Turkey's Gülen network in ten items

A brief history and characteristics of the Gülen network and how communists should understand their position in the bourgeois order are listed in ten-items by the Communist Party of Turkey
Thursday, 20 December 2018 15:20

Boyun Eğme  ["Do not Surrender"], the weekly political magazine of the Communist Party of Turkey (TKP), published a ten-item article to explain the Gülen network. Yesterday's ally of the AKP government and today's 'terrorist organization', Gülen network can only be understood by its ties to the state and imperialist centers.

Gülen had established local chapters for the Association for Fighting Communism in Turkey. Political Islamists, including Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan were the members of Association for Fighting Communism. But his alliance with the AKP has faltered in recent years. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's former ally, US-based Fethullah Gülen was one of the masterminds of the failed coup in July 2016. AKP government officially started to deem the Gülen network as a terrorist organization. The Turkish government wants him extradited to Turkey. A brief history and characteristics of the network, as well as the task of communists, can be listed as follows:

1. The gülenist organization was established by the approval, encouragement, and support of a network including business people, prime ministers, police, and commanders. It was not a secret fraction organized in the state, but a public enemy that was organized by the state itself.

2. Every step of the Gülenist network had been supported by various actors of the bourgeoisie; any obstacles had been removed from their way, and the network had been backed by financial support. It is not true that these had been done by secret Gülenists or some specific pro-Gülenist politicians. Former and current prime ministers and presidents, like Ecevit, Demirel, Özal or Erdoğan... They did not do it because they were deceived, because they were Gülenists or because they demanded gains for themselves. They did this because the capitalist system needed it and the state policy had to fulfill this need.

3. When Gülen was serving for the interests of the system and state in the capitalist Turkey, he had been under the command of the US from the beginning. And this is the rule of this capitalist system: The system and state could not exclude the US influence. The institution where Gülen was employed and promoted in the late 1950s is the most 'national' and pro-US state organization. It was the US diplomacy and military bureaucracy of which Gülen won the trust in the 1970s and after the military coup of September 12, 1980. This relationship had continued in the 1990s by becoming more powerful, by expanding and by opening new fields for various actors to move. When Gülen was totally in line with the US and started getting organized in Turkey, there was not even a political leader or an institution that had not been in the same line in the bourgeois order. There were military officials, prime ministers, presidents, politicians among those who brought Gülenists and the institutions of the US together.

4. Gülen is an international network established cooperatively by the Turkish and US states. His activities in Turkic republics and his extensions in Africa are all the results of this cooperation.

5. The network is a state organization. It serves for the interests of this bourgeois order. Gülen himself may be referred to as a special, magical or even religious value for this organization, but the existence and maintenance of the organization are to serve to the interests of capitalism. Those who heavily attacked Gülen and the network were once the members of the network and this is not related to their ability to hide but with the fact that they are faithful to the existing order.

6. The network, with its organization and its abilities that have been developed in years, has a significant position in the last 30 years of capitalism in Turkey. This network is precious for capitalism, for the bourgeois order.

7. It is not true that the network could not easily be removed from the state, that they could arise from everywhere and that some Gülenist state officials prevented the investigations about the network. The state cannot be separated from this network, its cadres and the logistic service provided by the network.

8. To understand these facts about this network and to fight against similar bourgeois organizations is a life-or-death struggle for the working class.

9. I would be a serious mistake to feel sorry for those identifying themselves as democrats who are victims of oppression and for those who try to continue as usual after accusing the Gülenists of everything.

10. Gülen is the bourgeois order itself. To fight against this order is to lead us to a proletarian revolution that will found socialist Turkey.