Last weeks assassination of Russia’s ambassador to Turkey appears to be part of an ongoing program to prevent the likely alliance between Russia and the Turkish state. Boldly carried out at a public art gallery, the murder was actually filmed and the gunman was able to make statements about Russian involvement in Aleppo. Amazingly, the hit man was a 22 year-old Turkish riot policeman who avoided metal detectors and shot the Ambassador – Andrey Karlov – at least eight times in the back.
As is often the case in these events, the gunman was also shot dead, preventing a direct investigation of who he may have been working with.
Here is a summary of the reaction of Russian and Turkish officials from Global Research:
(Excerpt)
“The Turkish foreign minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu, stated that, ““Both Turkey and Russia realize that the attack was aimed at damaging bilateral relations and compromising the achievements that have been made recently. Turkey and Russia should not let the organizers’ of this crime reach their goals. We should find out who is behind this heinous crime. We can succeed if we work together…the masterminds of the Russian ambassador’s murder wanted to harm the Russian-Turkish relations, but Moscow and Ankara should not allow terrorists to achieve this goal.”
The Russian foreign minister, Serge Lavrov, stated similarly,
“The main aim of the assassination of the Russian ambassador to Turkey is the desire to undermine the process of normalization of Russian-Turkish relations and to prevent the effective fight of the two countries against terrorism in Syria. We are confident that the main aim of those who plotted this barbaric thing was to undermine the process of normalization of relations between Russia and Turkey in order to prevent effective fight against terrorism in Syria.”
But we can be sure that it will not stop developing relations between Turkey and Russia. If the Turks convince the Russians they had nothing to do with it, that it was connected to the FETO organisation whose leader Fetullah Gulen is in the United States, living under American protection, though he has denied it, or to the terrorist organisations they have been supporting in Syria, and the western intelligence and military services supporting them, then it is likely to push Russia, Turkey and Iran, closer together against a common enemy. And, indeed, this appears to be the case as those three nations went ahead with talks in Moscow on Tuesday to forge a way ahead to a peaceful resolution of the war in Syria.
But the willingness to assassinate an ambassador means that we can expect the US and its allies to develop new actions in Syria against the Syrian government and Russia and their allies, just as they have reverted back to new sanctions against Iran in violation of their agreement with Iran.”
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Indeed, The Russians are becoming convinced that the exiled Fetullah Gulen movement is the “cats paw” behind the hit:
(Excerpt)
“Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu told his U.S. counterpart John Kerry that both Russia and Turkey are aware of Gülen’s involvement in the assassination of the Russian envoy. The two ministers had a phone call upon Kerry’s request, diplomatic sources said on Tuesday.
The sources said that the top diplomat told Kerry “Both Turkey and Russia know the Gülenist Terror Cult (FETÖ) was behind Russian envoy Andrey Karlov’s assassination.” The ambassador was killed during a speech at an exhibition in Ankara on Monday by a gunman dressed as a guard.
FETÖ is run by a fugitive named Fetullah Gülen who lives in self-imposed exile in the foothills of the Pocono Mountains in rural Pennsylvania. Through his middlemen and militants embedded in the key institutions of the state and the military, the top terrorist tried to overthrow Turkey’s democratically elected governments in the December 17-25 operations and the July 15 military coup bid, which both failed.”
Xinhua news service carries this comment from Putin’s recent press conference:
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2016-12/23/c_135928670.htm
“MOSCOW, Dec. 23 (Xinhua) — The recent murder of Russian Ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov was an attempt to worsen Russian-Turkish ties, but in vain, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Friday at his annual year-end press conference.
Putin said he had once been skeptical about the statement that the downing of a Russian jet in November 2015 was not ordered by top Turkish officials, but organized by people targeted at destroying Russian-Turkish relations, but he changed his mind after Monday’s assassination of the Russian ambassador.
He believed that there has been “deep penetration” of destructive elements in Turkish state structures, including law enforcement organs and armed forces.
However, “we understand the importance of Russian-Turkish relations, and we will strive to develop them by all means,” he added.
