The road is full of vehicles--tractors, horse carts, sawed-off buses with sagging rear ends, yellow taxis, overloaded motorcycles with sidecars--some carrying entire families with their goats. Everything is square and grey. The road and sidewalks are broken, dirty and patched. Unlike the deathly grey of the towns, the hills beyond are a rich chocolate-brown. The water is a sickly green-blue-black. The sky is the color of slate, with one enormous white cloud stretching off toward the hills in the distance. Acres of cheap boxlike housing sprout from the plains.
DP has come to the cradle of civilization, the uppermost tip of the fertile crescent, now torn apart by ethnic, political, tribal and religious strife. We are determined to get at the heart of this land, in order to understand why so much of the world is a dangerous place.
We stop to buy gas at a new petrol station. The attendant is baffled by our credit card. I run the card and sign the bill for him.
We drive past scattered groves of figs and pistachios. Trucks carry giant pomegranates. We are following the Iraqi pipeline on a highway originally built by the U.S., formally known as the "Silk Road."
Cheap Iraqi diesel, or masot, sells for 10,000 TL (Turkish lira or lire) a liter. It is brought from Iraq by trucks fitted with crude, rusty tanks.
As we go east, the fertile soil becomes fields of boulders and sharp rocks. The hills are ribbed and worn by the constant foraging of goats. Not much has changed here in 1000 years.
At Play in the Fields of the Warlords
We drive through the nameless streets of Sevirek, a small town that serves as the center of the Bucak fiefdom. In this age of enlightenment, there are still dark corners in the world where ancient traditions persist. We are in the domain of the Bucaks, an age-old feudal area in war-torn southeastern Turkey.
As we drive along the cobblestones, we notice that there are no doors or windows in the stone houses, only steel shutters and gates. We ask the way to the warlord's house. Men pause and then point vaguely in the general direction.
We pull up to the Turkish version of a pizza joint. From inside, two men in white smocks eye us apprehensively. The fat one recognizes Coskun and walks out to our car when we call out for directions.
We drive up a narrow cobblestone alleyway just wide enough for a car to pass. There's a Renault blocking the way. Getting out of the car, we notice for the first time that there is a man behind a wall of sandbags pointing an AK-47 in our direction. The large house was built 200 years ago and is lost in the maze of medieval streets and stone walls.
We politely explain who we are and why we have come. We had telephoned earlier and were told that no one was at home--an appropriate response for someone who has survived frequent assassination attempts from terrorists, bandits and the army.
Out from a side door comes a large man with a pistol stuffed into his ammunition-heavy utility vest. He flicks his head at me and looks at Coskun inquisitively. He hears our story. He recognizes Coskun from a year ago, when the photojournalist stayed with the warlord for three days. He smiles and gives Coskun the double-buss kiss, the traditional greeting for men in Turkey. He then grabs me by the shoulders, does the same, and then welcomes us inside. We walk up one flight of stairs and find ourselves in an outside courtyard. We are joined by two more bodyguards. They're older, more grooved, hard looking. Most of one man's chin has been blown off his face; it tells us that we should probably just sit and smile until we get to know each other a little better. We sit on the typical tiny wooden stools men use in Turkey. These have the letters DYP branded into them, the name of the political party with which the warlord has aligned himself.
The bodyguards stare into our eyes, say nothing and watch our hands when we reach for a cigarette. It seems that Sedat Bucak, the clan leader, is out in the fields, but his brother Ali is here. We are offered chai, or tea, and cigarettes. The bodyguards do not drink tea, or move, but they light cigarettes. One of the bodyguards sucks on his cigarette as if to suffocate it.
When Ali finally emerges, he is not at all what one would expect a warlord to look like. The men rise and bow. Ali is dressed in shiny black loafers, blue slacks, a plum-colored striped shirt and a dapper windbreaker. He looks like an Iranian USC grad. That he and his brother are the absolute rulers of 100,000 people and in control of an army of 10,000 very tough men is hard to imagine.
A Drive in the Country
Not quite sure why we're here, he offers to show us a gazelle that he was given as a gift by one of his villages. The gazelle is kept in a stone enclosure and flies around the pen, leaping through doors and windows. We ask if we can visit with Sedat. Ali says, "Sure," and repeats that he is out in the fields.
Realizing they would be embarking outside of their compound, they bring out an arsenal of automatic weapons from another room. Ali and his bodyguards get in the Renault and drive down the streets with the barrels of their guns sticking out the windows. Strangely, nobody seems to mind or notice. Even the soldiers and police wave as they drive by.
Following close behind, we are brought to their fortress, an imposing black stone compound that dominates the countryside. It is a simple square structure, each wall about 100 feet long. A central house rises to about 40 feet. The walls are made from kaaba, or black stone and are hand-chiseled from the surrounding boulders into squares, filled with special cement to make them bulletproof. One wall is over 20 feet tall.
