty of evidence. All recent scandals of police ties to political groups have been associations with far-right groups. Just look at the recent scandals in Germanyab nazi chat groups inside the police, connections of police to nazi groups and leaking of hidden addresses of immigration lawyers to right wing groups.
> However the reality is that immigrants are disproportionately more subjects of police brutality and arbitrary harassment, and there is plenty of evidence.
Obviously not in Rotherham, where the opposite is well documented over decades. You're trying to rewrite history, it seems.
No I'm not rewriting history, but you are rewriting reality by citing anecdotal exceptions. Don't get me wrong the rotherham scandal is horrible, it does not change the fact that it's an exception. Take for example the Met, the investigation into institutional racism has just reopened because of the many reports.
A far simpler and thus likelier explanation is that European countries are universally naive in their application of religious freedom and support for local minorities. Those ideas and laws came about before jihadism and the famous long arm of Ankara became what they are today. A cleverer approach is what is needed, more cognisant of the way that, for instance Ankara and Ryad, sponsors and instructs mosques in Europe. That sort of control should and can be severed, bringing migrants, sometimes already 3rd generation, definitively on board. I can tell you intelligence agencies are generally aware of this, but have no clear mandate to act. A confused and mostly wrong public opinion and politicians are not helping this.
Ironically, these ultranationalist organisations are linked to NATO's stay-behind anti-communist operations "Operation Gladio[0]" and it is known as "Counter-Guerilla[1]" in Turkey. Italian prosecutor Felice Cassino[2] famously took down its Italy branch but in Turkey there were numerous assassinations and political operations on those who dared to investigate the claims, therefore the organisation was never really destroyed.
Its existence was revealed by leftie prime minister Bulent Ecevit back in the 1970's but the details mostly remain on the speculative side.
Event writing about this is on online forums is kind if scary. Suspected members of this organisation are linked to country's troublesome political history.
It's sort of interesting history just repeats itself. Many (most) of the militant islamists group were also created with the help of the CIA, example case: the taliban. The state which is the known biggest supporter of militant islamism in the world is a dictatorship propped up by the US for decades, I'm talking about Saudi Arabia.
The Gray Wolves murdered Hrant Dink and are simultaneously a fascist and terrorist organization that both the Turkish military and Erdögan turned a blind eye to. They must not be allowed to operate in France.
There have been incidents in the US as well, like multiple cases of arson on Armenian churches in San Francisco.
Great! Another important topic of discussion derailed by HN's garbage algorithm.
It's #20 now but you can always tell when a post is doomed to oblivion by comparing the upvotes-to-time ratio to other posts on the front page. Unless the mods save it, this should be gone in a few minutes.
I don't like the ideas in most of these comments so far, but I still don't want to suppress this discussion. Let people show themselves for who they really are and what they really think, for good or bad, because we're never going to make any progress unless a discussion can actually happen.
When I submitted this, I didn't think of it from a "political" perspective. To me, this issue transcends politics and reveals a part of human nature that is beyond the definition of politics. I thought it would prompt an exploratory discussion of the matter and of human nature.
Unfortunately, many events which in reality exist with or without politics (like race-based hatred) are tagged with the political label. This also makes these events harder to discuss in an objective manner because an element of partisan thinking enters the fray: "does my party support this or not?" vs "do I believe this is right or not".
EDIT: There have been many front page posts about the genocide of Uighur Muslims in China. Is that considered political as well?
Of course the topic of Uighur's genocide is political. It's even -extremely- so.
That you seem to not percieve it so underlines your misconception that any issue linked to the human condition could possibly not be.
"Everything is political" should not surprise you, it's not a new concept.
On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.
Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.
Do these "Grey Wolves" [0] still exist then? I had no idea. I remember seeing a movie long ago [1] but not its story. It was either about them or the turkish mafia.
I'm glad that we had this process of coming to terms with our past here in Germany [2]. While not everything is rosy for sure, we are basically aware of our past while not being overly affected by it anymore in the sense that old grudges or unsolved conflicts would still exist. It must have been not easy for earlier generations here at all and it is still a recurring topic in history classes in german schools but I think we are in a good place in this regard now.
Must suck to never have dealt with the past (think: Armenian Genocide [3], look for "Turkey denies that the word genocide is an accurate term for these crimes") and have that stuck in your society.
Yes. They are also quite sizable in Germany where they are officially organized and about 20.000 members strong. To get an idea for the size: German far right extremists are estimated at about 30.000.
There is a source for 18000 members in 2017 in the Wikipedia article [0], see footnote 11. The "Bundeszentrale für Politische Bildung" [1] is a reputable source.
Well, not as much of an organization. Ulku ocaklari is the successor organization. Although it shares the same ideology as with its historical counterpart, it is considered mostly harmless. Generally due to the sheer incompetence of the organization).
