The International Herald Tribune
October 13, 2005 Thursday
Turks embrace novelist’s war on EU
by Dan Bilefsky
The year is 2010 and the European Union has rejected Turkey. Fascist
governments have come to power in Germany, Austria and France and are
inciting violence against resident Turks and Muslims. A vengeful
Turkey joins forces with Russia and declares war against the EU.
Turkish commandos besiege Berlin, obliterate Europe and take control
of the Continent.
Some critics will be quick to dismiss “The Third World War,” a new
futuristic novel by a 30-year-old Turkish writer, Burak Turna, as the
wild imaginings of a conspiracy theorist and literary shock jock and
in many ways it is.
But the novel, which dominates bookstore display windows in Istanbul,
has sold more than 130,000 copies in just two months and is rising on
best-seller lists across the country. As Turkey embarks on 10 years
of tortuous talks to join the EU, Turkish observers say the novel’s
popularity reflects the growing wariness of Turks about a Europe that
is increasingly wary of them.
“Turks are getting fed up with the EU’s constant demands and ‘The
Third World War’ has tapped into that,” said Sinan Ulgen, a Turkish
commentator. He noted that the book’s pithy, cinematographic style
has helped it resonate with taxi drivers, government officials and
housewives alike.
Turna is no fringe figure. His first novel, “Metal Firtina” (“Metal
Storm”), became the fastest-selling book in the history of Turkey
when it was published in December, a time of deep Turkish ambivalence
about the U.S.-led war in Iraq.
The book is a fictional account of a U.S. invasion of Turkey that
provokes a Turkish agent to detonate a nuclear bomb in a park in
Washington, leveling the capital. Overnight, the grungy former
journalist and philosophy student became a chat-show celebrity, a
cult figure among 20-somethings and an unofficial cultural barometer
for his country.
Turna says Turks’ fear of U.S. domination, reflected in the
popularity of “Metal Storm,” is being supplanted by a growing Turkish
ambivalence about Europe an ambivalence that has lurked in the
Turkish soul since after World War I.
At that time, West European powers dismembered the Ottoman Empire.
He says he wrote “The Third World War” “Ucuncu Dunya Savasi” in
Turkish to give Turks an outlet for their wounded pride about the
EU’s constant snubbing.
“Turks are waking up to two facts,” Turna said at a cafe near
Istanbul’s bustling Taksim Square, where he was greeted like a rock
star by young fans. “One is that everything told to the Turkish
people by EU leaders is lies. Two, that a Muslim country will never
get into an EU that doesn’t want us.”
Turna is a self-confessed history and science fiction junkie, whose
authoritative descriptions of U.S. military maneuvers in “Metal
Storm” prompted some in Turkey to accuse him of being a CIA agent.
He says he began researching “The Third World War” by brushing up on
1,000 years of European history and concluded that Europe will
inevitably reject Turkey and that the Continent will descend into
chaos and war.
“Europe is based on a racist nation-state structure that has created
world wars for the last 900 years,” said Turna, who added that none
of his works have been published abroad due to his incendiary themes.
“Even if there are no guns, the EU’s decision to turn its back on
Turkey will create a cultural war between Islam and the West.”
His novel pours scorn on the West in passages like one in which
Russian and Turkish officers discuss how they will carve up Europe
after defeating it:
“You are right, no matter what the consequences, a new European order
will be established,” interrupted Cemil Pasha, “and a new European
Union will be formed, and this time the strength will lie with
Eastern Europe.” The Russian general was pleased with this
assessment. “I will never say no to Istanbul being the center of the
new European Union. After all, I’ve been there myself,” the general
joked, “and I’ve seen the Bosporus which was quite enough for me!”
Cemil Pasha said, “Such an outcome would please me. Then Western
Europe would watch with grief the reconciliation between the Orthodox
world and Istanbul.”