The men appear nervous when I photograph the compound. This building is intended for combat. For now, it serves as a simple storage place for tractors and grain. From the top, one feels like a king overlooking his land and his subjects, which is exactly what the Bucaks do when they are up here. From this point, we can only see 50 miles to the mountains in the north, but we cannot see the rest of their 200 miles of land to the south and west of us.
We continue our caravan along a dusty road past simple villages and houses. The people here are dirt-poor. They subsist off the arid land. The children run out into the road to wave at us as we drive by.
Ali stops near a field where men, women and children are picking cotton. Cotton needs water, and there's plenty of it. It also needs cheap labor, another commodity of which the Bucaks have plenty.
The people stand still, as we get out of our cars. Ali tells them to continue working, while we take pictures. They resume picking, but their eyes never leave us.
The men decide this would be an opportune time to show off the capability of their arsenal. For one nauseating moment, I have the impression they intend to gun down this entire village. Yet it is target practice that Ali has in mind. Boys will be boys. So we then start plinking away at rocks, using all sorts of automatic weapons. We aim for a pile of rocks about 400 yards away. We are only aware of little puffs of smoke, as we hear the sound of ricochets as the bullets hit the black boulders. Ali is more interested in our video camera, so he plays with that while we play with his weapons.
When boredom sets in, we continue our journey in search of Sedat. We finally locate him about three miles away. We know it's him because of the small army that surrounds the man. His bodyguards are not happy at all to see us. We are instantly engulfed by his men poised in combat stances. Ali introduces us, but we still have to state our case. Sedat recognizes Coskun, but instead of the kiss, we get a Western-style handshake. We introduce ourselves to his dozen or so bodyguards. They do not come forward, so we reach for their hands and shake them. It's awkward, unnerving. They never let their eyes stray from ours.
Ahmed, a chiseled sunburned man who wears green camouflage fatigues, seems to be the chief bodyguard. He appears to like us the least. He wanders over to our car and starts rummaging through the luggage and junk on the backseat. I deliberately put my stuff there so that it would be easy to confirm that I am a writer. He picks up a Fielding catalog and starts flipping through the pages. When he sees my picture next to one of my books, he points and then looks at me.
The Feudal Lord
We chat with Sedat. He is eager to present a positive image to the outside world. We have brought a copy of an interview he had just done with a Turkish magazine. In it, he proposes linking up with the right-wing nationalist party and, together he says, they could end the Kurdish problem. Coskun suggests that such a comment could be taken as a bid for civil war. Sedat says, "Hey, it's only an interview. But I'm still learning." We suggest getting some shots of him driving his tractor. He is happy driving his tractor. But out here there are few other farmers who drive a tractor with an AK-47-armed bodyguard riding behind on the spreader.
Turkey has been at war with the PKK, or Kurdish Workers Party, since 1984. The Kurds want a separate homeland within Turkey, but Turkey insists they possess all the rights they need for now. The Turkish government is correct, but it doesn't stop the PKK from killing, maiming, executing and torturing their own people. The Bucaks are Kurds and the sworn enemies of the PKK, who are also Kurds. The difference is that the Bucaks have essentially carved out their own kingdom and even managed to integrate themselves into the political process in an effective, albeit primitive, way. They use votes rather than bullets to curry favor. They are also left alone by the government. They pay no taxes and have complete control over what goes on in their ancestral lands.
The Bucak family has been in Sevirek for more than 400 years. They are Kurds, but more specifically, they're from the Zaza as opposed to the Commagene branch of the Kurds. They also speak a different language from the Commagene. They have always controlled a large part of southeastern Turkey by force and eminent domain. Their subjects give them 25 percent of the crops they grow, and, in return, they receive services and are protected by a private army of about 10,000 men. Many other groups have tried unsuccessfully to force them off their land. In times of all-out warfare, all the subjects are expected to chip in and grab their rifles. The Bucaks have wisely aligned themselves with the current ruling political party, the DYP. Realizing that the Bucaks can deliver 100,000 votes goes a long way toward successful lobbying and handshaking in Ankara, the capital of Turkey. Sedat Bucak is head of the clan, at the age of 40. A warrior and farmer by trade, he is now a sharp and shrewd politician. If he's killed, his younger brother Ali will take the helm. Ali is only 24.
Sevirek has long been a battleground. The city was completely closed to all outsiders, including the army, between 1970 and 1980. During this period, there was intense street-to-street fighting between the Bucaks and the PKK. Thousands of people were killed; the PKK moved on to choose easier victims. The Bucaks cannot stray eastward into PKK-held territory without facing instant death.
The countryside the Bucaks rule consists of rolling plains, similar to Montana or Alberta. This is to the benefit of the Ataturk dam project, the fifth-largest dam project in the world.
Sedat can never travel without his bodyguards; neither can Ali. The bodyguards match the personalities of the brothers. Sedat's bodyguards are cold, ruthless killers. They're picked for the bravery and ferocity they showed in the last 10 years of warfare. Ali's bodyguards are younger, friendlier, but just as lethal.
