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Category: Cem Ryan

James (Cem) Ryan is a writer living in Istanbul, Turkey. A graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point, he holds a Ph.D. in literature. His historical novel, Natural Affinities, about New York City during World War I, was published in 2004 by (www.trafford.com/robots/03-1783.html).

WE ARE WITNESSING THE DISASTER

13 October 2014
Istanbul

Aydinlik Daily correspondent Mustafa Birol made an interview with former US Army officer and columnist James Ryan concerning his criminal complaint towards the governments of United States, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, France, Great Britain, Jordan and Romania regarding violations of Article 7 and 8 of the Rome Statute.

Mustafa Birol:
I talked to James Ryan, a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point and also a columnist in Aydinlik Daily, concerning his criminal complaint entitled “Criminal Carnage in Syria by the Criminal Cabal for Perpetual War” towards 12 countries including the US and Turkey to the International Criminal Court regarding violations of Article 7 and 8 of the Rome Statute which deal with war crimes and the crime of aggression.

— You have very recently made a criminal complaint against 11 countries including the USA and Turkey for alleged infringements of Articles 7 and 8 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Your criminal complaint constitutes a detailed summary of the war crimes conducted by the countries which can be defined as the anti-Syria coalition. Can you please tell me about the process which prompted you to make the criminal complaint and also the political developments that shaped your application?

Just living is a process, and not an easy one. The seeds for my filing this Complaint came from living in a foreign land, in my case, Turkey. Living abroad is the best way to see one’s native country as a foreign land. It’s called objectivity. I am a graduate of West Point, the United States Military Academy. It has an honor code—cadets will not lie, cheat or steal. And they are bound by honor to report themselves if they do. They face expulsion for an infraction. That moral behavior is intended to last long after graduation. A deceitful military officer is a danger to all.

In 2006, there was great concern that the illegality of Bush’s attack on Iraq could lead to war crimes charges being made against US military personnel. I and two other classmates began an organization called West Point Graduates Against the War ). We were appalled by the deceitful, murderous behavior of the government of the United States. The commander-in-chief of the military, George W. Bush, was a liar. And we had hundreds of fellow graduates who agreed and joined the organization. And so we come to today to the horrors in Syria and the awful truth about America and its criminal accomplices.

The political developments can be described by two words—greed and immorality. For oil, for power, for new markets, for post-bombing reconstruction contracts, anything and everything to do with money. America and its criminal accomplices live by the rule of the jungle, demonizing all who stand in their way, the latest target being Bashar al-Assad, president of Syria. Syria is a secular, culturally diverse, religion-tolerant country, something America should surely encourage. It is bewildering to me that America is so intent on destroying all the secular nations in this region, including its long-lasting, and apparently successful project in Turkey. Although they finally seem to have awakened from their thirty-four year sleep since the 1980 military coup.

— If we consider that the USA, Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia are not State Party signatories to the Rome Statute, do you still have hopes that your complaint will be examined carefully and result in a fair verdict?

Absolutely. The USA, Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia are within the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court because their crime of aggression and war crimes against sovereign Syria were planned, prepared and initiated on, in and over those nations who are State party signatories. And Jordan, Belgium, Croatia, Bulgaria, France, Great Britain and Romania ARE signatories. No guns, no war, and most of the guns came from Turkey via Libya and an array of European “donors.” Such generosity… to displace three million Syrians, kill hundreds of thousands and bathe the sovereign nation in blood.

Think of it this way—the weapons and ammunition for the mercenaries didn’t rain from the heavens. When Ilyushin 76 Jordanian transports flying under Jordanian military call signs leave Pleso Airport in Croatia and land in Esenboğa Airport in Ankara, when Qatari air force C-17s make 36 roundtrips between Amman and Zagreb, Croatia, when Qatari and Saudi Arabian C-130s make 30 roundtrips between Zagreb and Ankara…Are they hauling baklava and simit? No, they are hauling the stuff of war crimes and aggression. The evidence is overwhelming. And the law is clear.

Jordan has even given its territory to terrorist training camps run by the intelligence agencies of the United States, France, Great Britain and itself. This is in clear violation of Article 8(e), Crime of Aggression. What national leader gave the order to do this? Hopefully, we shall find out in court.

None of these countries live by the rule of international law, even those who signed the Rome Statute pledging their word to abide by its provisions. Jordan is a particularly hypocritical example. And those who did not sign? They think they are exempt. But they are not. The reason for including Jordan and the others is because they DID sign the Rome Statute. And Article 12(2)(a) and (b) are quite clear. And for this reason the four non-signatory nations should fall under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. Their crimes are ICC statutory crimes. Therefore under Rome Statute Article 12(2)(a) the Court has jurisdiction to prosecute them because their crimes were committed on, in and over ICC member states. Jordan and its fellow signers of the Rome Statute provide the jurisdictional legal leverage to get to the principal criminals, what I call the Criminal Cabal for Perpetual War, that is the US, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan.

One of the beautiful things about the law is its respect for and emphasis on language. One word emphasized by the International Criminal Court is “impunity,” that is, “to be free of punishment.

According to the Court, those perpetrators that commit grave crimes that threaten the peace and security of the world must not go unpunished. The preamble to the Rome Statute says it clearly, that the Court is “determined to put an end to impunity for the perpetrators of these crimes and thus contribute to the prevention of such crimes.”

