The Sledgehammer Facts

By Etyen Mahcupyan

Although the Sledgehammer (Balyoz) trial, in which the defendants stood accused of attempting to overthrow the democratically elected government in 2003, was concluded on Sept. 21 by the İstanbul 10th High Criminal Court at the 108th hearing of the case, debates surrounding the Sledgehammer trial still continue. This is why there is merit in summarizing the major developments in the case.

But I would first like to touch upon two important points: First, we see that the court’s decision concerning the sentences of the defendants (especially the low-ranking officers) varies from person to person and is not consistent. The second is that the intricate background of the Sledgehammer (Balyoz) coup plan is linked to many other coup attempts. The journals kept by Özden Örnek and Mustafa Balbay, the Ergenekon terrorist organization, the Council of State attack, the murder of Hrant Dink, the murder of Christian missionaries at the Zirve publishing house in Malatya, the murder of priest Andrea Santoro in Trabzon, National Intelligence Organization (MİT) reports, the statements of the General Staff and the content of documents found under the floor tiles at the Gölcük Naval Base are the major building blocks of this background. It is possible that this picture had an impact on the court’s decision but we need to underline that the picture is “real” and that these are not individual incidents. Now let’s turn to the Sledgehammer facts.

1) In early 2003, a seminar was held at the 1st Army Headquarters and the participants staged a war game. However, the content of the seminar was changed and the participants focused on a plan to eliminate internal enemies under the pretext of external threats. (The prosecutor claimed that the seminar was held without permission from the Land Forces Command, and low-ranking officials provided incomplete or incorrect information to their superiors. On the other hand, the defense lawyers claimed that although the content of the seminar was not approved by defendants’ superiors in the first place, the report on the details of the seminar was prepared and presented by their clients to their superiors.)

2) After the exposure of the Ergenekon terrorist organization, 19 CDs containing voice recordings of the seminar were leaked to the press. The CDs numbered 11, 16 and 17 list the strategies to be used for provocations and sabotage and the names of the officials tasked with these jobs. The other CDs do not contain this kind of information. The prosecutor claimed that these are the documents which were not discussed but used as presentation material during the seminar. They also added that these lists could not have been prepared without the permission of the officials mentioned in the lists. While some of the defense lawyers claimed the low-ranking officials were not sufficiently informed about the plans of their superiors, others have argued that all these documents are fabricated.

Of course these two things affected the court’s decision concerning the case, but they were not the real matter of controversy.

3) Many of the CDs contain information which was added to CDs later on, such as the names of foundations and companies established after 2003. (While the prosecutor claimed that the coup plotters might have updated the information on the CDs, the defense said that this was evidence of a fairly comprehensive plot against the defendants.)

4) There were some anachronisms in the documents which were deemed reliable by the prosecutor. (The prosecutor said that the same anachronisms in the 2003 documents also exist in the other documents described as criminal and that this situation also explains inconsistencies found in other documents. Claiming that these anachronisms are a result of human error, defense lawyers demanded they be separated from the previous documents.) Actually, this observation indicated that the documents were changed, but there was much debate surrounding who changed them. But in the meantime, something unexpected happened.

5) The same documents were on a hard drive which was found hidden under the floor tiles of the Gölcük Naval Command. The password of some of the documents on disc No. 5 from Gölcük was the same as the one for the computer of the major who was in charge of the secret cache in Gölcük. (The prosecutor considered it conformation of the coup plans, but the defense lawyers described it as part of a fairly comprehensive plot against their clients.)

This development supported the claims of the prosecutor because the documents in Gölcük were found in a storage area in the counter-intelligence section of the naval base, where security was very tight, and there was a major who was in charge of the secret cache in Gölcük and had access to many documents. The defense lawyers claimed that security was not very tight in the counter-intelligence section of the naval base and that anyone who had access to the hard disk could have forged any document.

The assumption of the defense lawyers can be considered an option, but they do not have even a single piece of evidence identifying those who planned the conspiracy against the military. This claim is based on the presumptions of the defense. On the other hand, there is the intricate background, a seminar whose content has been changed and computers assigned to specific officials. As for the anachronisms, unfortunately, they do not indicate a conspiracy against the military. They could be human error, as Çetin Doğan’s son-in-law, Dani Rodrik, has claimed, or the efforts of some coup plotters who are attempting to pervert judicial processes.