However, there are far too many individuals/groups (Equivalent to Mafia in Turkey, ultranationalist gangs in Europe) that sympathize/share views with said organization. And those guys are definitely not "mostly harmless".
- Turkey spent like decades denying any harm done to Armenians in general. Then for ~no reason at all, and not even in a place where Armenians are especially visible, a group of Turks decide to hunt some in the streets ? absurd squared
- That's yet another barbaric racist movement coming back from the past. Neo Nazis rallies in the US were a sad surprise after 45th PUSA election but now Turks ? .. if this is a social fever thermometer, it seems the fever is there.
Turkey and its brotherly nation, Azerbaijan are currently at war with Armenia trying to ethnically cleanse the Nagorno-Karabagh region. Tragically, US politics have overshadowed this war.
No really, even beyond that, I barely see any mention of the US election and I can't remember what happened two weeks ago. New ecological disaster, hate crime, terrorism, pandemics.. it's accelerating.
Maybe Armenia should not be illegally occupying Ajerbaijan territory if they don't want to be forcibly kicked out. This is simply war against occupation.
This, Crimea, and a ton of other places near Russia, have "occupation" because some stupid random URSS leader gave random territories away to random governors, because the logic was: "it is all part of URSS anyway".
So Nagorno-Nakahbath:
It been Armenian for THOUSANDS of years, there are structures there that are Armenian and 2000+ years old, also the place is full of the earliest christian churches (that were also armenian).
People that say Armenians must leave there because it is not theirs, are either ignorant of how the place became part of Azerbaijan (URSS gave it to Azerbaijan to appease Turkey) or are just anti-Armenian.
Crimea is a similar situation, kinda. The land been historically Tatar, but Russia invaded and took it in 1700something, it since then been a major Russian military area, when URSS had a Ukranian president, he gave Crimea to Uktraine, again thinking it wouldn't make a difference, not thinking URSS wouldn't last forever.
I just explained to you, that they were ALREADY there, they didn't take it by force, they already lived there, for litearlly thousands of years (we have archeological evidence for at least 2 thousand, thus thousands, in plural).
Legally the place does belong to Azerbaijan, because URSS gave it to them to appease Turkey, but de-facto it was never Azeri land.
Note: I am talking about Nagorno-Nakbath proper, not the lands around it.
That said, I'm not well informed about this topic and I'm just going off the maps I find. Although the source also has maps of Armenian genocide, so I don't expect them to have an anti-Armenian bias.
Also by force, I'm referencing the previous Karabakh war of 1993. You can't deny the existence of force there.
First, there were no "Armenain vilayets" in the Ottoman Empire. It was a term people in Europe and USA used to define the six vilayets where there were the most Armenians. It was not an official designation.
Second, Nagorno-Karabakh was not one of the "Armenian vilayets" because it wasn't part of the Ottoman Empire. It was part of the Russian Empire.
Finally, Armenians predate Azeris (and Turks) in all the areas we are speaking about and were the majority in many of them up until the Armenian Genocide. In a few, they are still the majority to this day. Nagorno-Karabakh is one of those.
The argument I was responding to was "Karabakh became Azeri land in the 20th century because Russia wanted to appease Turkey", and I'm saying that the maps show the land has been under Azeri control during 9th-17th centuries (and Ottoman/Russian after).
A discussion on whether being a majority ethnicity gives Armenia the right for occupation would be quite complicated and unsuitable one for a tech forum.
The media is liars. The whole world accuses Azerbaijan and Turks of murder, but this is not true.
Azerbaijan has never attacked a civilian settlement. But Armenia attacks civilians every day, as it did in the past.
Turks do not kill civilians in their ethics.
Karabag is an Azerbaijani territory and was occupied by Armenia in the ~ 1990s. They attacked the villages and killed them without children or women. Armenians swallowed the skin of the children, They was cutting off the belly of the pregnant woman and bet on whether the child to be born was a boy or a girl. Do you know?
For ~ 30 years, Azerbaijan defended its rightful case, demanded its land back, but Europe remained silent.
There is a decent Armenian community in France. It’s the country in Europe where they are the most visible. Lots of Armenians were welcome after the genocide.
That said, I entirely agree. The timing is suspect as well, with Erdogan ramping up propaganda.
Most visible compared to other nations but I assure you it's not a topic even remotely as discussed as other ethnic groups from all over the planet. It's not like armenians were rubbing it in turks face on national television.
You’re right, it has never been an issue either way as far as I know, the Turks being more interested in the Kurds living in Paris than in the Armenians.
But it is still more likely to happen in France, just because there are more Armenians there.
Why not? If I went to turkey and start to show everybody cartoon of muhamed I would probably be stoned. Why we cannot deport people who symphatize with genocide?
Organizations like Grey Wolves deserve a crackdown and their members deportation.
