REFLECTIONS OF THE COUP D’ETAT OF 14 JULY 1958 IN IRAQ TO THE TURKISH INTERNAL POLITICS

Abstract

In the summer of 1958, the Democrat Party (DP) government made the word of “coup” a topical matter and made it a primary reason of its polemics with the political parties. The leaders of the opposition criticized the government with being apprehensive while the government was urging that the alarm bells were ringing louder. Continuing debates between the leaders of the government and main opposition reached the public opinion via the press and the Turkish people curiously followed the process. At the beginning, counter criticisms had a very strong tone but later this tone was reduced. However, any single compromise between two leaders on the main themes of the debates could not be reached. One of the main elements of democracy is, of course, political parties. Government of a country is determined by votes of people in elections. However, there occasionally occurred some undemocratic interventions in Turkey, like many other countries in the world. From time to time some claims concerning a possible intervention were also expressed. The debate in 1958 was an example of such claims. The mentioned matter was reflected in a different manner in Ulus, the official publication of Republican People’s Party, and in Zafer, the official publication of DP. In this study, the discussions on a possible coup in 1958 were evaluated according to news in the Turkish press, especially the newspapers of Ulus and Zafer. There occurred an intense dispute among the political parties in Turkey because of internal political developments in Iraq in 1958. The political tension between the ruling party (Democrat Party) and the main opposition party (Republican People’s Party) caused the opposition parties to become closer and eventually their merging. In response to this, the ruling party formed the Vatan Cephesi (Homeland Front). Both collaboration of the opposition in one hand and the emergence of the Homeland Front Branches on the other hand caused to the spread of tension among people that was already widespread in the political life. Even the crash of Menderes’ plane in London in 1959 could only provide a tranquility of several months. It is very interesting to observe that a development in a foreign country caused to an accelerating tension in internal politics. In fact, when the developments are considered it can be argued that the quarrels in the internal politics, which had already existed, were accelerated. The debates between the government and the opposition went out of the parliament and expanded to whole country including masses. The situation reached to a point that the parliamentary system, democracy and national unity in Turkey were under threat. The intellectuals and journalists, whose views have been evaluated in this study, warned that the existing situation in Turkey would give harm to national unity and solidarity of the country and they suggested that the tension should be reduced and the politicians should work together to solve the problems. According to the government, the opposition was encouraging people for rebellion. On the other hand, the opposition accused the government of establishing a totalitarian regime. Under such claims and accusations, some journalists and authors of the time suggested formation of a coalition for national unity or determination of an impartial and respected arbiter just like in 1947. Such an arbiter should firstly listen to all complaints and work together with the party leaders and then an objective declaration should be prepared to reduce the tension. According to them, the Turkish political life was based on a two-party system. Thus the primary problem was not which party was to rule. The real problem was the tension between the government and the opposition and consequently a problem of national unity. As a result, accelerating tension between the government and the opposition could not be solved by the politicians and negotiations and this became one of the reasons of the 1960 military coup in Turkey

Özet

1958 yazında Demokrat Parti iktidarı, "darbe" kelimesini aktüel bir mesele haline getirmiş ve onu, kendisiyle muhalefet partileri arasındaki polemiklerin başlıca nedeni olarak görmüştür. Muhalefetin ileri gelen sesleri, bu konuda, iktidarı bir tür evhama ve kuruntuya kapılmış göstermeye çalışırken; iktidar kanadı ise alarm zillerinin gittikçe artan bir şiddetle çalmaya devam ettiğini söylemiştir. İktidar partisi lideriyle ana muhalefet partisi lideri arasında süren tartışma, basın vasıtasıyla kamuoyuna intikal etmiş ve Türk milleti bu süreci büyük bir ilgi ile takip etmiştir. Başlangıçta oldukça sert bir karakter gösteren karşılıklı eleştiriler bir süre sonra yumuşamıştır. Buna karşın iki lider arasındaki tartışmanın ana temalarını oluşturan konular üzerinde en ufak bir fikir birliğine varılamamıştır. Demokrasilerin en vazgeçilmez unsurlarından biri şüphesiz siyasi partilerdir. Ülkenin yönetimi, seçimler yoluyla halkın iradesiyle şekillenir. Ancak dünyanın pek çok yerinde olduğu gibi Türkiye'de de bazı dönemlerde demokrasi harici müdahale dönemleri yaşanmıştır. Bazı dönemlerde ise bu tür müdahale söylemleri ayyuka çıkmıştır. 1958 yılında da böyle bir tartışma vuku bulmuştur. Söz konusu mesele, Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi'nin resmi yayın organı olan Ulus gazetesi ve Demokrat Parti'nin resmi yayın organı Zafer gazetesine farklı biçimlerde yansımıştır. Başta Ulus ve Zafer gazeteleri olmak üzere Türk basınında yayımlanan haberler referans alınarak 1958 Türkiye'sindeki darbe söylentileri kapsamlı olarak bu makalede irdelenmiştir