So I say, let justice begin with these eleven nations and its so-called leaders and their lamentably vicious advisors. The names are in my Complaint. Interested readers can see the entire document on my website, Brightening Glance.

Finally, I have utmost confidence in the International Criminal Court. It is the last, best hope for peace and, importantly, to guarantee a lasting respect for international law and its enforcement. Without that, we have nothing.

— What do you think are the major strategic and financial goals of the US, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan, the nations most responsible for the crimes committed in your criminal complaint, on the path of developing such a covert war against Syria?

There is a nonsensical idea called Full Spectrum Dominance that the US military came up with a few years ago combined with the neo-con hallucination called the Project for the New American Century. It’s a two-headed monster that says America knows best and the world will understand, sooner or later, or else. And so this war-driven, financial machine has been grinding away at humanity, aided and abetted by the subversive help of its collaborating allies. The primary, motivating force for these disastrous policies is the sublimely arrogant and illogical idea that somehow, some way, America is “exceptional.” Obama loves to profess how much he believes in American “exceptionalism.” This is an historical extension of “winning” World War II and dropping the atomic bomb on two defenseless Japanese cities to get Russia’s attention. Thus the Cold War began. And as the world knows, Ronald Reagan won the Cold War and America has lived happily since. Setting this nonsense aside, there is a tremendous similarity between the powerful American forces of that era and those of today. One of Eisenhower’s last acts as president was to warn of the dangers of the Military-Industrial Complex. He was solidly ignored, except by one man, the man who succeeded him as president. Today, Eisenhower’s warning could be called the Military-Globalization Complex. These seem to be the deep-state monsters that must be obeyed at all cost. Democratic ideals are irrelevant.

When John F. Kennedy delivered an address entitled A Strategy of Peace in 1963, he also delivered his death sentence. “Mankind must put an end to war,” he said, “or war will put an end to mankind.” Five months later, another criminal cabal put an end to him. And to the prospects of peace, perhaps forever. And every president since then has paid attention to that criminal fact of Kennedy’s murder in full daylight in a street in Dallas, in particular, Barack Hussein Obama, Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

But you asked about the major strategic financial and strategic goals of the five Cabal members. Without getting stuck in a lot more words, here’s a one-word answer—MORE!

–You have openly stated in your complaint that the terrorist Islamic State of Iraq and Levand organization (ISIS), infamous with mass murders and brutal catastrophes in Iraq-Syria line, had been created by the United States and and funded by Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. So, what is the aim of the operations conducted again by the same anti-Syria coalition under the guise of stopping the ISIS atrocity?

Stopping the ISIS atrocity is a feeble attempt to stop the monster the Cabal created. And it cannot put the genie back in the bottle. We are witnessing the disaster that is US foreign policy and Turkish incompetence. And unless we face these absolute facts, nothing will improve. ISIS could have been destroyed two months ago as they charged along the roads from Syria into Iraq. I remembered the so-called Highway of Death in Iraq where the retreating, helpless Iraq army was destroyed by a relentless air attack. George Bush, the father, was so shocked by the atrocity that he called off the attack and declared victory. That same condition prevailed this summer but no one attacked. President Maleki requested air support to no avail. A great silence prevailed. Obama and his fellow felons were thinking. And so we arrive at today. A paralyzed Turkey. A confused America. And lots of people are dying. It is one of the blackest, sickest jokes in history. And the politicians that created this massive war crime, this massive crime against humanity must pay the price. Arrest. Trial. And if convicted, jail, and perhaps worse. And the International Criminal Court has the jurisdiction and the power to do this.

We face the following picture when we examine your criminal complaint in detail: The United States of America, of which you are also a citizen, is establishing terrorist organizations to achieve its strategic objectives. It is also establishing the logistics network of the said terrorist organizations and managing the transfer of militants, weapons and ammunition. Isn’t this fact sufficiently known by the citizens of the United States? Why can’t the people of the United States develop an effective anti-war opposition just as they have organized in the period of the invasion of Vietnam?

America is an expert in establishing terrorist organizations. It was their most important tool for their military coup business. SAVAK, the secret police in Iran. The Contras in Nicaragua, Augusto Pinochet, himself, in Chile. Kenan Evren, himself, in Turkey. And don’t forget the School of the Americas in Fort Benning, Georgia. That’s where the South American CIA-inspired bombers perfected their assassination skills. The so-called school was renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. I think I hear George Orwell laughing uproariously.

America always has willing accomplices. My Complaint names a few. There are many more. Power seeks out power. So when Obama speaks of America’s “partners” he really means accomplices.

Regarding the anti-war movement in America, I ask, “What war?” No draft of American youth into military, no war. Why do you think America went to the moon? To see if it was really made of green cheese? Such was a childhood myth. Why did America send satellites into outer space? To see if there were really little green men on Mars? Next question. Aren’t cell phones and I-phones wonderful? Sure they are. They tell us almost everything…except one thing…who is targeting us…for that’s what they are, a targeting system. All of these space-age heroic endeavors were but to develop a total targeting system. It’s part of Full Spectrum Dominance, it being the dominance of outer space. It being the domain of so-called “smart bombs.” “Smart” weapons systems eliminated the need for “boots on the ground.” “No boots needed” means American young people have no fear of being called to military service to defend the deceitful purposes of today’s America. So the deceit continues. So the hundreds of millions of parents are safe from having their children killed or maimed. Oh, there are some youngsters who volunteer for the glory of defending America from Saddam Hussein’s nuclear weapons. And these few are enough to maintain the illusion of boots being available to be on the ground. As far as Americans are concerned, someone else is fighting these wars. For them, America is exceptionally “exceptional.” And its all because their cell phones can tell them where they are. And its technology can kill anyone that threatens to kill them or their children.

