The Alt-Media Community and especially those Non-Russian Pro-Russians within it must understand the socio-political (“soft security”) dynamics at play in Turkiye’s upcoming elections in order to avoid inadvertently functioning as the US’ useful idiots for regime change by backing the anti-Russian opposition due to their hatred of President Erdogan.
Turkey’s ruling AKP and the leading opposition candidate have traded accusations of American and Russian meddling respectively in their country’s elections this Sunday. Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said that the US has been interfering in Turkiye’s democracy since the failed summer 2016 coup and most recently through a deep fake video that prompted an opposition figure to drop out of the race. Meanwhile, CHP leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu alleged that it was actually Russia that was behind this.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov responded to the latter by declaring that “We strongly reject such statements, we officially declare that there is no interference. If someone provided such information to Mr. Kilicdaroglu, then they are liars, that’s all I can say.” He also reaffirmed Russia’s support of Turkiye’s sovereign foreign policy, which aligns with President Putin’s assessment of his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, that he shared late last year during his Q&A session at the Valdai Club’s annual meeting.
This poses a dilemma for many in the Alt-Media Community (AMC) since quite a few “Non-Russian Pro-Russians” (NRPR) despise Turkiye’s incumbent leader for a variety of reasons mostly related to his closeness with Islamic political movements as well as his approaches towards Armenia and Syria. Nevertheless, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the opposition is preconditioning the public for trouble in Russian-Turkish ties in the event that they come to power, ergo Kilicdaroglu’s claim.
He’s setting the stage for distancing his country from its strategic partner on the pretext that it meddled in the upcoming elections, though this is really driven by the US’ zero-sum demand that it’s made upon Turkiye to take its side in the New Cold War instead of continuing to balance between it and Russia. If Kilicdaroglu loses, the pretext is also established for orchestrating an incipient Color Revolution on the false basis that his loss was due to supposed Russian meddling.
Likewise, however, the ruling AKP can also employ the same pretext vis-à-vis its accusations against America to justify its own protests if they lose too. The difference between these two scenarios is that Kilicdaroglu’s would be a bonafide Color Revolution due to the foreign connection behind it while the AKP’s would represent an example of “Democratic Security”, or counter-Hybrid Warfare tactics and strategies, in action.
In this context, that concept refers to nationwide protests organized by patriotic forces and the state for “regime reinforcement” purposes in the face of foreign regime change threats like those that would be posed by American meddling resulting in Kilicdaroglu winning the elections. The AMC and especially those NRPRs within it must understand the socio-political (“soft security”) dynamics at play in order to avoid inadvertently functioning as the US’ useful idiots for regime change by backing the opposition.
Whatever one’s gripes against President Erdogan may be, he’s proven himself to be a reliable partner for Russia in spite of those two’s differences on a wide array of sensitive issues. By contrast, Kilicdaroglu is already preconditioning the public for distancing Turkiye from Russia at the US’ behest in parallel with potentially orchestrating an incipient Color Revolution if he’s defeated at the polls. Regardless of whatever happens on Sunday, it’s almost guaranteed that there’ll be some form or another of unrest.