They pack automatic weapons: German G-3s, M-16s and AK-47s. They each also carry at least one handgun as well as four to six clips for the machine guns and three to four clips for their pistols. Ali and Sedat also carry weapons at all times. Their choice of weapons also reflects their personalities. Ali packs a decorative stainless steel 9mm Ruger, and Sedat carries a drab businesslike Glock 17.
Some of the bodyguards, such as Nouri, wear the traditional Kurdish garb of checkered headpiece and baggy wool pants. The salvars appear to be too hot to wear on the sunburned plains. One of the guards explains that they work like a bellows and pump air when you walk, an example of something that works. Others wear cheap suits. Some wear golf shirts; still others wear military apparel.
While we are taking pictures of Sedat on his Massey Ferguson, the guards bring out the gnass, or sniper rifle (gnass is Arabic for sniper). It is an old Russian Dragunaov designed to kill men at 400-800 meters. When I walk down to take pictures, Ahmed, the cagey one, slides the rifle into the car and shakes his head. He knows that a sniper rifle is not for self-defense but is used for one thing only, as they explain to us, "With this rifle, you can kill a man before he knows he is dead."
Many of the men have a Turkish flag on the butts of their clips. One bodyguard offers me a rolled cigarette from an old silver tin. It tastes of the sweet, mild tobacco from Ferat. We both have a smoke. I open my khaki shirt and show him my Black Dog T-shirt, a picture of a dog doing his thing. He laughs: Seems as if we're finally warming up this crowd.
The younger brother of Ali's bodyguard asks me if I am licensed to use guns. He likes the way I shoot. I try to explain that, in America, you need a permit to own a gun and that people are trained or licensed. He looks at me quizzically. It's no use. I doubt they would understand a society that lets you own a gun without knowing how to use it.
We blast off some more rounds. Ali's bodyguards are having fun. We then bring out the handguns. We are all bad shots. Trying to hit a Pepsi can, no one comes close. Then one of the bodyguards marches up to the can and "executes" it with a smile. It is a chilling scene, and I'm glad it's only an aluminum can.
While Ali's bodyguards clown around with us, Sedat's bodyguards never move, or even take their hands off their guns. Nouri has his AK-47 tucked so perfectly into the crook of his arm, it is hard to imagine him not sleeping with it.
After chatting with Sedat and nervously entertaining his bodyguards, we head back into town. There, we're taken to lunch at Ali Bucaks restaurant and gas station. We eat in Ali's office. The bodyguards act as waiters, serving us shepherd's salads and kabobs with yogurt to drink. They serve us quietly and respectfully. They eat with one hand on their guns. The SSB radio crackles nonstop, as various people check in. We talk to Ali about life in general. Can he go anywhere without his guards? No. What about when he goes to Ankara on the plane? They have to put their guns in plastic bags and pick them up when they land. What about in Ankara? They change cars a lot. Does he like his role? He doesn't have a choice. Does he like feudalism? No, but he doesn't have a choice. The government does not provide services or protect their people, so they must do it themselves. Who would take the sick to the hospitals? Who would take care of the widows? Since power is passed along family lines, it is his duty.
As we eat, a storm comes in from Iraq. Lightning flashes and thunder cracks. We talk about politics, baseball cards and America. They are all familiar with America because every Turkish home and business has a television blaring most of the day and night. The number-one show is the soap, "The Young and the Restless," which comes on at 6:15 every night.
Sedat is a soft-spoken man--about 5 feet 6 inches tall, sunburned and suffering from a mild thyroid condition. He wears a faded green camouflage baseball hat, Levis and running shoes, as your neighbor might. He also carries a Glock 17 in a hand-rubbed leather holster. It is unsnapped for a quicker draw. Maybe not quite like your neighbor! He is never more than 15 feet from his bodyguards. Men drawn from his army as personal bodyguards have the lean, sunburned look of cowboys. He comes from an immediate family of 500 Bucaks. They make their money by growing cotton and other crops they sell in Adana.
It is hard to believe that this gentle, slightly nervous man and his forces are the only ones in Turkey who here been able to beat the PKK at their own game.
For now, everything is well in the kingdom. The dam will bring water for crops; the PKK is now concentrating on other areas; the people are happy, and Sedat is now a big-wheel politician. There is much to be said for feudalism. I offer to send him some of my books so that he can read about the rest of the world. He thinks this is a great idea. But he doesn't speak or read English.
DP Fashion Tip
Mekap is the brand of sneakers preferred by the PKK. They can be identified by the red star on a yellow badge. If you ask at a shoe store for Mekaps, you will get a very strange reaction; the merchant will assume you're from the police and testing him.
We drive from Sevirek to Diyarbakir. The city of Diyarbakir is built on a great basalt plain and has 5.5-km long walls made from this ominous looking black stone. The triple walls and functional look betrays its origins as an ancient military outpost. Today, the 16 keeps and 5 gates have barbed wire, sand bags and machine gun nests. We will pass from a feudal kingdom to a large, bustling city that is the flashpoint for much of the violence that grips Turkey. We realize as we drive down the lonely roads that we are leaving the protection of the Bucaks and will soon be in PKK territory. If we were to be caught with Ali's address, we'd be killed. If the PKK had any knowledge of our contact with the Bucaks, we'd be instant enemies.
