US embassy cable - 04ANKARA6615

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ANKARA 006615 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/29/2014 
TAGS: IZ, KPAO, MOPS, PREL, TU 
SUBJECT: DISTORTED TURKISH REACTION TO FALLUJAH OPERATION 
CREATES POISONOUS ANTI-U.S. ATMOSPHERE 
 
Classified by Ambassador Eric Edelman, E.O. 12958, reasons 
1.4 (b) and (d). 
 
1.  (C) Summary:  Over the past two weeks, Turkish media 
portrayal of the al-Fajr operation in Fallujah has been 
unabashedly biased, vehemently anti-U.S. and often flat-out 
wrong.  The MFA did not react to the most outrageous 
misstatements until November 26; the military has been 
publicly silent.  Some Turkish officials, including the PM 
and FM, have even added fuel to the fire.  The Ambassador has 
privately and publicly worked to correct the record, but the 
Turkish public, and leading officials, seem ready to accept 
the most incredible allegations about the facts in Fallujah, 
and there is a poisonous anti-U.S. atmosphere on Iraq in 
Turkey today.  We cannot stress enough the importance of 
having reliable, timely information and images for our 
efforts to counter the prevailing trend.  We also need a 
consistent message from Washington to visiting Turkish 
officials that anti-American statements by the PM, FM and 
others will reverberate negatively in the U.S. and damage the 
relationship.  End Summary. 
 
Biased Media 
------------ 
 
2.  (U) Most Turks get their information from television, 
where coverage of Fallujah operations even by "responsible" 
stations has been one-sided and accompanied by slanted 
commentary.  Stations have repeatedly shown footage of a U. 
S. soldier shooting a wounded prisoner and of U.S. troops 
entering mosques.  Even state-owned TRT television broadcast 
a claim that the U.S. used chemical weapons in Fallujah, 
comparing it to photos of Saddam's 1988 chemical weapons 
attack on Halabja. 
 
3.  (U) There has been almost no mention in electronic or 
print media of weapons caches found in Fallujah, or mosques 
used as fighting positions and weapons depots, or evidence of 
torture and killings by terrorists in Fallujah.  Reports of 
beheadings and kidnappings -- the Margaret Hassan killing, 
for example -- are reported as if they were isolated events 
caused by "atmosphere" created by the U.S.-led occupation. 
Strikingly, Turkish media have drawn practically no 
connections between Fallujah terrorists and killings of 
Turkish truck drivers and contractors. 
 
4.  (U) We have seen no media accounts from Turkish reporters 
on the scene.  Some accounts have been based on telephone 
interviews with civilians, with no mention of how the person 
came by the information they are relating.  Many others are 
unsourced.  The TRT report insidiously implied that the 
chemical weapons claim was based on Agence France Presse 
sources, when it actually originated on Islamist websites and 
Islamist-oriented Turkish dailies. 
 
5.  (U) Much media coverage has been flat-out wrong.  The 
media has repeatedly claimed U.S. use of chemical weapons and 
massive civilian casualties.  Yeni Safak, an 
Islamist-oriented daily close to the AK government (and the 
PM's paper of choice), claimed 1,200 U.S. dead and 5,000 
civilian dead in Fallujah operations.  One virulently 
anti-American columnist in Yeni Safak has claimed US forces 
have used chemical weapons, poison gas, nerve agents, napalm 
and phosphorous bombs.  He also wrote on November 27 that 
"they" (clearly meaning coalition forces) are raping and then 
killing women and children and leaving their naked bodies on 
the streets of Fallujah to be eaten by dogs. He further 
claimed that the marine shooting the wounded Iraqi in the 
mosque in Fallujah was "deliberately" broadcast by American 
authorities "to distract attention from the larger massacres" 
going on there. 
 
