The early parts of this book by Nicole and Hugh Pope are quite engaging. Turkey is described as a very popular tourist destination, and one couple we know said it was their favorite of several stops on their recent cruise. I recommend the book for people either interested in the country or who intend to visit. I challenge anyone to read the first page and not be intrigued. The authors say, “We still find it hard to pin down precisely when we fell in love with Turkey.” They then go through a list of endearing moments such as when a “…mustachioed fierce Turk’s face melted into an open and loving smile at the sight of a small baby.” Another is about the taxi driver who was a complete stranger but offered a loan to travelers finding themselves with no money at the end of a long ride. Other moments are not as comforting. A Turkish soldier who had gone out of his way to help strangers on a rainy night proudly said he was in charge of his unit’s torture section. There are other references to the reputation for brutality. The movie Midnight Express about the horrors experienced by an American in Turkish prisons after being arrested trying to smuggle drugs is a lasting contributor to the negative image of the country.

The authors obviously believe there is much more good than bad about the country. They write, “We were inspired to write this book by a wish to hand on something of the rich complexity of the Turkey we know, a Turkey much worthier of interest than might be expected from the narrow diet of news reports about Kurdish clashes, human rights violations, and economic crises usually fed to the general reader.”

Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, whose last name means “Father of the Turks”, is a central character in the book. The country became independent with the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923 after the Ataturk-led military defeated the Greeks. Ataturk insisted that Turkey would be a secular nation despite being raised as a devout Muslim. School children begin their day with a ritual in which the children shout in unison, “I am a Turk! I am honest! I am industrious!” This chant is completed in front of a bust of Ataturk. Ataturk was tireless and demanding in shaping the country in the image he wanted and was also tireless in promoting his country. He is said to have told an American journalist that Turks discovered American fifty years before Christopher Columbus. He might have not been amused that the only Ottoman Turks documented to have reached the new world were a boatload of prisoners dumped in the South who called themselves Melunjans, or “cursed souls.”

Turkish school books describe “…the first all-Turkish hero:  Attila, known in the West as Attila the Hun.” The books teach that Attila was not the barbarian commonly portrayed in the West, but instead was a gifted diplomat. Instead of being a murderous horde the conquering Turkic tribes “…civilized and improved the primitive people they found…” Other early famous Turks include Shah Jahan, the Turkic-speaking Mongol ruler who ordered the building of the Taj Mahal and another Mongol leader, Genghis Khan.

The early history of Turkey includes what seems to have been an endless list of battles between the Ottoman Empire Turks and nearly every neighbor. The leaders were busy plotting against one another when they weren’t in the field fighting neighbors. If you were required to describe the history of Turkey in one word, I think the word would be “violent.”

There are many interesting insights into the development of the country, and I learned there is no such thing as an “average Turk.” The Armenians still understandably remember the slaughter of hundreds of thousands or perhaps over a million of their ancestors after many fought with the Russians against the Turks during World War I. Large numbers of Greeks were forcibly expelled in an exchange with Turks living Greece after the Turkish army defeated the Greeks after World War I. The Greeks razed the cities in Turkey with fires as they were forced out. There are still tens of thousands of Christians and Jews living in dominantly Muslim Turkey. Perhaps they are not currently being threatened because the book indicates the craftsmen needed to allow the economy to prosper have been the Armenians, Greeks, Christians, and Jews.

The conflict with the ethnic group that confuses me the most is with the Kurds, who have been said to be the largest ethnic group in the world without a country.  I thought at first the Kurds must represent a different religion, but both they and the Turks are dominantly Sunni Muslims. One hint at why there is a “religious-based conflict” is that the Kurds are said to have been angered by the move to a secular government while they believe in the strict sharia religious laws of Islam. There is probably more to it than that, because the Turks and Kurds have been trying to exterminate one another for decades, with the Turks sometimes, but not always, getting the upper hand. The Kurdish terrorist organization called the PKK continues to extract a toll on Turks. Chapter 15 titled “The Kurdish Reality” has some disturbing information. The Kurds are said to have focused on killing teachers and the families of the men who joined the state-sponsored Village Guards. The Turks never fail to retaliate. An attempt to establish Kurdish representation resulted in the murder of a hundred party activists and imprisonment of many more.

The book describes in detail the politics of Turkey following the death of Ataturk. One central theme is the conflict between the demand by Ataturk that the country be secular and not controlled by Islamists. “Islam is the most controversial issue to divide the Turkish republic…deeper even than the ethnic Kurdish question.” The authors ask, “Can the country integrate the traditionalist views of Islam into its modernizing…? Can turkey make peace with its traditions and culture…and adopt a pragmatic form of Islam?” Those questions don’t even consider the centuries of conflict between Sunni Muslims and the Alevi (followers of Ali, the son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad) Shias.

There are disturbing societal problems in the country. Domestic violence is commonplace. One survey found that “…49 percent of women believed a man might have legitimate reasons to beat his wife, 41 percent of women admitted to having been victims of such violence, and 28 percent thought they deserved it.” Turkey had a woman named Tansu Ciller who was prime minister in 1993 to 1996. Unfortunately, she didn’t seem to be interested in women’s rights. She left office a wealthy woman and under a cloud of suspicion about corruption.

There has been an erosion of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk’s insistence that Turkey can advance only with a secular government. The current government (which came into power after the book) includes both a president and prime minister of the “Justice and Development” party. That party is said to favor Islamist views, although the party rejects that claim.

Tourists enjoying a visit to Turkey should enjoy the richness and diversity of a fascinating country while being diligent at remaining quiet about any opinions they have about religious and ethnic conflicts. They also should not attempt to smuggle drugs if they don’t want to experience the dark side of the country as portrayed in Midnight Express.