The PKK control the countryside and, it is said, the whole of eastern Turkey at night. It is not a particularly large group, perhaps some 8000 soldiers trained in small camps, but they're armed with small weapons--AK-47s and RPGs and a few grenade launchers. They travel in groups of 12 men and can muster a sizable force of about 200 soldiers for major ambushes. Their leader lives in the Bekáa Valley in southern Lebanon, under the protection of the Syrian government. He calls for an independent Kurdistan, which Saddam Hussein has given him by default in northern Iraq. But he wants more. He wants a sizable chunk of Iran and Turkey as well.
Despite the numerous checkpoints and military presence in the area, there has been little success in defeating the PKK. The Turkish Army has set up large special ops teams and commando units that specialize in ambushes, foot patrols and other harassment activities. But once you see the topography of eastern Turkey, you realize that you could hide an army 1000 times the size of the PKK. The terrain is riddled with caves, redoubt-shaped cliffs, boulders, canyons and every conceivable type of nook and cranny. It is easy terrain to move in, with few natural or man-made obstructions.
The PKK go into the villages at night to demand cooperation. If villagers do not cooperate, they are shot. In some cases, entire families, including babies, are executed. The PKK follow a Marxist-Leninist doctrine and play out their guerrilla tactics similar to the former Viet Cong or the Khmer Rouge. The PKK also likes to kidnap foreigners for money and publicity, and they like to execute schoolteachers and government officials. Special ops teams report to the civil authorities and to the military. Turkey considers the PKK as criminals and is reluctant to use civil law and superficial civilian forces against it.
Turkey has been in a state of war for 10 years now--that being the war the military is waging within its own borders.
The Test Pilot
We decide to spend an evening with a former leader and trainer of special ops teams. Hakan is now Turkey's only test pilot. In Turkey, this doesn't mean flying new prototype planes; it means flying out to helicopters downed by the rebels, making repairs and then flying or sling-loading them out.
Hakan lives in a high-rise building, guarded by three soldiers, barbed wire and fortifications against attack. His apartment is modern and well furnished. There are no traditional rugs, just black lacquer furniture complete with a fully stocked bar. Except for the barbed wire, we could be in Florida, which is where he trained as a Sikorsky Blackhawk pilot.
He has a two-month-old baby and is looking forward to being transferred back to western Turkey. His contempt for the PKK is obvious, having killed many of its members and having many PKK rounds aimed at him. He feels that the PKK is winning in this part of the country, but there will be no victory. The PKK problem cannot be solved militarily. It must be solved economically, by making the Kurds the beneficiaries of government help and giving them a stronger political voice. Killing terrorists is merely his job. He can't wait to get transferred out of Dyabakir. His wife plays with their baby on the floor. The baby never stops smiling and laughing. I think of the barbed wire and nervous soldiers downstairs. He can offer no political insights: PKK are people who he is paid to fight. When he is in Ankara, he will occupy himself with other things.
Eastern Turkey is the poorest and least developed part of the nation. Most educated people come from western Turkey. Most of the soldiers, politicians and professional classes are from western Turkey. The government sends these people to eastern Turkey for a minimum of two years of service. Most can't wait to get back to Istanbul or Ankara. Eastern Turkey has much closer affiliations with Armenia, Iran, Iraq, Azerbaijan, Syria and Georgia. Western Turkey has the ocean as a border. Eastern Turkey is rife with dissension and must deal with its warlike and poor neighbors. Iraqi, Iranian, Armenian and Syrian terrorists actively fight the government and each other. Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed fundamentalist group, hates the PKK. The PKK hates the government. The militia hates all rebel agitators, and the army and police clean up the messes left behind.
The Governor
I decide that we need another point of view. We go to Siirt about 40 km from the Syrian border and directly in the heart of PKK territory. Siirt was once a great city during the Abbasid Caliphate with the remnants of 12th and 13th century mosques. We are definitely in harm's way, since the PKK travel from Syria into the mountains behind us. Just down the road is the military outpost of Erub, designed to control a critical mountain road that leads down toward the Syrian border. There is another reason why we have chosen this tiny town. Coskun was born and raised in Siirt. I suggest that we go and chat up the governor and get his point of view.
Coskun is somewhat hesitant about meeting with the governor of Siirt province because he has a natural (and well-founded) aversion to politicians. But since we will be traveling directly into and through the war zone, we want to be sure that when we get stopped by the military we can drop names, flash the governor's card and ensure at least a moment of hesitation before we are shot as spies or terrorists.
