Turkish State Media Builds Coup Narrative, Claiming General ‘Confessed’

Gen. Ozturk Denies Being Behind Friday's Coup

Following Friday’s failed military coup, Turkey’s state media is hard at work building an official narrative of what happened, with an eye toward keeping public support strong for the ongoing purge of the Turkish government of anybody even suspected of disloyalty.

The Anadolu news agency made it very clear that Gen. Akin Ozturk, who served as the Air Force Chief from 2013 to 2015, was to blame for the matter, claiming he had confessed to prosecutors during his post-coup interrogation that he had planned the coup.

Gen. Ozturk, however, insisted that this was not the case, he says that he was neither the ringleader of Friday’s coup nor was he involved at all in the planning stages of it. He says he told the prosecutors that he didn’t know who was behind the coup, but that he suspected the Gulen Movement was involved.

Turkish officials are keen to charge Fethullah Gulen with treason over the coup, though getting him extradited from the US may be difficult, given the lack of actual evidence of his involvement. Gulen condemned the coup, and he too denies involvement.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.