— When I read your columns in different media organs in the specific dates I realized that you have faced disappointment with the foreign policy adopted by Barack Obama after being elected as the President of the USA. What had you been expecting and what did you face?

I, and many, many others like me, viewed Obama as the great hope. A highly intelligent, educated lawyer, he spoke sense, and spoke it well. On election day I wept in joy. And I never wept for a politician before. Now I weep, almost every day, for what might have been, for what didn’t happen, and for my native country in general.

Everything he could have done, he did not do. In fact, he became a greater killer than Bush. And now he even sounds stupider than Bush. I am sad, very sad, for this. He spoke so glowingly of change. And change things did. Now the world is in a catastrophic state. And what is to come? No leader speaks sense. Corruption is general all over. Who will save the children of this world? The likes of religious fakes? The likes of hack, sold-out politicians? The likes of boot-licking journalists on the CIA payroll? The likes of singers, and writer and actors that conspire with pseudo-fascist governments to sing and act the safe, party-line? Who will save the children? Smart Bombs?

This is what we face. This is why I filed my Criminal Complaint with the International Criminal Court.

The hero of the epic called LIFE will be the people blessed with the energy and brains of youth. These are the vast majority of people in the world, all of whom have put up with the nonsense of so-called democratic living for decades. They see clearly the disaster that incompetent leadership has brought. The world is on the edge. Brutality is everywhere, from the mouths of politicians to the knives in the bloody hands of ISIS.

So who will save us? We will. There is no other way.

I remember a story on this subject:
A man once asked his gardener to plant a tree. The gardener objected that the tree was slow growing and would not reach maturity for a hundred years. The man replied, ‘In that case, there is no time to lose, plant it this afternoon.”

So let’s do something this afternoon.

— The charges attributed to Turkey in the criminal complaint are the providing of chemical and war weapons as well as logistics, intelligence and financial support to several terrorist organizations fighting against the Assad administration in Syria. Can you please tell us about the role of Turkey in the broader plan?

Are you asking me whether a country like Turkey, basically a state with a thoroughly politicized and dysfunctional legal system could be expected to abide by international law? Because that is the problem. With such a judiciary system, that allows politics to determine the law, how can one expect Turkey to do anything but participate with America in the rape of Syria as it participated in the earlier rape of Libya? And that’s why the principals should be brought to trial. Things will only worsen if they are not.

As far as Turkey’s role in the broader plan…it was America’s naughty errand boy, doing the dirty work and making some money on the side from black market oil and the like. I think that the duplicity and corruption is, at last, obvious to the world. Turkey’s foreign policy is a disaster and fully responsible for the catastrophe in Syria. That’s the reason for the Syrian catastrophe, that and American stupidity. Turkey did not realize that the Syrian army was well-equipped, well-trained and had high morale. How irresponsible of the prime minister and the general staff! Indeed, it was the height of reckless ignorance. Now it’s zero friends and nothing but enemies for Turkey. And no way out. Due to its cheap thinking and small-minded bargaining, to say nothing about the destruction of the Turkish army, navy and air force, Turkey cannot even defend the borders that its politicians have erased. So a role in a broader plan? What plan? No role, in anything. How Turkey will recover from this domestic and international fiasco is beyond my understanding.

Finally, do you have any message for the pro-peace readers Aydinlik?

Being pro-peace is not enough. But that does not mean making war. It does mean realizing that we have a lot more power than we think we do. We have vastly more collective brain power than the ignoramuses who have brought this world to its current sad condition.

For openers, read my Criminal Complaint to the International Criminal Court at:

http://www.brighteningglance.org/criminal-complaint-international-criminal-court-6-october-2014.html

If you support it, tell the Chief Prosecutor at:

otp.informationdesk@icc-cpi.int

And finally a few closing words from the last pro-peace American president, John F. Kennedy:
“Our problems are manmade; therefore, they can be solved by man. And man can be as big as he wants. No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings.”

I believe that. But first we have to get the criminal politicians out of our way.

####

October 19, 2014
LAUGHING MY HEAD OFF

Satan’s Army, Gustav Doré

So numberless were those bad angels

Hovering on wing under the cope of hell

John Milton, Paradise Lost

LAUGHING MY HEAD OFF

22 August 2014

“I suppose the pain of parting will be red and loud.”

Vladimir Nabokov, Invitation to a Beheading

Yesterday President Obama announced that “the entire world is appalled” by the beheading of an American photojournalist. Marie Harf, a spokesperson for the US State Department stressed that nothing whatsoever will change and that the bombings will continue. “We don’t make concessions to terrorists,” she said.

Exceptional America! Please excuse me, dear reader. I’ll be back in a few minutes——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————Okay, I’m back. Thank you for your patience. I feel much worse.

“I believe in American exceptionalism with every fiber of my being,” said the president of the United States a few months ago at West Point. And for the past five minutes I have been laughing my head off at the Nobel Peace Prize winner’s “exceptional America.”