As we pass the heavy security of the Siirt administration building, it seems that the governor is in. His bodyguards are quite perturbed that these strangers have walked right in and asked for an audience. They quietly talk into their walkie-talkies and stand between us and the soundproof door that leads into the governor's office. The governor takes his time to put on his game face and finally invites us in. It is kisses all around, chocolates, tea and cigarettes. We thank him and tell him our business. We are here to see what is going on in Turkey. He is proud to have us in his region. Two of his aids sit politely on the couch. The governor speaks in long, melodious, booming soliloquies that, when translated into English, come out as "We are maligned by the press" or "There is no danger here." Finally, they ask me what I have seen and what I think of their country. I tell them the truth. The people here are extraordinary in their friendship and warmth, but we are in a war zone. He launches into a response that boils down to "It's safe here, and we want you to tell your readers to come to Turkey and Siirt province." He then tells us of the attractions that await the lucky traveler: canyons as deep as the Grand Canyon, white-water rafting, hiking, culture, history, etc. We say great, give us a helicopter and we'll go for a spin tomorrow.
He goes one further. He invites us to dinner that night so that he can spend more time with us. Coskun wants to kick me, as I accept. Later that night we go to the government building for dinner. Joining us will be the head of police, the head of the military, three subgovernors and a couple of aides.
We pass through security and are ushered into the dining room. Sitting uncomfortably, we make small talk while a television blares away against the wall. As we sit down to dinner, we indicate that we are curious and ask the military commander just what is going on. Everyone is dressed in a suit and tie or uniform. Coskun and I do the best we can with our dusty khakis. Either because the room is hot or they are just being polite, they take their jackets off for dinner. The governor carries a silver 45 tucked into his waistband. His formal gun? As the men sit down to dinner, something strikes me as funny. Coskun and I are the only ones not packing a gun for dinner.
The dinner is excellent: course after course of shish kebob, salads and other delicacies washed down with raki (a strong anisette liquor) and water. The taste of the raki brings back memories of the hard crisp taste of Cristal aquadiente, the preferred drink of the Colombian drug trade. Throughout dinner, the head of police is interrupted by a walkie-talkie-carrying messenger who hands him a piece of paper. He makes a few comments to the side, and the man disappears. Every five to 10 minutes the man returns, the police chief makes a quiet comment, and he goes away.
Meanwhile, the governor continues to extol the beauty of his country--nonstop. He is the center of attention, simply because no one else is speaking. The others nod, smile or laugh. Most of their attention is on the television blaring in the corner. Suddenly, the red phone next to the television begins ringing. The call is answered by the attendant. It is for the colonel. The colonel excuses the interruption and speaks in low tones. The police chief puts his walkie-talkie on the table. It becomes apparent that the base is under attack by a group of PKK of unknown size. Throughout dinner, the conversation steers toward politics as it must. Like many countries, there are two parallel worlds here: the world of administrators, occupiers and government, then the world of the dispossessed--the people who till the soil, who build their houses with their own hands, who bury their dead in the same ground that yields them their crops. Tonight and every night, that world is ruled by the PKK, Dev Sol, Armenian terrorists, Hezbollah and bandits. At dusk, the world is plunged into fear, ruled by armed bands of men that are neither chosen nor wanted by the ordinary people. At dawn, the country is back in the hands of the government, the people and the light. During our conversation, there is no right and no wrong, only an affirmation that each side believes it is in the right.
The red phone continues to ring, and the little pieces of paper continue to be brought up to the police chief. The police chief is now speaking directly into his walkie-talkie. Meanwhile, the governor continues to regale us with stories about Siirt. As we eat course after course, I am offered cigarettes by at least three to four people at a time. Doing my best to accommodate my hosts, I eat, smoke and drink the sharp raki, all the time keeping one ear on the governor's conversation and the constant mumbled conversations being carried out on the phone and the walkie-talkie.
The governor is very proud of the tie he wore especially for me--a pattern of Coca-Cola bottles. He brings in his young daughters to meet me. They are shy, pretty and very proud of their English. We chat about life in Siirt, and I realize that they are virtually prisoners in the governor's compound. The governor tells us of a road we should take to enjoy the scenery, a winding scenic road to Lice via Kocakoy. Finally, the colonel is spending so much time on the phone that he excuses himself. The police chief is visibly agitated but is now speaking nonstop on the walkie-talkie. Messages continue to arrive.
The television is now featuring swimsuit-clad lovelies and has captured the attention of the governor's aides and his subgovernors. As the dinner winds down, we retire outside to have coffee. I am presented with a soft wool blanket woven in Siirt. We have a brief exchange of speeches, and I notice that the colonel and police chief have now joined us. I ask them what all the commotion was about, and they mention that it was a minor incident that has been handled. The governor reminds us to tell people of the beauty of this place, the friendliness of the Turkish people and the people of Siirt.
As we prepare to go, they wrap my blanket in today's newspaper. Smack dead center is a full-color photograph of a blood-soaked corpse of a man who has been executed by the Dev Sol terrorist group for being an informer.
The next day, there is no helicopter waiting for us. When we inquire as to its whereabouts, we are told that it was needed to do a body count from the attack the night before. We ask the blue-berated special ops soldier what the best way is to see the countryside. He assumes that we must be important, and, instead of telling us to get lost, he carefully reviews our options. As for the road we want to take into the mountains, he informs us that it is heavily mined and would have to be cleared before we could attempt a crossing. In any case, we would need an armored car and an escort of soldiers and probably a tank. We ask about the helicopter, which would be safer, but we will need to wait until he can get a gunship to accompany us.