Karlov was shot dead by a Turkish policeman on Monday at an art exhibition ceremony in the Turkish capital of Ankara.
Russia, Turkey and Iran agreed to jointly act on Syria, one day after Karlov’s murder. The relationship between Moscow and Ankara has taken a turn for the better from the stalemate resulting from Turkey’s downing a Russian warplane on Nov. 24, 2015.”
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Let’s take another look at the Gulenist movement, which has largely been run by the CIA and has successfully infiltrated tens of thousands of high positions in the Turkish government. Here is an excerpt from our August article on the failed coup in Turkey this past summer:
The Linkage Between Iran-Contra, The Boston Marathon Bombing And The Turkish Coup Attempt
August 21, 2016
The direct linkage between Iran-Contra, The Boston Marathon bombing and the recent failed Turkish coup is CIA officer Graham Fuller
By John Titus
Once again proving that CIA officers never actually retire, Graham Fuller has been caught with his hands all over the recent coup attempt in Turkey. The July 15th attempt from within the Turkish military to overthrow the government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was met by snarky comments by former Central Intelligence Agency officials. The Huffington Post reports:
“Several former spooks appearing on CNN Friday night to discuss the attempted military coup in Turkey had more than a few pointers for the seemingly amateurish military officers leading the takeover efforts. And at least one contributor seemed more disappointed in their performance than relieved that the coup has thus far failed to topple a democratically elected government.
Leading the pack was Robert Baer, a veteran former CIA officer and author ― and, apparently, a former coup participant.
Baer told CNN anchor Anderson Cooper that the Turkish coup was “not professionally done.”
“I have been involved in coups before,” he said. “They should have taken CNN Turk and closed it down the first minutes, the radio station, social media, the internet. Even if they didn’t arrest [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan, they should have taken care of all of that right at the beginning.”
Baer also revealed that he had discussed the possibility of a coup with Turkish military officers in the past few months.”
And this:
“James Woolsey, a former director of the CIA who has advocated for the hanging of National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden, offered his analysis of the Turkish coup on CNN earlier in the evening, arguing that it was a tactical failure.
“With coups, as with military operations, the plans never survive the first part of the operation,” Woolsey said. “You have to be flexible enough to change your tactics as you’re going through. And it doesn’t sound like these coup plotters had that kind of flexibility.”
While that may sound like the Agency is attempting to distance itself from the disastrous performance of the plotters, it is evident that they were involved. The motivation appears to have been Turkey’s pivot to Russia, and it has been reported that Russia and Iran provided Erdogan with intelligence that the coup was in progress.
Graham Fuller has widely been implicated in the planning and execution of the debacle, and he has a long history of screwing things up. Here is some background from Fuller’s Wikipedia page:
“State Department[edit]
Fuller joined the State Department of the United States, entering the Foreign Service for assignments in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.[7]
CIA[edit]
He served 20 years as an operations officer in the CIA. Assignments include postings in: Germany, Turkey, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, North Yemen, Afghanistan, and Hong Kong.[10] In 1982, the CIA appointed him National Intelligence Officer for Near East and South Asia.[11] In 1986, the CIA appointed him vice-chairman of the National Intelligence Council.[12][13]
Iran–Contra Affair[edit]
In 1987, Fuller was identified as the author of a 1985 study that according to the New York Times was “instrumental” in the decision of the Reagan Administration to secretly contact leaders in Iran and “eventually led to the covert sale of United States weapons to Tehran in what became the Iran–Contra affair.”[3][4] The document suggested that the Soviet Union was in position to influence Iran and that the United States might gain influence by selling arms to the country.[14] According to Fuller, he had revised his opinion as the situation developed, but though he had told Government officials, a written report on the change was not circulated.[14] Fuller denied that the original “think piece” he had prepared with Howard Teicher was “tailored … to support Administration policy.”[14]
After government[edit]
Fuller left the CIA in 1988 for the RAND Corporation, remaining as a senior political scientist until 2000.[8][10] At the RAND Corporation he wrote, among many publications, on political Islam in various countries, and on the geopolitics of the Muslim world.”