And Ms. Harf’s words really cracked me up. Let me describe my out-of-head experience:

I was sitting on a chair in the kitchen. Early morning, still dark. Now, all the mornings and days are dark. I think about how Obama and Clinton and Kerry and Erdoğan and Davutoğlu cooked up this outrageous crime against humanity to destroy Libya and Syria. They would use Turkey as a staging area for their proxy army, their Satanic army of well-paid mercenaries. What geniuses! Exceptional America did the same thing decades ago in Afghanistan funding Bin Laden’s mujahideen that later became al-Qaeda. Wow! How smart these dopes are! Very humorous. And they all wear expensive suits and ride in black, shiny, sad limousines. And again they drive over the terror cliff, this time with the arrogant assistance of the treacherous Turkish government. They say you can’t tell the same joke twice. But not America, not “exceptional” America. Do you remember the song lyric? But where are the clowns?/Quick, send in the clowns/ Don’t bother, they’re here. If you remember, you get the idea.

And these clowns had their military and intelligence and diplomatic agents assemble in Adana, Turkey about three years ago. Everything was secret, except everyone with half a brain knew what was going on, except the American press and the lame, obedient Turkish media. Oh, Petraeus, the boy wonder, was involved, too. So was Fidan, the chief Turk spook. It’s funny how time flies when you are having fun, isn’t it? Ha! Ha! Ha! They had donors come too. Rich, treacherous folks like the obese Saudis and the tennis-tournament-sponsoring-but-non-tennis playing Qataris. They have money, oil money, and lots of it, and not much else, except duplicity.

They also met in Istanbul. At fancy hotels. What better conditions to assemble Satan’s army? But you knew this, didn’t you? No? You mean the New York Times didn’t cover the story? Aydınlık newspaper broke the story in Turkey. Too bad the American correspondents missed it. Not that it really mattered. But how sad. How hilariously tragic. I am now laughing out loud at the empty remarks of Ms. Harf. Marie Harf, spokesperson! Exceptional America certainly does not make concessions to terrorists. How silly of me to think so. Instead of mere concessions, it sponsors, feeds, arms, outfits and pays outrageous salaries to them. Ha, ha, ha, I keep laughing, catching the ironic humor in Harf’s weasel words.

Now I am positively giddy thinking about Turkey. What a funny country! How can two Turkish war criminals become America’s favorite foreign friends. So well did they destroy their own country that America suggested that they both be promoted. And they were! Wow, how funny is that? One, the destroyer of Gezi Park youth, is president, the other, the “zero-problems-with-neighbors” genius, will be prime minister. This genius who wears a perpetual smirk beneath his scruffy moustache wrote a book on foreign policy called Strategic Depth. The destruction that is Turkish foreign policy resides in a deep, deep strategic cesspool. For that, and other miscues, mishaps and misdeeds, he will lead the nation. The ever consistent Erdoğan’s first act as president-elect was to knowingly violate the Turkish constitution. Since the position of the Turkish president is supposed to be above politics—HA! HA! HA!—Erdoğan must immediately resign as prime minister and as head of his political party. He refuses to do this. Why? Because he would lose his immunity from prosecution for a few days. And in case you haven’t heard, Erdoğan has a problem in this regard. But surely the political opposition, the “bread boys,” are pressuring him. Well, ha! ha! ha! not exactly.

Even funnier is how just about everyone in Turkey who can help America is paid off to make it happen. How else to explain this amazing comedy of errors and stupidities. I mean, bribes, big bribes. Big, CIA level unaccountable bribes. How else can one explain a media that only prints pro-government propaganda? Why else would a media fire any and all columnists who dissent? How else can one explain a political opposition that helps their opposition, the opposition that they are supposed to oppose? What a weird sentence that was…but not as weird as the political opposition leaders Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu and Devlet Bahçeli. These two should have a comedy act on one of the brainless Turkish TV channels. Slapstick would be appropriate—they can beat each other with loaves of bread reminding the electorate of their pathetically inept choice of a presidential candidate.

Just thinking of these two walking laugh-riots makes what’s left of my brain spin. In fact my head is now spinning faster and faster and faster and—whoops!— there it goes, bouncing along the floor—tak! tak! tak!— into the corner by the refrigerator. My left eye sees the wall, the other, the dark space between the floor and the front of the refrigerator. The rest of myself remains on the chair. How humorous this is. I laugh and blow dust. I sneeze and blink my eyes so rapidly that my head rolls back an inch and I can see myself out of the corner of my right eye. There I sit, headless, my arms crossed, stupidly waiting. My head by the refrigerator thinks how it must be for the hundreds that have been beheaded by the evil breed of the American scheme, the devilish Free Libya Army, changing to the diabolical Free Syrian Army, changing now to the fiends of ISID.

I am now hysterical. Like me, even babies, mostly Christian babies, have also been beheaded. But I did it willingly through laughter. They had it done by America and Turkey, by the so-called “leaders” and by their ignoramus makers of foreign policy. How humorous was Ignoramus Clinton to revel in the barbarous disembowelment and anal rape of MuammarKhadafy? “We came, we saw, he died…Ha! Ha! Ha!” chuckled the ignoramus American Secretary of State. Is Kerry, and his litany of lies about Syria, any less amusing? Any less of an ignoramus clown? Ha! Ha! Ha! No. He is just another monstrously “exceptional” American. And speaking of monsters…

How does the president of the United States explain to the American taxpayers that their dollars are financing the beheading of Christian babies…and so much more? The president announced that “the entire world” is appalled by the beheading of an American journalist. But is he, Obama, appalled? If he is, how does he explain that he has assembled Satan’s Army? And why does it take a bestial slaughtering of an innocent journalist to get Obama’s attention to the horror that his policies have created? The world knows this. There are no more cover stories. He has made a devil’s bargain with the “strategic depth” incompetent ignoramuses in Turkey. This is the horrible truth. It is a horrible mistake. Now what?