The author has been spreading his “clash of civilizations” ideas on
the Turkish chat-show circuit and in fiery speeches titled “The World
Order After the Dissolution of the EU” to sold-out audiences across
the country. At a recent book signing event in Izmir, an Aegean port
facing Greece, he began by asking the crowd of mostly 15- to
25-year-olds how many supported Turkey’s joining the EU. Not a single
hand was raised.
He says this is a Turkish backlash against what he calls the
“anti-Turkish mania” on the Continent.
Sales of “The Third World War” have been helped by the fact that the
book was published in August against a backdrop of rising nationalism
in Turkey.
In recent weeks, as the EU intensified its demands for Turkish
concessions in sensitive, emotionally charged policy areas like
Cyprus and Armenia, sales of Turkish flags have surged.
“Turks are a proud people,” Turna said. “Countries like France think
we are begging them to join the EU, but the reality is that we will
just turn in on ourselves, become skeptical or just lose interest.”
His depiction of Turks’ growing skepticism is borne out by opinion
polls here. One by the Istanbul-based Foundation for Economic
Development, an independent research institute, showed that Turkish
support for EU membership plunged in May to 63 percent from 94
percent a year earlier.
Turna acknowledges that his propensity for satire and hyperbole often
gets in the way of the facts. In “The Third World War,” Governor
Arnold Schwarzenegger has become president of the United States and
supports Europe’s offensive against Turkey. He provides backing
through a secret pagan society, the Brotherhood of Death, that seeks
global domination and is meant to represent U.S. neo-conservatives.
Turna grew up in a traditional but intellectual family in Istanbul,
imbibing a mix of military history, Kantian rationality and secular
Islam. As a student, he spent hours on the Internet, googling U.S.
military sites and memorizing Pentagon jargon. In college, he studied
business and philosophy, then worked briefly as a journalist before
writing “Metal Storm” with a friend, Orkun Ucar.
He confesses that his only trip to Europe was one visit to Munich
five years ago, a fact that helps explain why “The Third World War”
features baroque descriptions of Germany’s beer capital but is
spartan in its characterizations of the rest of the Continent.
His frequent travels in Asia, he said, have led him to conclude that
Turkey’s future rests in an “eastern alliance” rather than in the
West.
Turna proposes that Turkey limit its relationship with the EU to a
free-trade agreement and instead link up politically with China,
India and Russia.
“India has 250 million rich people, China has a huge economy and
middle class. Russia is flowing with cash. Why are my politicians
wasting time in the corridors of the EU when they should be visiting
and courting these countries, like the U.S. does?”
Just as Europeans are ignorant about the real Turkey, Turna argues,
Turks are ignorant about the real EU. He blames the Turkish media and
the political establishment for portraying the EU as a panacea that
will help make poor, agrarian Turkey flush with cash.
“There is not a proper debate on Europe in Turkey,” Turna said. “It
has become taboo to criticize the EU. The Istanbul elite sell the EU,
while the rural part of the country has little understanding of what
joining the bloc really means.”
Pressed about the benefits that Turkey’s EU membership drive has
brought, including better rights for minorities and the
liberalization of the Turkish economy, Turna acknowledged that the
carrots and sticks of the EU process have been important for a
country that has been plagued by instability. But he adds a caveat
often heard in the salons, cafes and boardrooms of Ankara and
Istanbul.
“What matters for Turkey is being part of a process that has
accelerated political and economic change,” he said. “But the process
is more important than the endgame, and no one will shed a tear if
the EU doesn’t let us in 10 to 15 years’ time.”
Since “The Third World War” came out, Turna has been working on a
soon-to-be-published philosophical treatise called “Sistema.” He also
has started his own publishing house to translate new foreign authors
into Turkish.
These days, he says, he spends a lot of time playing video games. His
favorite? A game called the Rise of Nations in which countries
compete for global domination. “I love to pretend that I’m China and
to bomb Europe into the Stone Age,” he says.