A Place in Time
We figure the only sightseeing we are going to do today is on foot. Coskun reminisces with his first employer, a gentle man who puts out a tiny newspaper with a 19th-century offset press and block type. He has broken his arm, so he apologizes on the back page for the paper being so small. Everyday he laboriously pecks out the local news with one finger using an old Remington typewriter; he then reads his copy, marks it up, and hands it to the eager teenagers who sort through the dirty trays of lead type. He has a choice between two photo-engraved pictures that sit in a worn old tray. One is the governor, the other is the president of Turkey. When the type is hand-set, they laboriously run off a couple of hundred copies for the dwindling number of loyal readers. I leave Coskun with his old friend.
Siirt is a dusty, poor Kurdish town, with a history of being occupied by everyone from Alexander to the Seljuks to the Ottomans. Some of the people are fair-skinned, blonde and blue-eyed. Others have the hard Arabic look of the south; while still others have the round heads and bald spots of the Turks. Siirt is a happy town, with the children contentedly playing in the muddy streets. As I walk around the town, the children begin to tag along with me. All are eager to try out their words of English. I urge them to teach me Kurdish. They point at houses, dogs, people, and chatter away, "Where come you from?" and "Hello mister, what eeze your name?" I wonder where I would ever need to use Kurdish. Some visitors say Siirt looks like a poorly costumed bible story. Here and there along the broken streets are ancient houses with tapered walls; many people still use the streets as sewers. Goats, cows and chickens wander the streets. Near the mosque, the less fortunate goats are sold and then slaughtered on the spot. Donkeys sit patiently. Men physically pull me over to where they are sitting and demand that we have tea. I realize it would take me years if I stopped and had tea with everyone who wanted to chat. I begin to respect the delicate but strong social web that holds this country together. Soldiers, fighters, rebels, farmers, politicians, police all offer us hospitality, tea and a cigarette. The tiny parcels of information and face-to-face encounters transmit and build an understanding of what is going on, who is going where and why.
In every shop a television blares. Western programs and news shows constantly bombard these people with images that do not fit into their current world. At 6:10 "The Young and the Restless," dubbed in Turkish, captures the entire population. It is typically Turkish that they would treat the TV like a visitor, never shutting it up and quietly waiting for their turn to speak. I can only imagine that the blatant American and Western European images are as familiar and comforting to the older generation as MTV's "The Grind" is to us. As with all small rural towns around the world, the young people are moving to the big cities. The future is colliding with the past.
They're Your Modern Stone Age Family
We decide not to hang around and wait for the helicopter and the helicopter gunship to be arranged. Instead, we decide to drive into the countryside, where the army has little control. Along the way, we stop in a little-known troglodyte village called Hassankeyf. This was once the 12th century capital of the Artukids, but today, it is a little visited curiosity. Here, Coskun knows an old lady who lives in a cave. This historic area will be underwater when the massive hydroelectric dam is completed. Hassankeyf could be a set from "The Flintstones." The winding canyon is full of caves that go up either side, creating a cave-dwellers high-rise development. Far up in the highest cave is the last resident of this area. The lady claims to be 110-years old. My guess is that she is closer to 80. But it probably doesn't matter, since in this land, she could be older than Methuselah and have seen nothing change. We climb up to chat with her, while down below the golden rays of the sun illuminate the Sassouk mosque. Across the canyon are the ruins of a Roman-era monastery. This was once a remote outpost for the Romans.
She doesn't seem pleased to see us. In a grouchy manner, she invites us into her cave. The lady lives alone with a cat and her donkey. The donkey has his own cave carved cleanly and laboriously out of the soft limestone.
The cave where the old woman lives leads back into a rear cave, where she makes her bed on straw and carpets. The roof is covered with a thick greasy layer of soot from the small fire she uses for cooking. She says she is ill and needs medicine. We have brought her a bar of chocolate but we do not have any medicine with us. We give her some money but realize she is days away from any drugstore and her only method of transport is her donkey or a ride from one of the villagers.
People from across the steep valley yell and wave at us. They do not get many visitors. We take pictures of the lady. She seems happy to have someone to talk to, and, after her initial grumpiness, she offers us some flat bread. It crunches with the dirt and gravel baked into it. We smile and say it is good.
As the sun sets further, the ancient ambience is broken by the loud thumping and hoarse whistling scream of a Cobra gunship returning to Siirt. This was probably our escort, but we are glad to be sitting here in the cool golden dusk in a cave, in a place that will soon be erased off the map.
We have to leave. Travel at night is not safe. The PKK control this area and the military will fire at anything that moves on the roads at night. We must make it to the Christian town of Mardil, or as the locals call it Asyriac, before it gets completely dark. The old lady wishes us well. The Christians who live in the town of Mardil speak the language of Jesus: Aramaic. Strange that we are also in the land of the Yezidi, the religion that prays to Satan. We are told the PKK do not attack Asyriac because of their ties to Assad. Here, we will spend the night with some people who hold the honor of having the most dangerous profession in east Turkey: schoolteachers.