Now you decide which is more convincing. Is the Sledgehammer plan a conspiracy against the military or a coup attempt prepared by the military?

Dani Rodrik's Facts

BY ETYEN MAHCUPYAN

Just hours after my article that referred to Dani Rodrik was posted on the Internet, Rodrik issued a response in his blog "Balyoz Davası ve Gerçekler" (Balyoz Trial and Facts). Apparently urged by a sense of duty, Rodrik naturally didn't want to lose any time in correcting my “misstatements.”

At the beginning of the blog post, three hypotheses are stressed. First, he says that the Balyoz (Sledgehammer) plan was not discussed in the 1st Army seminar held in 2003. There are similarities between some of the discussions at the seminar and phrases used in the coup documents, but these similarities "could have been easily introduced by those who fabricated the documents." Second, he claims that Çetin Doğan, the former head of the 1st Army and Rodrik's father-in-law, did not lie to his military superiors about what occurred at the seminar. He ended up going with a version of events that "differed from the version his superiors had asked for," but it "was distributed to his superiors beforehand." Third, Rodrik maintains that the seminar did not refer to a "coup" or "who would come to power following it." All of this information can be found on the evidential CDs.  Rodrik tries to create a protective framework for his father-in-law. He prioritizes the voice recordings about the seminar, but trivializes the evidential documents. At the same time, since he knows this wouldn't secure sufficient protection for Doğan, he not only suggests that those documents could have been planted by "fraudsters," but also attempts to prove that Doğan's superiors have taken part in the crime. He does not address the fact that the “possibility” that the documents in question could have been planted by fraudsters does not automatically prove that these same documents were not created by Doğan and his cronies. Rodrik avoids any discussion of why Doğan's superiors attempted to prevent Doğan from disclosing the seminar records if there is no incriminating content, or why Doğan insisted on his version of the full scope of events or whether he communicated the content of that seminar to his superiors without any change. We should understand why Doğan acts this way: If you set out with the intention of diverting people from the facts, you will naturally not be eager to uncover the facts.

Rodrik's blog post then enumerates various arguments in response to my article. But first let me make a correction: Rodrik argues that the General Staff has acknowledged that they had the originals of some of the Balyoz documents, but that they are not related to coup plans. However, the General Staff had merely declared that not "all" of the Balyoz documents fall within its area of responsibility and that some plans which were part of the Balyoz coup were not in its archives any longer when the court's request was made. It provided the names of those documents that were not in the archives, and in so doing, the General Staff indirectly accepted the fact that the documents that it didn't name could have been in its archives. The General Staff has also not refuted the documents belonging to the major who was in charge of the secret cache in Gölcük. Unfortunately, we don't have any dignified reason for assuming that Rodrik is not capable of correctly reading even a simple General Staff statement.

On to Rodrik's reasoning: We have three interconnected assumptions: (1) "The files on the disputed CDs also exist on the authentic CDs, the veracity of which has not been challenged by the defendants," but the fraudsters could have planted them on the disputed CDs. (2) The documents in Gölcük were found in a storage area in the counter-intelligence section of the naval base, where the security was not very tight. Since many documents could be leaked to the outside, it is possible that some documents could likewise be brought inside. (3) Hard drive no. 5 from Gölcük was not password protected. Some documents were password protected, but coup documents were not. Therefore, he concludes, anyone who had access to the hard disk could have forged any document.

In other words, from Rodrik's perspective, the military has such a poor security system and such an undisciplined and heedless mentality that anyone can forge the military's documents. If they could do it, then we can assume that they have done it. If we can assume this, then Çetin Doğan is innocent. Well, let us suppose that the documents have been forged, but then how on earth is it possible that no military official has realized it? After the forgery, hasn't anyone had access to them? Or is that they have had access to them and realize what's in them, but they don't care? Rodrik fails to follow the trail of his own reasoning, and therefore he feels obliged to rely excessively on the possibility that there could have been an imaginary criminal.