If they love their neo-Ottoman sultan so much, they should enjoy the great Peace and Prosperity he built in Turkey proper, including the Glorious and Strong Turkish Lira. Not live among the unbelievers and pay with their dirty Euro.
Membership in Grey Wolves should be considered on par with membership in neo-Nazi structures. No reasonable country would suffer foreign neo-Nazis building structures right under their noses.
I have no sympathy for right-wing extremists, but EU countries still operate within the rule of law. You cannot deport people who are member of a legal organization, and I don't think there is enough evidence to declare it a terrorist organization.
I feel making a case that they are either a terrorist or just a criminal organisation would be the easiest way to get rid of them outside of turkey. Such cases are really subjective so it shouldn't be that difficult. Just last month a greek far right political party was judged to be a criminal organisation. Grey wolves could share their fate.
There are a lot of ideas here sparking with (at least) border-line racism (against racist, but it's racism nevertheless).
But what you say stands out, because there is an easy solution that's not tainted by racism: These people are threatening other people. They form an organization to promote this. We as a society have a tool against that: Law.
We certainly have law, but they are not applied. It is hard to pick people from the mob an put them on the stand. And these people hide in a large groups. Same as Nazis did. Alone they are afraid and harmless. We seem to forget the history here. If we don't suppress extremism early we will have much bigger problems.
I am not talking about all Turks/muslims. But about those that participate in fascist marches, share hate propaganda. No place if you don't respect freedom of speach and share rasism. Also stop money from Saudis and Iran to build mosques. Return hateful clergy. I would also like to shut down catholic shurch but that is another debate :D
A comment openly promoting racism and deportations - unflagged and obviously not downvoted. Sometimes I feel like losing faith into this community. We are better than this.
I am really anti rasism. People in video are clearly racists. I don't care if they are europeans, turks, christians, muslims, arabs, indians, americans. I just think if you are in EU and you do not respect the laws, you should be deported if possible, depending on your legal status. Why is it bad to speak against mob that tries to find and kill Armenians?
"The marches followed violent clashes earlier Wednesday, when a group of pro-Armenian demonstrators blocked a motorway near Vienne, and clashed with members of the Turkish community. According to police, clashes with knives broke out, and four people were injured, including a 23-year-old man who was hit with a hammer."
Read before spreading your xenophobia against Turkish people.
>Who is spreading xenophobia against Turkish people?
Article from Vice itself is pure xenophobia.
>If I click that link I only see Turkish text, what am I supposed to read?
Read the Vice article at OP it says same. If you want translation here you go,
"Armenian activists, who blocked the A7 highway near Lyon, France, attacked a group of Turkish citizens going to work with a stick, ax and knife, causing serious injuries to 2 TURKS aged 17 and 22!"
>Also what does this protest have to do with a fascist group on an ethnic cleansing hunt?
Nobody ethnic cleansing anyone here, no point in dramatizing events.By doing so, you just empty the meanings of words.
> Nobody ethnic cleansing anyone here, no point in dramatizing events.By doing so, you just empty the meanings of words.
Ah, I'm sorry I guess English is not your first language. The article says the following had happened:
"250 people marched through the city centre waving Turkish flags, yelling violent threats like: “We are going to kill the Armenians.”"
This is the literal definition of ethnic cleansing. If you disagree, do you mean that this did not happen? Or are they looking for specific Armenians that were part of the event you are talking about?
There hasn’t been any “hunt for Turks”, and the Armenian community has been overwhelmingly peaceful for the ~100 years it existed. Both Turks and Armenian have always been welcome in France. There is no climate of fear that can justify this sort of behaviour. This is purely a result of the heightened tensions around Armenia.
There also isn’t any Armenian organisation that’s comparable to the Grey Wolves. Turkish militants are much more of a threat to stability in Europe than Armenians (although they aren’t a major one either).
So the situation is not quite symmetrical. I can get that some nuances might be lost in the reporting but the two sides clearly are not as dangerous.
Turkey is not denying only the Young Turks' role in Armenian genocide, but also the pogroms against Armenians in Baku that are a direct cause of the current situation in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Mutatis mutandis, somehow I don't see the German government sending drone attacks to Israel.
You mean Azeri (who are ethnically Turks) do not deny the Armenian genocide as well, and the Turks are not particularly interested in helping out Azerbaijan because the other side is Armenia?
You are trying to pull context to somewhere else hard, this current 2020 fight between Armenia and Azerbaijan has nothing to do with Armenian Genocide, its a border dispute connected with events of Soviet Union dissolving. Of course Turkey will help Azerbaijan if even it was not against Armenia but Iran or someone else.
My point is that they were attacking representatives of the state that has committed genocide against them (and hasn't undergone meaningful reformation since + denies it to this day), not random people that are ethnically Turks. That's a gigantic difference, one is targeting a state, the other is targeting an ethnic group.