As for my own beheading through hysterical laughter? My head continues to gather dust by the refrigerator. I can still see my other part on the sitting on the chair like two sacks of onions. Can I stop laughing long enough at this darkest of all tragicomedies to pull myself together? Is it really worth the effort?

James (Cem) Ryan

Istanbul

22 August 2014

August 22, 2014
KEYSTONE KOPISTAN

A Grim Non-Fairytale

Everything is unbelievable in the kingdom of Keystone Kopistan, located between Bulgaristan, Greekistan, Syrianistan, Irakistan, Iranistan, Devilistan and the deep blue sea. In fact, the most popular exclamation of astonishment in Keystone Kopistan, always used about the never-ending fraud called “Turkish Democracy,” is “Inanılmaz!” meaning “Unbelievable!” In reality, the unbelievable is always completely believable in K.K. This has been the case since 10 November 1938. Things always worsen and unbelievably so. For example, this is now one more unbelievable thing going from bad to worse: the police in Keystone Kopistan are now arresting the police, that is, each other. There is neither law or order nor order or law in the “advanced” democracy of Keystone Kopistan. Things there are always unbelievably true.

But a far more serious condition prevails. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, widely thought to have been the all-powerful prime minister of Keystone Kopistan never was. It seems that Erdoğan, the bad-boy, tough guy prime minister (and now president-in-waiting) discovered upon awakening on the morning of 17 December 2013 that he had only imagined he was prime minister, police chief, head of the Supreme Court, chief prosecuting attorney, chief destroyer of all military forces, chief economist, chief architect, chief paymaster, chief collector of receivables, chief subcontractor, and chief Chief. In fact, Erdoğan had been deep in a twelve-year dream about Yavuz Sultan Selim (1470-1520), known as Selim the Grim for his bloody-handed cruelty. These two sure make strange, grim bedfellows, don’t they?

On 17 December, the police came knocking on Erdoğan’s door looking for shoeboxes. Oh how they ran, these cops of Kopistan. And oh how Tayyip and the kids ran, ran, ran. And how all the ministers ran. And how all their children ran. And how the words flew. And how Erdoğan, thinking he was prime minister, fired all the cops and prosecutors and judges. And how four of the more corrupt ministers resigned and ran away to do house cleaning chores, so helpful did they become to their wives that day. Everyone was chasing everyone that day—fathers chased children, husbands chased wives, police chased thieves, helicopters flew, curses flew, shoeboxes and candy boxes flew and everyone and everything chased money, vast, countless amounts of money. So what should be done?

Well that was easy. Since everything is both believable and unbelievable in Keystone Kopistan, Erdoğan blamed the police, the newspapers, the Israelis, the American ambassador and the entire country’s population of stray cats. He even blamed Pennsylvania. Unbelievable, wouldn’t you agree? Yes, but…and “but” is a very important word in Keystone Kopistan. But… it is also believable. And since the media bosses are all corrupt, and most journalists are scribblers for Erdoğan’s interests, and since bribes and lies are the common means of discourse, all are made to believe that a “parallel” state did it. No one asks very much about what happened to all the money. No one asks very much where Erdoğan got all the good cops to replace the bad cops. No one asks much in Keystone Kopistan. And since half the voters are paid by the ruling party, they will also surely die for him and thus surely vote for him. And so these unquestioning incompetents made him president, with a lot of help from the equally incompetent political opposition. And Erdoğan laughingly tallied his winning votes and now, knowingly and safely, counts his unbelievably extraordinary assets.

Speaking of counting, Selim the Grim was also interested in counting. He specialized in the murderous mathematics of religion. So much so that he slaughtered 40,000 “heretical” Anatolian Alevites, having concluding that killing even one of these despicable heretics was functionally equivalent to the heavenly reward receivable for killing 70 detestable Christians. Obviously he couldn’t find such a concentration of Christians in those days so he invented the Alevite multiplier effect. Selim the Grim was pleased with his genius and continued with his math studies, adding other variables to his original deadly equation: 1A = 70C. Selim the Grim, soul brother for Tayyip the Grimmer…and the grim tale of Keystone Kopistan continues.

One can easily understand Tayyip the Grimmer’s fascination with this earlier Sultanic killing machine. After all, after his own interests everyone and everything else comes last. So in homage, Tayyip the Grimmer decided to build a third bridge over the Bosporus, naming it the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge. In perfect historical harmony, this bridge will slaughter millions of trees, plants, wildlife, rivers, streams and the Istanbul air, in short, the entire ecological system of Bosporus and Istanbul will enter a long, torturous death cycle. It is the mathematical, real world equivalent to billions of dollars of real estate speculation and undercover deals. Allah is indeed generous to pious believers. Selim the Grim proved that. And Tayyip the Grimmer reinforces Selim the Grim’s mathematical speculations proving that one shoebox packed with U.S. dollars equals $1 million. Unbelievable! Who needs shoes! Yes, unbelievable. So believe it! And be pious!

Last December 17, Tayyip the Grimmer awoke from his dream. What? he shouted, You mean I’m not the man in charge? It seems that the major arrest programs of the government’s plan to destroy the military—Ergenekon and Balyoz—happened, but the government didn’t do it. Huh? Yes, the army was destroyed, but not by Tayyip the Grimmer. Huh? Journalists and military officers had their careers and, in a few cases, their lives destroyed, but not by the government. Huh?