If coup documents were forged by fraudsters, then how can we explain the anachronisms? Rodrik has an extremely humane, tolerant response to this. "They are isolated instances that obviously crept in as a result of human error," he says. Moreover, he says this in an effort to prove that there was no systematic updating of those documents. That is, there was no systematic updating because anachronisms were clearly the result of human error. Supposing that the anachronisms in the 2003 documents were the result of human errors made by the members of the military, how can he argue that the anachronisms in the “disputed documents” said to have been prepared in 2009 are not the result of the human errors made by the members of the military? Based on the anachronisms in CD no. 11, how can he claim that there was a conspiracy against Çetin Doğan? 

Who Conspired Against Dani Rodrik?

By Etyen Mahcupyan

When the Justice and Development Party (AKP) came to power in the elections held in early November 2002, the military decided to take some action. In the following months, Çetin Doğan, the former head of the 1st Army, sent faxes where he made analogies between the AKP's election victory and the Nazis coming to power; he sent these documents directly from his office.

The height of boldness was on display when the Balyoz (Sledgehammer) coup plan was discussed. The content of a military seminar were modified and Doğan lied to his military superiors about what actually occurred. The former army head tried to prepare the groundwork for a coup by causing turmoil and social upheaval by spreading believable lies. In a seminar document, the plotters also identified who would come to power after the coup.
When the Balyoz plan was revealed and taken to court, a surprise figure appeared: Dani Rodrik, a famous economist who is also Doğan's son-in-law, argued that the evidence was fabricated and even wrote a book on the matter. According to his argument the accusations were based on three CDs whose contents were manipulated. In the CDs dated 2004, names of organizations and places created after the CDs were made were identified. Rodrik considered this a great flaw, proving that the CDs were manipulated; he argued that there was a conspiracy to set Doğan up. He said he did not endorse the guardianship role of the army, adding that he strongly believed that the truth should be revealed.
But now we have adequate information that would satisfy Rodrik. First, we now know that the information on these three CDs is also included on the other CDs without any changes or modifications. Second, the copies of the modified CDs were also found in the search carried out in the “cosmic room” of the military compound in Gölcük; it was unrealistic to think that these CDs were planted there by conspirers. Defense lawyers had hard disk no. 5 examined by experts in the US; the experts concluded that many documents on the hard disk were saved in 2009, but seemed to have been created in 2004. This pointed to a conspiracy but nobody asked the real question: Who was responsible for the conspiracy? And then the final, fatal discovery was made: The personal password of Capt. Yakar was the same as the password of hard drive no. 5. There was a deliberate manipulation; however, the conspiracy was staged not by the conspirers who wanted to put Doğan into a difficult position, but by his colleagues.
There was only one possible explanation for the deliberate modifications that caused contradictions in the documents: The coup plotters were constantly updating their plans and in turn making changes to their documents, while waiting for an opportunity to stage a coup; additionally they also purposefully created some minor contradictions in the documents to protect themselves from prosecution. When the investigation was initiated, a respected figure other than the defendants needed to explore these contradiction and raise doubts because only if done by an outsider would it serve the argument that they were being set up and thereby, undermine the prosecution. Perhaps his son-in-law was the first person Doğan thought of for this service. Having an internationally renowned academic prove the existence of a conspiracy through scientific investigation would offer great psychological support for Doğan and his friends, and it would become possible to put pressure on the court. However, things did not go as they had hoped. The documents seized in Gölcük, the modifications made by people who were responsible for the protection of these documents and the fact that the General Staff indicated they had some of those documents, which were supposed to have been under protection, ended the era of dreaming.
Perhaps Rodrik dedicated himself to the scholarly inquiry into the relationship between democracy and economy. The recent developments should be illuminating enough for a scholar who would want nothing but the truth. Unfortunately, you cannot remove the father of the person you wed from the picture. While looking for conspirers all around, you might suddenly realize that you have been set up.

Sledgehammer Case: Tapes of the Generals

Here is the actual voices of the generals who made a coup attempt to overthrow the elected government in Turkey a few years ago. Remember they got very heavy sentences for their attempts.
 

