Treating lieutenants like 'lepers'!..

We are literally surrounded by fire on all sides. Missiles are flying over our heads between Iran and Israel... The US and Israel are settling into the Greek Cypriot administration... Greece is deploying Patriot air defense systems to Crete... Putin says, 'All of Ukraine is ours.'

In these circumstances and conditions, what is our situation?

We don't even know!..

There is no perceived need for the National Security Council to meet in an extraordinary session, for a secret session to be held in the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, or for the public to be informed about the measures taken or to be taken. We don't even know where the S-400s are, or if they are still in their boxes.

What we do know is that Erdoğan said, 'We are not running a grocery store; we are governing one of the world's greatest countries, the Republic of Turkey... May our nation be at ease.' Ministers followed up with a series of tweets supporting these words from Erdoğan.

Furthermore, Minister of National Defense Yaşar Güler, after visiting the Iranian border with the TSK command staff to conduct inspections and observations, condemned Israel's attack on Iran, called on the international community to stop Israel, and announced that security measures along our borders have been increased.

“Parliament did not convene” we said; let us correct that. The IYI Party submitted a motion to evaluate the effects of the Iran-Israel conflict on Turkey and to take the necessary steps; however, the motion was rejected by the votes of the AKP and MHP!..

Fortunately, a memorandum published under the signature of Parliament Speaker Numan Kurtulmuş was accepted unanimously. With that memorandum; “Israel's ongoing genocide against the people of Gaza, all its actions threatening regional peace, and its attacks on Iran were condemned in the strongest possible terms” condemned.

So, there is no situation to panic about; all is well!..

The agenda of the Parliament already confirms this.

There is a struggle to open olive groves in Milas and Yatağan, Muğla, to mining...

Erdoğan is being equipped with new powers, from the Council of Higher Education (YÖK) to the Economic and Social Council...

One of the powers granted in this context is that Erdoğan will now determine the waiting periods for promotion in the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK). In other words, he will promote whoever he wants and send home whoever he does not.

Who knows, perhaps this is also one of the measures taken against the ring of fire surrounding us!..

In addition to determining these promotion periods, the authority to dismiss personnel from lieutenants to colonels for indiscipline was also going to be given to Erdoğan, but for some reason, it was later abandoned and removed from the omnibus bill.

THE CRIME OF TAKING A PHOTO

When lieutenants and indiscipline are mentioned, what is the first thing that comes to mind?

Of course, it is the incident where hundreds of lieutenants crossed swords among themselves after last year's Military Academy graduation ceremony, What happened after they said, “We are the soldiers of Mustafa Kemal.”

The dismissal of class valedictorian Ebru Eroğlu, along with Talip İzzet Akarsu, Batuhan Gazi Kılıç, Serhat Gündar, and Deniz Demirtaş for “indiscipline,” and the dismissal of three commanders from the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) for failing to stop the lieutenants...

The purging of the four commanders who voted against the dismissal of the lieutenants at the Land Forces Command High Disciplinary Board, which decided on the expulsions...

The rejection of the stay-of-execution lawsuits filed by the lieutenants against their dismissal...

The fact that the other lieutenants, excluding Ebru Eroğlu, were forced to work at the Ankara Metropolitan Municipality...

These are the official parts of the incident.

And then there is what happened behind the scenes. Such a to ensure that such "indiscipline" does not happen again, a state of martial law has practically been declared at the Military Academy, with measures such as limiting the number of family members who can attend future graduation ceremonies, and banning lieutenants from entering the field to meet their families or taking photos after the ceremony... It turns out there was more to see and hear. Let us explain.

Ebru Eroğlu, who lives with her family in Istanbul, went out shopping recently. When she entered a store selling military supplies, she ran into some cadets. Since they share that cadet spirit, they hugged each other and then took a photo.

And what happened?

When the students returned to school, their phones were checked. Those photos were found, they were forced to delete them, and

they were warned: "Let this not happen again." ......

The other incident occurred during the Russian Red Army Choir and Dance Ensemble's performance in Ankara on May 28.

Lieutenants Talip İzzet Akarsu, Batuhan Gazi Kılıç, Serhat Gündar, and Deniz Demirtaş also watched the show, where scenes from Turkey and Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk were projected onto the stage screen, and the Mehter March and the Çanakkale folk song were performed. By coincidence, a group of Military Academy students and some of their instructors were also at the concert.

They met, hugged, and took photos together.

The same thing happened upon their return to the school. The school administration, having heard about this somehow, checked the students' phones and made them delete the photos. Furthermore, the instructors who went to the concert were also subjected to a kind of interrogation, can you believe it?!..

You would think these bright lieutenants were murderers, terrorists, rapists, gold smugglers, or plague-ridden!..

These are the new scenes from the 'fortification of the internal front'...

Müyesser YILDIZ

June 22, 2025