Analysis: Why Recep Tayyip Erdogan is coming down hard

A crackdown on Turkey's failed military coupists could be exactly the wrong strategy for president Recep Tayyip Erdogan to employ in dealing with opposition to his rule.

All four opposition parties have condemned the coup, which Erdogan claims was organised by former ally Fethullah Gulen, a self-exiled moderately-fundamentalist cleric with a large following who broke with Erdogan in 2013 over corruption. Gulen has condemned the coup and denied involvement.

Erdogan has called the coup "treason", called for Gulen's extradition to Turkey from the US and launched a purge of the armed forces and justice department of alleged "Gulenists", although thousands had already been dismissed or prosecuted in 2014 when schools and charities run by Gulen's Hizmet movement were shut down. Fresh purges now could drive Gulen's supporters underground.

Although prime minister Binali Yildirim has promised power-sharing between the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and opposition parties, the government could alienate them by making a clean sweep of dissidents.

This would exacerbate the rift between Erdogan’s opponents and the AKP. He has come under fire for trying to “Islamise” Turkey’s secular state and shift from a parliamentary to a presidential system with himself as chief executive.

After the discovery of an alleged coup in 2007, Erdogan detained, put on trial and jailed scores of senior officers but clearly did not end dissent.

Erdogan could dangerously weaken the armed forces by mounting a purge. This would lead to the estrangement of the secular “Kemalist” opposition parties, which have been marginalised by the AKP’s parliamentary majorities. This could widen divisions already created by his increasingly autocratic rule.

European sector

The opposition parties represent the traditional secular elite who identify with the European sector of Turkey west of the Bosphorus and reject Erdogan’s agenda, which appeals to the eastern Asian Anatolian hinterland, accounting for 97 per cent of the country’s territory and half of its population.

During the 1923-2002 reign of the west, the east got short shrift. Secular governments discriminated against devout conservatives in the working and lower middle classes and the provinces. When Erdogan called on his supporters to go to the streets and foil the coup, these were the people who did his bidding.

Erdogan has tipped the balance in favour of the east, polarising the country. As his party has had an almost automatic majority in parliament since 2002, he has been able to erode secularism by introducing compulsory religious classes in schools, building mosques and boosting the influence of Muslim clerics.

To Turkey’s worsening divisions, Erdogan has added rifts over two avoidable conflicts embroiling the armed forces and prompting senior officers, including generals and the former chief of air staff, to lead the coup attempt.

Last year Erdogan ended a three-year ceasefire and re-ignited the 30-year conflict between Ankara and Turkey's 20 per cent Kurdish minority, which seeks recognition of Kurdish rights and autonomy. He has been accused of using the "Kurdish threat" and "Kurdish terrorism" to strengthen his party's bid to regain its parliamentary majority in the November election.

Islamic State

Erdogan has also been criticised for funnelling foreign jihadis, weapons and funds to

Syria

with the aim of replacing the government of president Bashar al-Assad with a Muslim Brotherhood-dominated regime. This policy has led to the take-over by Islamic State and al-Qaeda of large swathes of territory in Syria and

Iraq

and the establishment in Turkey of Islamic State cells, which have carried out deadly bombings in Ankara, Istanbul and provincial cities.

To cope with media criticism, Erdogan shut down television channels, took over newspapers and prosecuted journalists, muzzling the press and eliciting charges that he has been demolishing Turkey’s faltering democracy.