Then who did it? That’s easy, said Tayyip the Grimmer. It was all a sneaky trick done by that unspeakable, terrorist imam in Pennsylvania. He did it! Feto of Pennsylvania did it! My archenemy, my old friend and, until now, my co-conspirator and accomplice. He did it! Huh?

So while Feto the Unspeakable was doing all the secret dirty business under the blind eyes of a sleeping government, who raped environment? Who plundered the nation’s assets? Whose police maimed and murdered the nation’s youth during the Gezi Park Movement. Who insulted the mothers of dead children? Who continues to defame the dead children? Who arms and finances the ISID killers? Who supports these terrorist demons who consume the inner organs of their dying victims? Who fails to speak out when these sub-human insults to the animal world behead men, women, children and infants in the name of Allah? Who?

Why it’s the grim, soon-to-be-president of the Republic of Turkey. He and his truly unspeakable, unbelievable, fully believable supporters have brought hell to Keystone Kopistan. Believe it!

James (Cem) Ryan

Istanbul

19 August 2014

August 19, 2014
IN ANOTHER COUNTRY, IN ANOTHER WORLD

IN ANOTHER COUNTRY, IN ANOTHER WORLD

Gezi Park, A Symphonic Movement of Infinite Movements

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

The Second Coming, William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)

With the inevitability and power of spring it arose. From the pregnant earth, from the thinnest of air, from the soul of a long-abused people, it leapt, irresistible. And like the biggest of bangs, it exploded. And the nation was drenched in blood and smiles, hate and sweat, tears and lies, generosity and gas bombs, police brutality and corporate compassion, scimitars and penguins, slander and song, all proof—absolute, exhilarating, genuine proof—that all was well with the ageless Turkish youth. And all was wrong with the treasonous government, now ten years about its nasty business.

No one understood it. How could simple trees have harbored such explosive force? Could mere trees, so easily destroyed like scraps of wood by the thoughtless, thieving government, spark a revolution? A clump of trees in the center of the toxic city, a spurt of gas on a beautiful woman in a red dress by a boneheaded cop, and suddenly the nation was enraged and on the march. And in this manner a terrible beauty came to Turkey. Call it freedom. Call it self-defense. Call it rebellion. Label it at your peril. No one understood it then. No one understands it now. Call it Gezi.

First came the young people, swift, agile and beautiful. They made Gezi Park a new Garden of Eden, a place of peaceful protest, resistant occupation and serenity. These kids will save these trees. And their roots became one. “Intolerable insolence,” said a government mouthpiece. Who needs trees when another shopping center can plunder the people? And in good time the fascists sent their brutal police to make the world safe for relentless capitalism. Like thieves in the night they came, these so-called police and their helmets, armored vests, clubs, pistols, gas bombs, rubber bullets, incendiary devices and cannons belching poisonous sprays. A sneak attack against kids armed only with dreams, patriotism and courage. It was no contest. The cops cleared the park but the world learned the exact nature of the Turkish government and its supporters. In a week, the lies and slander from the now emboldened government left the prime minister standing naked. And out of gas, tear gas, so intense was the resistance. Blindings, murders, beatings, knifings, slashings, thousands injured, all of them democratically and peacefully assembled to register their legitimate protest, six lovely boys dead in the stinking street. The cities were shrouded in fog. Democratic, peace-loving America had to resupply poisonous gas canisters to its naked puppet prince. Their ambassador spouted his usual gas about the Turkish government having a “conversation” with its people. Imagine, such a conversation…perhaps a conversation like America had with the innocent Japanese people in Hiroshima on 6 August 1945.

And then the kids disengaged. They turned passive. Like stones they stood in the public space claiming their right to exist, as one, or as a million. And the government threw more gas. And the fascists were more clearly defined by their violence. Slowly, ever so slowly, the fascist carcass was unveiled, twisting slowly on its meat hook.

The ruling elite think it went away, that a little more violence will finish it forever. More jailings, more gassings, more state-sponsored murders, more denial of public space to the public, more threats, more nonsensical self-serving “democratic” political packages, more, more, more, more of the same. This will surely work. They fear for their political lives, these fossils from a world that is finishing. All those who have grown drunk on its atmosphere of greed, ignorance and violence will never understand Gezi. They gape and gasp like beached carp stinking in the noonday sun. Such will be their end. And thus it has begun…

James (Cem) Ryan, Ph.D.
Istanbul
1 October 2013

August 13, 2014
A DUCK?

Things are not always what they appear to be. The same goes for people. Take me, for example. I am an American. Since my grandfather was born in Ireland, I am able to be a citizen of Ireland, hence legally Irish. Yet through birth I was always of Irish descent, whether a citizen of Ireland or not. Citizenship is a legal formality. My great-grandfather was German. So I am also of German descent, though to a much lesser degree. I was baptized Catholic as an infant, an event over which I had absolutely no control. Accordingly, I was enrolled in a mixed-gender catholic elementary school named Saint Barnabas. (I remained ignorant of who this Barnabas fellow was until I came to Turkey and learned that he was from Cyprus and preached in Antakya). I served mass as an altar boy, thus memorizing much Latin. In my last year of elementary school, I won the parish Christian Doctrine competition. One Saturday in May, I competed at the city-wide level. I hurriedly finished the examination in order to get to the Polo Grounds in time to see the New York Giants play the Brooklyn Dodgers. Both the Giants and I lost that day. I was very upset about the Giants.