The Most Dangerous Job
Schoolteachers are part of the colonial oppression against which the PKK is fighting. Kurdish children are not allowed to speak the native tongue in school. Teachers in Turkey are assigned to work for four years in East Turkey before they can work in the more lucrative eastern cities of Istanbul and Ankara. Here, they are paid 8 million Turkish lira a month, about US$220 and about 30 percent more than they would usually make. About 30 percent never do their time in east Turkey and buy their way out of the dangerous assignment. By comparison, soldiers get paid 35-40 million Turkish lira a month.
The teachers live in simple stone houses--one room for living and one room for sleeping. There is no plumbing; the bathroom is an outhouse about 20 yards from the house. But these conditions are not what make this job dangerous. Over the last three years, 75 schoolteachers have been executed by the PKK. Schoolteachers in east Turkey are not raving political stooges of the government who spread torment and hate. They are bright college-educated people who teach reading, writing and math. Many are just starting families and enjoy the work they do. The few who are dragged out of their houses at night, sentenced, and shot in the chest probably wonder what they did to deserve such a cold and uncelebrated death.
We spend the evening with two young teachers, a husband and wife, and their two young girls. They share their simple food and are good company. There is little to do here once the sun goes down. The inside of the simple stone house reminds me of a bomb shelter: whitewashed, cold and damp. The house is lit with a single bare lightbulb hanging down from the ceiling. After dinner, we walk to the homes of the other teachers in this small village. Each family of teachers is happy to meet outsiders. There are two young female teachers who bring us cookies and tea, and there are two married couples, each with a small child. We gather together in their simple homes and talk about life in the war zone. Three days ago, three teachers just northwest of here were rounded up, tied hand and foot, and shot the same way you would kill an old dog.
Many people feel that the teachers were shot because they had weapons in their houses. After the shootings, the teachers from this village traveled to town to talk to the region's military commander and protest the arming of teachers as militia. The colonel instead greeted them as the protectors of the village. Taken aback, they explained that they thought he was the protector of the village. "No," he smiled and said, "it is much too dangerous to have troops out there at night." The colonel offered them rifles and ammunition to give them peace of mind. "After all," he said, "I am surrounded by hundreds of soldiers, barbed wire and fortifications as well as over a hundred trained antiterrorist commandos for backup." He offered the teachers one of each: a "big gun" (a German G-3) for the men and a little gun (AK-47s) for the women. Not knowing how to react, the teachers abandoned their first line of attack and glumly accepted the weapons and boxes of ammunition. They admitted to us they had no idea how to use them and were terrified that the children would find the rifles under their beds. So they kept them unloaded.
As I walked back under a brilliant star-filled sky, I marveled at the ridiculousness of it all. Here we were with eager, youthful young men and women--educated, enthusiastically discussing life and politics, sharing what little they have and trying to make sense of it all, while a few miles down the road sat the PKK training base of Eruh and the Syrian border only 50 km away. The town has been the scene of heavy fighting between the PKK and the Turkish special forces. No one dares go out of the village at night for fear of being shot as a terrorist by the nervous militia.
The people are thankful for their stone houses, as they cower below windows during the heaviest shooting. Here, there is no doctor, no store, no transportation, no facilities of any kind. To think that a beautiful night like this could be interrupted by sudden death is unimaginable.
Tearing Down the Silk Road
Despite our token flirtation with death, we spend a sunny morning playing with the children and then continue on our way to the Iraqi border. I am curious. Just before we leave the village, we are stopped by a group of people. They point to a stinking swamp in the center of the village. They complain that the government came in to build a pond and now it is a sewer. They seem to think that we have some way to restore it. We listen, shrug our shoulders and sadly drive off.
Winding our way down to the main road, we inhale the clean mountain air and stop to take pictures of the sparkling brooks and lush scenery. This can't be a war zone. Down on the main road, the military checkpoints begin. At the first checkpoint 14 km from Cizre, we are quite bluntly asked, "What the hell are you doing here?" The appropriate answer seems to be the most absurd: "Just looking around." Cooling our heels and drinking tea in the commander's bunker, we are given our passports back and smugly told that we have been scooped. A television news crew from "32 GUN" (a Turkish news show) had already made it into Iraq. The commander assumes that we are journalists trying to cover Saddam's big military push to the south. Apparently, the television crew got special permission from the Iraqi embassy in Ankara and is the only news crew in Iraq. Not too bothered by this revelation, we share a cigarette with the sergeant, and more tea is brought out. It appears that our time with the governor and the military commander of Siirt province has paid off. We ask the officer in charge if he could radio ahead and let the trigger-happy soldiers know we are coming.
We should be in the cradle of civilization, between the fertile thighs of the Tigris and the Euphrates. Instead, we are in a hair-trigger war zone, where every man is a potential killer and every move might be your last.