Three Former Turkish Generals Get 20 Years

Former 1st Army Commander retired Gen. Çetin Doğan (L), former Naval Forces Commander Adm. Özden Örnek (C) and former Air Forces Commander Gen. Halil İbrahim Fırtına (R) have been sentenced to 20 years in prison on coup charges. (Photo: AA)

 

21 September 2012 / TODAYSZAMAN.COM

Three former Turkish generals, who were key suspects in the Sledgehammer coup trial, have been sentenced to 20 years in prison on coup charges, a ruling that is expected to help curtail the Turkish military's hold on politics.

 

Former 1st Army Commander retired Gen. Çetin Doğan, former Air Forces Commander Gen. Halil İbrahim Fırtına and former Naval Forces Commander Adm. Özden Örnek were initially given life imprisonment but the court said the three would only serve 20-year prison sentences because they were unsuccessful in their bid to topple the government. It acquitted 34 officers in the case, which has underlined civilian dominance over the once all-powerful military in Turkey.

Retired Gen. Engin Alan, War Academies Commander Gen. Bilgin Balanlı, retired Gen. Ergin Saygun, former National Security Council (MGK) Secretary-General Şükrü Sarıışık, retired Gen. Nejat Bek, retired Adm. Ahmet Feyyaz Öğütçü and retired Gen. Süha Tanyeri were also each sentenced to 18 years in prison.
Prosecutors had demanded 15-20 year jail sentences for the 365 defendants, 364 of them serving and retired officers.

The court issued 16 year jail sentences for 214 suspects, including the retired Col. Dursun Çiçek and retired military judge Ahmet Zeki Üçok, in the historic coup trial.

Çiçek was arrested on charges of preparing the Action Plan to Fight Reactionaryism, which sought to undermine the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government and the religion-based Gülen movement.

Among the 365 suspects, 250 behind bars and the rest pending trial outside of custody. The verdict session was the 108th hearing in the trial.

Suspects entered the courtroom to the applause of viewers, who sang various military anthems as the suspects, most of whom are of military background, walked in.

Four defendants delivered their final statements on the last day. The court adjourned before announcing the verdict.

On Friday, Naval Col. Hakan Mehmet Köktürk, jailed at Maltepe Military Prison, was taken to the İstanbul hospital of the Gülhane Military Academy of Medicine (GATA) reportedly after suffering a heart attack.
İsmail Tepecik, a lawyer for retired Gen. Çetin Doğan, the main suspect in the investigation, said all suspects should be acquitted, speaking to reporters outside the courtroom before the session's start.

Security was tight outside the courtroom on the final day of the hearing. Those who entered the building were frisked and searched with the help of detector dogs. About 500 court viewers, 60 members of the press and 30 lawyers were allowed in.

Some of the highest-ranking former and current members of the military have stood trial in the Sledgehammer case, including Gen. Balanlı, former Air Force Commander retired Gen. Fırtına, former Naval Forces Commander retired Gen.  Örnek and former generals Doğan and Saygun, who both served as commanders of the 1st Army.

The 10th High Criminal Court heard the trial. All of the sessions were held at a courthouse built on the property of Silivri Prison. Military suspects in the trial were kept at the military prisons of Hadımköy, Hasdal and Maltepe. The suspects entered the courthouse at 1 p.m.

Presiding Judge Ömer Diken and the other members of the panel of judges entered the courtroom shortly after. After opening the hearing, Diken recalled that the court had adjourned on Thursday to discuss the verdict, but said it had not yet reached a decision. The court adjourned again after the four remaining suspects delivered a final statement.

Retired Gen. Alan, who was elected to Parliament from the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) in the last election, is also among the suspects. Retired Gen. Levent Ersöz is another prime suspect in the investigation. He did not attend Friday's hearing.

While verdicts seemingly have stormed the public and sparked many debates, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declined to comment on court rulings with regards to the Sledgehammer coup trial. He said the process will continue at least for a while regarding the appeal rights of convicts as they likely will appeal court orders to the Supreme Court of Appeals.

 “It is not true to make a comment at the moment. We’ll have the chance to make overall assessment after complement of the process.” Erdoğan said.

