Page 7 - Turkey Outlook 2022

No harvest of military “attractions”

The past year presented few opportunities for Erdogan to create some
expeditionary military “attractions” that firm up his base support. Not that he
won’t chase up any chances he gets in the coming year.

Even the PKK, a Kurdish separatist terrorist organisation that over the years
has been a handy target for the Erdogan regime whenever it has needed some
bloody action, is nowadays not producing much for the gun sights.

The jihadist groups backed by Erdogan remain a ticking bomb. Recently, one
jihadist cut the head off a student in Antalya. Another targeted three Syrian
workers while they are sleeping in Izmir, leaving them with burns. On
December 28, somebody attacked a pro-Kurdish HDP office in Istanbul.

With the military “attractions” route somewhat exhausted, officials are focusing
on geeing up Turks with natural gas and gold “discoveries”, which in reality
don’t exist, at least not to anywhere near the extent claimed. Stagnation is in
the air. Erdogan’s people even seem to have little energy for pushing their
master’s infamous “Canal Istanbul” project, a wild mega infrastructure scheme
that would cut a swathe through Turkey’s largest city, causing tremendous
environmental damage while offering few commercial gains.

However, despite all its weaknesses, the regime is still able to herd enough of
the global media to keep the “warts and all” story of the disastrous Erdogan
administration from view.

Virus

Outlook 2021 Turkey: “When the virus spread around the world in the early
months of 2020, there were those selling the story that it would end before it
even got going. Now, there is the vaccine story…”

In pandemic news, since November, the highly infectious Omicron coronavirus
variant (one whiff of breath is all it takes to get infected, doctors say) has been
taking over from the Delta variant. As 2021 came to a close, there was even
talk of another variant, Delmicron, namely a combination of Delta and Omicron.
Europe was partly locked down.

Under normal conditions, the winter of 2021-2022 should be the last winter of
the pandemic. There are hopes that Omicron will take us from pandemic to
endemic, with low Omicron severe illness and death rates and the variant
coming to be regarded as nothing more than a “common cold”. However, don’t
bet the farm on it. Take into account that by the end of 2022, we could be
watching the development of yet another deadly variant.

Never forget

“Scientists are sounding the alarm over how much damage could be inflicted
by a big earthquake that strikes Istanbul, a city of 15mn full of unregulated
construction and old building stock.”

Black swan?

What black swan? In 2022, nothing will be a surprise in Turkey.

7 Turkey Outlook 2022 www.intellinews.com