“Regardless of Turkey's political and military alliances with the West, we continue to receive the biggest threats from the West; be they political, economic, cultural, or by all other means," he told a select group of journalists in Istanbul two weeks ago after the delivery of the first S-400 components.

Such rhetoric from the leader of a NATO country might be regarded as awkward by many, though it is unsurprising for several reasons.

Firstly, Erdogan was never pro-Western. While the president was not outspokenly anti-Western until 2014, animosity towards the West, particularly the United States, was a major pillar of the teachings of former Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, under whom Erdogan served as Istanbul mayor in the 1990s.

Hostility and mistrust of the West go back to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War One and are influenced by a variety of Islamist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood.

Erdogan has successfully driven his support base, almost half of the country, away from the West through tools, including the media, the Religious Affairs Directorate (Diyanet), intelligence organization and a number of NGOs.

According to a survey in the pro-government Yeni Safak newspaper, 97 percent of Turks believe the United States is their enemy, and 95 think U.S. forces should be ejected from the Incirlik air base in southern Turkey.

Erdogan also publicly accused the United States of being the power behind the July 2016 coup attempt and said European countries had supported it.

Western leaders have been reluctant to publicly counter Erdogan’s rhetoric, helping to bolster his image as a Sunni leader able to stand up to the West.

Erdogan established new alliances within Turkey after 2013 corruption investigations uncovered an oil-for-gold scheme to bypass sanctions on Iran. The president saw the only way to survive politically was with the backing of pro-Russian Eurasianists in Turkey, a group that was powerful within the military and judiciary.

The Ottoman Youth Society, which backs Erdogan with branches in every town and city, announced an official alliance with the youth wing of the Homeland Party, a small, nationalist group led by veteran politician Dogu Perincek, who has important support within the military and intelligence community.

Under normal circumstances, it would be impossible for these ideological opposites to even be in the same room. But Erdogan knew he would not be able to stay in power without support from the military and National Intelligence Organization (MİT). He therefore made sure to safeguard his reign by redesigning these two institutions.

Traditionally, MİT was run by generals who saw internal and external threats from a military perspective. Erdogan’s first step was to redesign MIT in 2010, appointing his long-time confidant and then Prime Ministry undersecretary, Hakan Fidan, as its director, a man without past intelligence experience.

Fidan quickly assigned new deputies and reshuffled staff to ensure full control and loyalty. Erdoğan backed Fidan by passing new laws giving MİT new authorities such as the ability to obtain official or private data, law enforcement investigative powers and immunity from prosecution. MİT agents became untouchable and were armed with all the data they could get their hands on.

Fidan set up six new undersecretaries under his command, along with two significant offices; one directly working with Salafi jihadist organizations in Turkey, and the other in the Middle East, hiring and training agents targeting the West and carrying out intelligence operations.

These two new offices worked independently, directly under Fidan, and became completely compartmentalized from the rest of the agency.

For example, when I was the chief of the counterterrorism and operations department in Urfa, we started to see strange movements of non-local MİT agents between the Turkish and Syrian border; activities including meeting the leaders and representatives of local and Syrian jihadist groups and navigating and leading supplies across the border. A few high-level local MIT directors even resigned their posts or retired early because of ongoing operations within their jurisdictions, which they had not been informed of.

In addition to the redesigning of MIT, Fidan also started to work with NGOs and think tanks to help Erdogan gain support domestically and internationally.

The best-known cases include the provision of assistance to Islamist charity the Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH) for its activities abroad. IHH facilities in return were used as cover for intelligence operations.

The establishment and rapid spread of the Ottoman Youth Society in the most critical jurisdictions across the country has been another crucial project laid out by Fidan, who has also fed journalists and the so-called pro-Erdogan troll army with critical intelligence and information. Finally, agents working abroad have been given critical information about Erdogan’s enemies to post on social media, or simply to be used to make their lives more difficult.

When I was interviewing a criminal from the town of Akcakale on the Turkish-Syrian border at the end of 2013, he openly told me that he had been instructed by MİT to open a branch of the Ottoman Youth Society in his town and that he had already found the place, and was in the process of renting the building.

The second and maybe more important role of the MİT was the reshuffling of the Turkish military so that Erdogan would be immune from threats from the generals.

By the time Erdogan allied with the “Eurasianists”, he had already decided that Turkey would shift towards the East, the military would be handed to mainly pro-Russian generals, and generals with NATO experience or those deemed to oppose him would be sidelined.

Most of the new generals were not even shy about their distaste for the United States and NATO. For example, General Zekai Aksakalli, assigned as special forces commander, is known as Turkey’s Qasem Soleimani because of his strong anti-U.S. rhetoric.

Seeing the anti-American trend within the Turkish military, U.S. General Joseph Votel, the head of the U.S. Central Command, said, “the purge of the Turkish military is “something to be very, very concerned about … We have certainly had relationships with a lot of Turkish leaders, military leaders. In particular, I am concerned that it will impact the level of cooperation and collaboration that we have with Turkey, which has been excellent, frankly.”

Erdogan’s new alliances with Turkish Eurasianists and Russia, and the restructured MİT and military, give the president enough confidence to blatantly and unwisely stand against the United States and the West.

The result is that the purchase of S-400 missile systems from Russia is now going to cost Turkey its participation in the F-35 program – a project in which it has invested billions of dollars – and worsen the economic crisis.

It is clear that Erdogan does not care about the economy as much as he cares about his own position, simply because he does not trust the West. He is ready to counter any opposition at home by force to stay in power.

While opposition wins at local elections in March and June could be seen as a sign of democratic overhaul, one should not be naïve enough to think Erdogan would leave power through democratic means.

Ahval

Reporter’s code: 50101