Sledgehammer: the beginnings

The first time the Sledgehammer plot was publicly discussed was on Jan. 20, 2010, when the Taraf daily claimed that a group of generals had conspired to overthrow the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government, devising a plot titled the Sledgehammer Security Operation Plan. The daily claimed that among the plans of the generals was bombing the Fatih Mosque, one of İstanbul's biggest, during a busy Friday prayer and other atrocities to shake public confidence in the government. The plot was devised in 2003, according to the paper. The next day, the İstanbul Prosecutor's Office launched an investigation into the claims. Forty retired generals and officers on active duty -- including high-ranking former and current generals or admirals Doğan, Süha Tanyeri, Saygun and Özden Örnek were detained on Feb. 24, 2010.

Seven people, including Ramazan Cem Gürdeniz, a senior admiral, were arrested in the first wave of arrest. On Feb. 26, Doğan and retired Gen. Engin Alan testified to specially authorized prosecutor Bilal Bayraktar, and were put under arrest by a decision of the 10th High Criminal Court, facing charges of “attempting to overthrow the government of the Republic of Turkey with the use of force and violence.”

The indictment against the suspects was accepted on July 19, 2010. There were initially 196 suspects -- all of them retired or active duty military officers -- in the trial.

On Dec. 6, 2010, the trial took on a new course when nine sacks of documents were found hidden under the floor tiles at Gölcük Naval Command, detailing the alleged plot to overthrow the AK Party. The first hearing was on Dec. 16, 2010.

In June 2011, four more military officers were arrested in the trial. Prosecutor Hüseyin Ayar completed a second indictment on June 16, indicting 28 defendants, including Gen. Bilgin Balanlı and Gen. İsmail Taş. The indictment was accepted by the court on June 28, 2011, with the prosecutor demanding up to 20 years for the suspects on charges of attempting a coup d'état. On Aug. 15, 2011, the court started hearing the accusations in the second indictment.

A key arrest was made on Sept. 19, 2011, when Senior Col. Ümit Metin -- who was already under arrest as part of a separate investigation into an alleged plot to assassinate several naval admirals -- was arrested as a Sledgehammer suspect.

On Oct. 3, 2011, Gen. Beyazıt Karataş, who was wanted as a suspect, turned himself over to the authorities. Also in October the court merged the two indictments into a single trial. Yet a third indictment -- against 143 suspects -- was accepted on Nov. 23, 2011. This indictment was incorporated into the main trial on Dec. 29, 2011, bringing the total number of suspects in the trial to 365. On March 2 this year, former Chief of General Staff retired Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt and Gendarmerie General Commander Gen. Bekir Kalyoncu testified in court as witnesses. On March 14, retired Gen. Ergin Saygun, another suspect who was wanted by the prosecution, turned himself in. He was arrested on the same day. On March 29, the prosecution delivered its 920-page opinion on the trial. On April 6, the court filed a complaint against 11 lawyers with attempting to influence a fair trial. On Aug. 3, retired Gen. Hilmi Özkök, who was the chief of general staff at the alleged time of drafting of the Sledgehammer plot, testified in court. He said he had warned the generals against crossing the line during a seminar in 2003 on the Sledgehammer plot -- which the defendants said was only a war strategy game. On Aug. 16, the defendants delivered their final statements.

Indictment basics and evidence overview

According to the Sledgehammer Indictment, soon after the general elections of November 2002, a full-fledged coup plan under the leadership of 1st Army commander Doğan was launched to topple the AK Party government. The plot contemplated the bombing of mosques, downing a Turkish fighter jet, the takeover of hospitals and pharmacies, the closing of NGOs, the arrest of journalists and politicians.

The indictment also charges that the coup plot was given a dress rehearsal on March 5-7, 2003 in a seminar at the 1st Army Headquarters.

The first evidence against the suspects emerged in January 2010, when an anonymous tipster delivered a suitcase to journalist Mehmet Baransu. The suitcase contained various materials, including documents not related to the investigation. Three CDs -- which formed the backbone of the prosecution's argument -- in the suitcase were the subject of the Sledgehammer investigation. The journalist shared the documents with the prosecutors shortly after obtaining them. The CDs contain documents that mention Sledgehammer and related activities such as operational plans (subplots the generals called Oraj, Suga, Çarşaf, Sakal), a list of civil society organizations that would be closed once the generals were in power, blacklists of individuals from various institutions, journalists to be arrested, vehicles, hospitals and pharmacies to be taken over and personnel assignments. Later, the documents found at Gölcük were added to the pile of evidence against the suspects.