My teachers in elementary school were all women, mostly religious nuns. I went to an all-boys catholic secondary school. My teachers in high school were all men, mostly religious brothers. My grades were good throughout. My close friends were mostly Christian due to my neighborhood. We competed in sports against Jews and African-Americans and Puerto Ricans without incident. We traveled freely through their neighborhoods. We rode subways and buses without fear. We played basketball in Harlem in a playground next to the Polo Grounds. My boyhood athletic hero was Willie Mays, the black centerfielder for the baseball Giants. I went to university at the United States Military Academy at West Point, then all male, including the faculty. And then I graduated and another life began. I never went to these “homes” again. And now I live in Turkey, as a Turk, since my wife is Turkish. And since my last name ends in –yan, I could nominally be mistaken for an Armenian.

What are we? What’s your story? There is an old saying about this question. “If it walks like a duck, swims like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck then it probably is a duck.” So what are we, “probably?”

Hurry up now, decide. People are dying by the thousands because of what they are or appear to be. They are dying by the thousands because they are “different.” Am I different? Are you different? Different from what? From whom? What does “different” mean?

And now, again the question! So what am I? A Christian? Irish? An American? A CIA agent? A radical? A tree lover? An agnostic? A revolutionary? A military man? A New Yorker? A Marxist? A book lover? A Turk? An Armenian? A non-Armenian? A non-Sunni? A non-Alevi? A non-Jew? A non-Turkmen? A non-Syrian? What am I?

A prime minister! A prime minister, for his background, fortunate beyond belief, spews hate speeches, incessantly orders destruction of the environment, covets wealth and power, despises differences, sneers at the hope-filled enthusiasm of youth, orders them maimed by gangster police. He is never happy, this prime minister. He divides like a Samurai warrior cleaves. Finely, precisely, he slices and minces and dices, all people, all things, all ideas not his own. His ill repute stifles. Criminality and lawlessness describe the ruined landscape, the waste land, that is Turkey. His face tells the story of his ruination. This torment of the spirit cannot be effaced. What does his mirror tell him? Does anyone tell him? Someone should. What is he? His is the story of Dorian Gray.

And me! What am I? I don’t know. Today, looking to the coming catastrophe that is the political system of Turkey, I consider myself a duck.

James (Cem) Ryan

Istanbul

9 August 2014

Picture of Dorian Gray Ivan Le Lorraine Albright (1897-1983) As seen in the 1945 film.

August 9, 2014
PENNSYLVANIA’S WAR NOW ON TWO FRONTS

Thursday, August 7, 2014

PENNSYLVANIA’S WAR NOW ON TWO FRONTS

Izmir beachhead established. PKK raids Gülen Gang in Saylorsburg, Pa.

Candy, flowers and laughing women. Weeping, cursing and shoeboxes.
A pre-raid aerial view of the Gülen Gang’s headquarters, Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania

Harrisburg, August 7, 2014

By Max Placid / McClatchy Newspapers

In a morning mist, Pennsylvania’s paramilitary forces landed on the Turkish coast at Izmir on August 4. They met no resistance but they did encounter a jubilant Turkish crowd who greeted the Pennsylvanians by bombarding them with Turkish delight candy and Atatürk flowers. As the Rocky Balboa Brigade, an elite unarmed (except for their fists) attack force, sprinted down Martyrs Street, hilariously laughing women streamed into the Kordon, Izmir’s magnificent seaside esplanade. “Go Rocky!” they screamed through tears of joy, “Get Bulent for us!” Of course, they werereferring to the hapless Turkish deputy prime minister who bizarrely admonished Turkish women for laughing in public. It seemed to the surprised Pennsylvanians that they were participating in some sort of weird liberation. As the Balboa Brigade veered left onto Kemalpasha Street tables of sliced melon, white cheese and glasses of rakı (the Turkish national beverage) appeared. But the highly disciplined Pennsylvanians ignored the temptation. “Yo Turks! On the way back! On the way back!” shouted Colonel Rocky Balboa, brigade commander. It was obvious that their immediate objective was not Izmir.

On the home front, on the same day as the Izmir landing, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett launched a pre-emptive pre-dawn raid on the CIA safe-house of an alleged imam, Fethullah Gülen. Gülen is a longtime, infamous ally of the Turkish prime minister. Both have been previously convicted—Gülen in absentia—of seditious behavior. Governor Corbett, now commander-in-chief of the hastily formed Pennsylvania Kombat Kommand (PKK), announced that he is fully aware of the conspiracy between the current Turkish government and what has been labeled the “Hey Pennsylvania” movement. “Gülen and Erdoğan are cut from the cloth,” said Corbett and elaborated in the following statement:

“Together they have conspired to destroy Turkish democracy. They have used the most disgusting, criminal methods in their treason. And I am ashamed to say that America’s CIA aided and abetted their crimes. Regardless of what others may think or say, the people of Pennsylvania have no place for these ‘religious’ two-faced criminals. An undercover gang in Pennsylvania will be quickly uprooted and brought to justice. And that’s the reason for the raid by the PKK.”