6.  (U) Amid the media tidal wave about Fallujah, 
distinctions between coverage in the Islamist and mainstream 
press have disappeared.  The November 22 front page of 
left-leaning nationalist Cumhuriyet declared that U.S. 
soldiers employed a shoot-to-kill policy for all military-age 
males in Fallujah; Cumhuriyet's November 29 edition carried 
supposed eyewitness accounts of U.S. use of illegal and 
non-conventional weapons and U.S. soldiers shooting women 
carrying white flags. 
 
7.  (U) Anti-U.S. demonstrations have become more frequent, 
recently occurring almost daily at the Embassy.  A November 
28 anti-U.S. rally in Istanbul protesting Fallujah operations 
drew 20,000 people, according to media figures.  In an 
address to the rally, former Islamist Refah Party PM Erbakan 
repeated genocide allegations.  The rally was front-page news 
in the November 29 editions of both Islamist Yeni Safak and 
left-leaning Cumhuriyet. 
 
Some Officials Fuel the Fire 
---------------------------- 
 
8.  (U) Some Turkish officials have added fuel to the fire: 
 
-- In comments at Marmaris University on November 14, PM 
Erdogan referred to those killed by coalition forces in 
Fallujah as "martyrs." 
 
-- According to press reports, on November 22, FM Gul said 
that the U.S. is in danger of "losing the Turkish public" 
because of inaction against the PKK in Iraq; the MFA 
spokesman later called us to walk back Gul's statement. 
 
-- On November 25, Parliament's Human Rights Committee 
President called U.S. operations in Iraq "genocide," 
unprecedented even by Hitler, and claimed the U.S. was using 
illegal weapons, possibly including atomic weapons. 
 
-- In his November 25 remarks to the Human Rights Committee, 
Deputy PM Sahin called the operations "a massacre." 
 
-- Opposition leaders have also spread the distorted view, 
claiming that the "pro-U.S. government" is failing to express 
criticism. 
 
Turkish MFA and Military Reaction 
--------------------------------- 
 
9.  (C) We have been passing information on Fallujah 
operations to the MFA, which remained silent until after the 
Ambassador raised Elkatmis' and other statements with FM Gul 
on November 26.  The MFA issued a November 26 statement about 
Fallujah noting that "the criticisms...that are called for 
have been made" and "exaggerated descriptions and 
characterizations, such as referring to genocide or the use 
of atomic weapons, cast a shadow over the credibility and 
fairness of the criticisms..." 
 
10.  (C)  We have also been passing updated information about 
Fallujah to the Turkish General Staff.  (Although Turkish 
LNOs in Baghdad and Tampa have access to the same 
information, their reports flow slowly through channels 
without wide distribution.)  We believe this information 
prevented the Turkish military leadership from making rash 
and ill-informed statements as they did in the early days of 
the September operation in Tal Afar. 
 
11.  (C) However, the Turkish media bias on Iraq and Fallujah 
may be effecting more junior officer levels which do not have 
access to accurate information.  A November 18 incident at 
Incirlik Air Base in which a Turk (probably a young airman) 
said over a shared radio net "we hate 
Americans...(garble)...die" illustrates that a virulent 
anti-American feeling is developing at lower ranks in the 
Turkish military. 
 
Ambassador Strikes Back 
----------------------- 
 
12. (C) In an effort to stem the anti-American tide, the 
Ambassador privately raised his concerns about Erdogan's 
statements and the egregious leaking of the Erdogan-Cheney 
phone call with both MFA U/S Ali Tuygan and the PM's National 
Security Advisor, Egemen Bagis, on November 19 and 22, 
respectively.  These conversations, as well as the Embassy 
reaction Elkatmis' comments (para 8 above), were also the 
subject of a meeting between the Ambassador and Tuygan on 
November 26.  At the conclusion of the meeting, Tuygan 
ushered the Ambassador in for a private meeting with FM Gul, 
who had just returned from the Netherlands.  Gul was by turns 
aggressive and apologetic.  He professed to be "unhappy" with 
the state of U.S.-Turkish relations.  He complained about the 
Ambassador hosting the Archons of the Orthodox Church of 
North America "under the patronage of the Ecumenical 
Patriarch."  He said Turkey needed "more cooperation" with 
the U.S. at this "crucial time" before December 17.  "I am 
not comfortable with the situation at present, to be honest," 
he said.  After protesting that he was doing his best to 
cooperate with the U.S. on Iraq, notably at the meeting in 
Sharm al-Shaikh, he admitted that there was a public opinion 
problem in Turkey.  He disowned Elkatmis' statement on 
genocide and said he would make a statement to that effect 
publicly.  (Begin FYI:  At the airport, Gul had refused to 
distance himself from Elkatmis.  After the meeting with 
Ambassador Edelman, he issued the weak statement in paragraph 
9, denouncing "exaggerated claims" which undercut the 
credibility of the legitimate criticisms of U.S. policy.  For 
his part, Parliament Speaker Arinc has said he "respects" 
Elkatmis's statement.  End FYI.) 
 