Coup suspect confesses to discussing coup at 2003 seminar

A Sledgehammer coup case suspect on Thursday confessed that instead of an official military plan, three action plans regarding the post-coup period were discussed at a seminar in military barracks in 2003, during which preparations were allegedly made for the Sledgehammer coup plot.

Sledgehammer is a suspected coup plot believed to have been devised in 2003 with the aim of unseating the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government through violent acts. According to the Sledgehammer plan, the military was to systematically foment chaos in society through violent acts, among which were bomb attacks on the Fatih and Beyazıt mosques in İstanbul.

One of the Sledgehammer suspects pending trial, Lt. Gen. Tevfik Özkılıç, made his defense at the 75th hearing of the Sledgehammer case at the İstanbul 10th High Criminal Court on Thursday. During the hearing one of the jailed suspects in the case, Ayhan Taş, asked Özkılıç whether he had sensed the alleged preparations for a coup during the 2003 seminar, which he participated in as an observer. In response Özkılıç said “no,” adding that instead of discussing the official military plan named the “Egemen Action Plan,” a proposal was made to discuss “private matters,” which included a “martial law plan,” a “rear area security plan” and a “state of emergency security plan.”

Özkılıç also noted that he was opposed to the proposal to discuss other issues on the grounds that the subject of a seminar could not be changed three months prior to the seminar.

After the remarks from Özkılıç, retired Gen. Çetin Doğan, a key suspect in the case who is currently under arrest, took to the stand and asserted that he did not demand that the Egemen action plan be completely removed from the seminar.

In response to a question from retired Gen. Recep Rıfkı Durusoy, a jailed suspect in the case, who asked if the Sledgehammer action plan included any actions against the government, Özkılıç said he did not remember and that he did not know if such actions were included.

Doğan had said in a hearing on June 16, 2011 that only the Egemen action plan was discussed at the 2003 seminar.

Another suspect in the case pending trial, Meryem Kurşun, also delivered her defense at Thursday's hearing. She said: “I applied to the military as a sociologist in 2005. I was informed by the military which websites I should follow [anti-government propaganda websites constructed to disseminate propaganda against the government with the intention of overthrowing it with the military], so I didn't have the ability to choose what news to post on the websites. These websites are not my personal websites; I only did what was done by the rest of the officers serving in the information support department of the military.”

The Sledgehammer plot allegedly sought to undermine the government to lay the groundwork for a coup d'état. The military, which has overthrown three governments since 1960 and pressured a conservative government to step down in 1997, has denied that such a plan existed. All suspects are accused of a failed attempt to destroy Parliament and overthrow the government. Such a charge calls for a jail sentence of up to 20 years in prison.

The Cihan news agency reported on Friday that the head of the İstanbul 10th High Criminal Court conducting the trial, Ömer Diken, said that there are still suspects pending trial who did not attend the hearing, although the court ordered district gendarmerie commands to make the suspects available the day before the hearing. In the Sledgehammer case, Article 250 of the Code on Criminal Procedure (CMK) says that a person facing charges that fall under the scope of terrorist activities cannot benefit from any immunity, regardless of his or her rank.

Diken went on to say that the court will take necessary measures for the suspects who did not attend the hearing and the district gendarmerie commands that did not bring these suspects to court on the day of their hearing.

A full 171 suspects are under arrest and 41 who are pending trial attended the 75th hearing of the Sledgehammer case on Thursday. However, 78 of the suspects who are under arrest -- including War Academies Commander Gen. Bilgin Balanlı and former military prosecutor Ahmet Zeki Üçok -- did not attend the hearing. Gen. Levent Ersöz, who is currently in jail as a prime suspect in the investigation of Ergenekon and also pending trial as a suspect in the Sledgehammer case, as well as Col. Dursun Çiçek, who is in jail as part of an anti-government Internet campaign probe and is also pending trial as a suspect in the Sledgehammer case, did not attend the hearing on Thursday.