The Pennsylvania Kombat Kommand (PKK) is another quickly assembled strike team consisting of a highly-trained special weapons contingent of state policewomen, Pittsburgh Penguin hockey players and the starting lineup of the Philadelphia Phillies baseball team. All three groups are skilled in insertions, extractions and evacuations.
Jimmy Rollins
The raid of Gülen’s hideout at 1857 Mt. Eaton Road in Saylorsburg, often referred to as “Feto’s Farm,” was a complete success. Silence prevailed as the Kombat Kommand encircled the premises. Guards at the front gate were neutralized by Jimmy Rollins, the Phillies shortstop, who leveled his bat at the two gatekeepers. One of them, a Turk named Imdat Aptal, volunteered immediately to act as an interpreter. In appreciation, Rollins generously autographed Aptal’s copy of Pearls of Wisdom, by F. Gülen.

Thus having secured the entrance, a barrier of interlocking hockey sticks was implaced by the defensemen of the Pittsburgh Penguins. (Note: Being summer, the Penguins wore roller skates in this operation.)

“No one can pass!” ordered Rollins.

“Kimse geçemez!” echoed Aptal.

Immediately thereafter an impenetrable defensive perimeter was established by Rollins baseball teammates and the Penguins.

Meanwhile great wailing and lamentation came from the main house. Beddua this and beddua that, here a beddua, there a beddua, and every so often the word “parallel” was heard .

“What’s all this yelling about beddua?” asked A.J. Burnett, the Phillies big right-handed starting pitcher.

“The boss is angry again,” said Aptal. “He’s bedduaing, I mean, cursing and talking to Allah.”

“Yeah? Well you come with me and tell him that he better watch his mouth and that he’s being busted in the name of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.”

“Of course,” said Aptal.

Behind the mansion a backhoe was digging huge holes in a green field. Inside the mansion, sobs were gushing from the main office, as smiling police women searched Gülen and his premises. The air was electric. The full horror story of religious intrigue, espionage, prostitution, forgery, blackmail, narcotics trafficking, judicial corruption and treason might soon be revealed.

It was. The bookcases in the main office were not bookcases at all. Officer Mary Jane Stonebreaker leaned against a copy of Love and Tolerance, also by F. Gülen. and—wow!—the bookshelves suddenly swung open to reveal a vast storage vault. Endless ranks and rows of boxes filled the space. A warehouse of shoeboxes!

“Who lives here, Imelda Marcos?” asked the astonished police officer. “What the heck is this place? A shoe factory or something?”

Ryan Howard

Ryan Howard, his 36-ounce Louisville Slugger bat acting as her backup weapon, opened one of the boxes, this one labeled T. Erdog.

“This is a money factory, Officer Stonebreaker.”

“Gee, I only touched the book,” said the policewomen with an ironic laugh. “What would have happen if I read it?”

“Yeah,” agreed Howard, “I make 25 million dollars a year with the Phillies. These guys make that much in a day. We’re both in the wrong business.”

“But at least we’re honest,” said Officer Stonebreaker.

“Yeah,” said the big first baseman, “Let’s find this creep so you can bust him.”

Meanwhile the results of the outside excavation and the inside investigation were being displayed in the lobby. In addition to firearms and enough explosive devices to launch Pennsylvania into the afterlife, evidence of the long-term, continuing connection of the subversive relationship between the Gülen movement and the Erdoğan government abounded, to wit:

A box of counterfeit Marmara University graduation diplomas.

30 years of handwritten correspondence, birthday cards, thank-you notes and travel post cards between Gülen and Erdoğan. The latest from Erdoğan, dated July 4, 2014 and encoded in Turkic-English as follows:

DEER ESTEAMED FRIEND FETO, WE SHURE FOOLING THEM NOW. ALL THINK PARRRALLLELLL STATES IS TROO. HA HA HA. TANKS A LOT FOR STASH FOR KASH. I WILL BE A PRECEDENT OF TURKEY SOON NOW FOR SHURE. YOU BETCHA IN VON MINIT OR TOO. PLEEZE GIVE RIGARDS TO LOAF OF BREAD FRIENDZ AT AGENTSY. HEH HEH HEH. MEANS CIA. RTE

Scores of video cassettes revealed the auditioning of Deniz Baykal body-doubles. Outtakes show Fethullah Gülen sitting in a director’s chair wearing a beret and smoking a cigar. Every time he yells “CUT!” he takes a drag on his stogie, blows smoke, then curses frantically.

Feto Inc. Listening Device

Listening devices.

15 automatic signature machines.

37 cash counting machines.

Barrels of dice. Cartons of playing cards. Cases of poker chips.

236 new copies of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Treason, Blackmail, Falsification of Evidence and Embezzlement.

7,698 copies of How to Fool All the People All the Time.

11 copies of The Joys of Montage, Subterfuge and Sabotage.

4,789 copies of How to Plant Evidence and Ruin People’s Lives.

A truckload of hypodermic syringes.

The search continues. “It is astonishing how these religious hypocrites use crime in the name of God,” said Governor Corbett. “We will continue to press the attack at home. And we are pleased to hear from Colonel Balboa that the Turks are with us. Pennsylvania Kombat Kommand! Your immediate objectives are Ankara, the parliament and the prime minister! Forward!”

All Gülen Gang personnel were booked at the Saylorsburg police station. Under the terms and provisions of the Patriot Act of 2001 and the Espionage Act of 1917, the accused gang members were remanded to the Monroe County Correctional Facility in Stroudsburg pending completion of the investigation.

####

James (Cem) Ryan

Istanbul

8 August 2014

August 8, 2014