F. William Engdahl writes in “New Eastern Outlook” – “Graham E. Fuller – Where Were You On The Night Of July 15?”
(Excerpts)
“As a massive nationwide investigation by police and security forces continues inside Turkey, new damning details emerge almost daily that point to the key role of the CIA behind their Fethullah Gülen Movement (termed FETÖ for Fethullah Terrorist Organization in Turkish) and the US military. Now the Turkish media reports that none other than Gülen mentor, “former” CIA man Graham E. Fuller, along with another “former” CIA person and close Fuller associate, Henri J. Barkey, were at a luxury hotel on one of the Princes’ Islands in the Sea of Marmara, some twenty minutes from Istanbul, on the night of July 15.”
“According to the Istanbul Yeni Safak paper, on the July 15 night of the coup Henri Barkey and a group of seventeen others, mostly foreigners, met for hours in a locked room in the Splendid Palas hotel on the tourist Princes’ Island outside Istanbul and reportedly followed coup developments on TV amid their closed-door talks, according to testimony of hotel personnel. The paper cites a source from Istanbul Police’s Intelligence, Counter Terror, Cyber Crime and Criminal Units, who reported that Barkey was holding a meeting at the hotel with 17 top figures, most of them foreign nationals, on July 15, the day of the failed coup attempt in Turkey.
According to the hotel management, Barkey had held a “meeting that lasted hours until the morning on July 16 in a special room. They have been following the coup attempt over TV channels,” the hotel personnel told police.
Graham E. Fuller too?
Other reports from well-informed Turkish independent journalists say that among the members present with Barkey the night of the coup was former CIA senior officer and mentor of Fethullah Gülen, Graham E. Fuller, former CIA Station Chief in Turkey. That would be no surprise. Fuller and Barkey are both old Langley CIA associates. Both have long involvement with affairs Turkish. They even co-authored a book, Turkey’s Kurdish Question.”
Istanbul-based Yeni Safak News confirms with more information:
“Eight soldiers, who fled Turkey after the abortive coup attempt, actually intended to help the ex-CIA chair Graham Fuller from Istanbul where he was coordinating the coup plot on July 15, an AK Party MP said.
“They were trying to whisk Fuller away that night. The helicopter was also going to take him to Greece, not only the pro-coup soldiers,” Orhan Deligöz, an AK Party deputy in Erzurum, the eastern province which is hometown of Fetullah Gülen, wanted for forming and running terror organisation.
Deligöz has given insight into what Fuller had intended to do in Istanbul before his unplanned departure from Turkey. “On that night, Fuller was holding a meeting with experts at the hotel he was staying. He even had requested technical equipment installed to make a speech to the United States via a video link. If the coup attempt had reached its aim, he would have contacted the States for discussions over the pro-coup era and unfolding events following the coup.”
Graham Fuller, the former CIA station chief in Istanbul, is said to have fled to Turkey a few days before the failed coup plot and spent his days in Splendid Palace Hotel in Büyükada, also known as Prinkipo, the largest of the Princes’ islands near İstanbul. Fuller had reportedly checked into the hotel with a passport issued in the name of Henry Barkey.
Deligöz believes that U.S.-based terrorist Fetullah Gülen, cloaking himself as a Muslim cleric, has been collaborating with CIA for nearly five decades. “In 1964, Fuller was assigned as CIA station chief in Istanbul. Two years later, Gülen began establishing his religious community. In later years, Gülen has been given a residence permit in the States with the help of Fuller,” the MP explained. “This is not a newly-planned project, his followers had been training for this purpose since the 1960s.”
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As in the title of the article above, there is linkage to Iran-Contra and the Boston Marathon Bombing all through the same individual, the control officer for Fethullah Gulen – Graham Fuller. Please go to the link above for further information.
There is no doubt that the Russians know who was really behind the assassination, clearly meant to strain Russo-Turkish relations. It looks like that plan failed.
