Turkey is going through another political convulsion following the statement by a leading general that the task of "destroying fundamentalism is of life and death importance" for the survival of the secular republic. It was a clear signal that the armed forces want to see the Islamist Prime Minister, Mr Necmettin Erbakan, removed from office after a series of confrontations with his government over growing Islamic influence in education and suspected collusion between these forces and Kurdish separatists.
The message was delivered at an unusual press conference attended by foreign correspondents and senior Turkish journalists. The armed forces are a powerful institution in Turkey. Their influence can be traced back directly to the war of independence against the Greeks and Ottoman forces in 1919-23 led by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, which culminated in the declaration of the republic in 1924. It rapidly took on a secular identity, influenced by French Jacob in nationalism and an assimilationist model of Turkish citizenship, directed especially against religious institutions and designed to bolster an ambitious programme of state building and modernisation.
The current army concern can be traced back directly to the formation last year of the coalition government between Mr Erbakan's Welfare Party and the True Path Party led by Mrs Tansu Ciller. It has been expressed through the National Security Council, rather than as a direct intervention. But its intent seems clear to associate Islamic fundamentalism with Kurdish separatism as internal enemies of the Turkish state and to denounce their assumed regional allies, notably Iran.
Any direct move by the army to intervene politically would be seen in Europe and the United States as incompatible with the democracy which defines Turkey's European identity. There is a widespread concern for human rights in Turkey, arising in large part from the ruthless conflict between the armed forces and Kurdish armed bands and political parties. The army's instinct is to associate regionalist movements with separatism and the breakup of the Turkish state. Given the difficulty Kurdish parties have had in organising it is not surprising that some of their support should have gone to the Welfare Party. But it is important not to confuse that party with more extreme Islamic movements elsewhere, or, indeed, in Turkey itself.
Mr Erbakan has been able to draw on many streams of discontent and social marginalisation, and on protests about corruption and political ineptitude. It is also important not to associate charges of human rights abuses with much more prejudiced assumptions about Turkey's cultural incompatibility with European civilisation and therefore with EU membership. The opposition secular parties have proved incapable of providing an alternative government so far, while Mrs Ciller has played a canny political gamef.