13.  (C) The Ambassador noted that the U.S. continued to 
support Turkey and was weighing in with European capitals to 
keep extraneous Cyprus and Aegean-related issues out of the 
decision on beginning of accession talks.  That being said, 
charges of "genocide" would not be received well in the U.S. 
It would make it harder to deal with the Armenian genocide 
resolutions in the Congress.  The Ambassador also referred to 
the incident at Incirlik and some altercations in Ankara that 
demonstrated the dangers of the overheated atmosphere.  The 
Ambassador expressed concern that an atmosphere was being 
created in which it was possible for people to say anything, 
no matter how scurrilous, about the U.S.  These words could 
lead to actions that would cause injury or even death to 
Americans in Turkey.  Gul agreed that "anti-Americanism is 
bad for you, bad for us, and bad for the cause of world 
peace."  In that regard he tried to place in context his 
reported remark that "the U.S. has lost Turkey" due to 
inaction on the PKK.  At the end, Gul agreed that the Turkish 
government should try to bound the outbreak of 
anti-Americanism. 
 
14.  (U) On the public diplomacy front, the Ambassador spent 
two hours November 26 in an on-the-record interview with the 
Ankara bureau chief of the Turkish daily "Aksam," briefing 
her on the reasons for the Fallujah operation, the tactics 
being used by the terrorists there, and what coalition forces 
found when they entered the city.  The Ambassador 
supplemented the briefing with photos released by the U.S. 
military that show weapons caches in Fallujah mosques; 
slaughterhouses where hostages were held, tortured, and 
killed; weapons labs; car bomb factories; insurgent weapons 
stocks and equipment.  The session resulted in a full-page 
spread the following day, including photos of weapons caches 
in mosques and of Iraqi government personnel distributing 
humanitarian assistance.  The Ambassador's comments on the 
subject were reported accurately.  Other columnists have 
begun to comment on the danger of Turkey loosely throwing 
around charges of genocide.  We intend to get the briefing 
materials on what the U.S. found in Fallujah distributed more 
broadly in the press this week. 
 
15.  (C) Comment:  As a result of the pervasive biased and 
anti-U.S. media coverage, most Turks have a view of Iraq that 
could come from al-Jazeera.  To most Turks, Fallujah means 
massive civilian casualties, systematic U.S. military 
violations of the laws of war, wanton desecration of mosques. 
 The MFA's lateness in correcting the record, officials' 
statements in line with media distortions, and the failure of 
all but a few Turkish opinion makers (including the military) 
to speak out on a factual basis have helped reinforce this 
perception and have created a poisonous anti-U.S. atmosphere 
on the subject of Iraq.  We are told that the few columnists 
who have tried to portray a balanced view have received a 
backlash of criticism from officials, peers and readers.  We 
are trying to correct the record, and more factual material 
faster would help, but the key will be getting Turkish 
officialdom and opinion leaders to stand up.  We need 
Washington and Washington-based visitors to Turkey to send a 
consistent message that continued America-bashing will erode 
support for the GOT in Washington and create more problems 
for both sides down the road.  End Comment. 
EDELMAN