We take a few Polaroids for the officer and we hit the road again. At each blown bridge and sandbagged checkpoint, we stop and chat with the soldiers. Up ahead of us is Mount Kadur, where the Koran says the ark of Noah rests: It sits like a forbidden beacon 3500 meters high. We drive along the Syrian border clearly defined by eight-foot high barbed wire and 30-foot guard towers every 500 meters. We are on a beautiful piece of smooth two-lane blacktop built right smack on top of the "Silk Road." We are not traveling by camel today. I keep the Fiat's gas pedal pressed to the floor, the speedometer spinning like a slot machine. The only time we have to slow down is at a checkpoint or when a bridge has been blown up. The heavy trucks labor toward the west, as we pass burned-out hulks of gas stations. We stop in Silapi, the last Turkish town before the Iraqi border, to get something to eat. Silapi is one of the dirtiest, drabbest holes I have ever visited. Row after row of truck repair shops, dusty streets, and grease-smeared people watching as we drive by.
We pick a restaurant where the secret police eat. You can tell the secret police by their bull necks, gold chains and walkie-talkies. The hotel next door is decorated with stickers from the world's press and relief agencies. The food is good. Outside our restaurant, a retarded man with no legs sits on his stumps. Using blocks to get around, he is black from the soot and grime of the street. He uses an old inner tube to prevent the hot road from burning his stumps. He watches us eat. The people pass him by as he grimaces and grunts, his hand extended. I marvel that this man is still alive in this godforsaken outpost. I go outside and give him some lira. He begins to cry and tug at my leg, thanking me in his tortured way. When I leave him, children begin to crowd around and start to beat him for his money. I go back outside, and another man chases the children away. We tuck the money away, since his spastic hands keep flailing around. When I go back into the restaurant, one of the men at a table next to ours tells us that the beggar will probably be dead tonight, killed for the money he now has. I feel very sad and want to leave this place.
As we blast down the road toward the Iraqi border, I notice that the big guns in the Turkish bunkers are not facing south across the road to Syria, but toward Turkey to the north and the rebel-held hills beyond.
The Angels
Much later, back in Istanbul, I stand in front of the massive Hagia Sophia Mosque. Inside, it is quiet. Two men make their prayers in the serious, hurried style of Islam. The worn carpets and the vast ceiling absorb the whispering and rustling like a sponge.
Outside, it is dark and the rain is cold and heavy, pushed by the sharp wind. The brilliant floodlights cut tunnels of light upward into the low clouds above the softly sculpted building. It is as if the prayers of centuries power this energy, sending the shafts of pure blue light through the clouds and to the stars. High above, I think I see angels. A mysterious low chorus seems to pervade the atmosphere. But alas, the angels are just seagulls and the chorus is a distinct ship horn. And the prayers of a thousand years are lost and rubbed to dust in the aging carpets inside the mosque.
For a brief moment, it was calm and peaceful. The angels had come to answer those prayers. Instead, I know that out in the rolling fields of the east, there will be more death under the Turkish stars tonight.
Postscript
On Sunday, November 12, 1996, there was a car accident in Susurluk, about 90 miles south of Istanbul. A black Mercedes slammed into a tractor trailer truck killing three of the four passengers aboard. This would not be unusual for a Sunday on the deadly highways of Turkey except the only surviving passenger was DP's buddy Sedat Bucak. Although Bucak is colorful in his own right, his now deceased friends are more interesting.
One of the four on board was Abdullah Catli, an accused hit man for the Turkish military, convicted drug smuggler, former member of the extreme nationalist group the Grey Wolves and blamed for a number of arson attacks in the Greek Islands and assassinations in Athens in 1988. He was also accused of selling drugs in Switzerland. In July of '96 he escaped from Swiss prison. Catli was accused of murdering casino operator Omer Lufi Topal. Three policemen were also implicated. These policemen then became part of Sedat's bodyguard. Bucak was accused of trying to grab Topal's assets and to be behind his execution. A search of Catli's body found a false ID card, a badge showing him to be a police officer and a green Turkish passport that only senior civil servants have to avoid visas when traveling.
In the trunk were seven pistols, silencers and ammunition. The registration plates were bogus and it took a while for the government and press to understand exactly what had happened
Mr. Catli's companion in the car was Gonca Us, a former Miss Cinema in Turkey. She was accused of being a Mafia hitwoman under the watchful eye of Catli. He isn't exactly on every girl's crush list. He began his notoriety on March 9, 1978 when he personally strangled seven university students for being members of the Turkish Labor Party. He was wanted by Interpol and was on their "Most Wanted" list.
Catli was also famous for being the man who supplied the gun to the Bulgarian who shot the Turk, Mehmet Ali Agca, who shot Pope John Paul II in 1981.
Sedat Bucak, True Path MP, the head of Bucak clan and leader of a tough anti-PKK army of 10,000 men is still the undisputed lord of the Sevirek valley between Dyabakir and Urfa. Although some say his army is only 2000 men, others estimated 8000, he is paid over $1 million a month to fight the PKK. That brands him as a mercenary in the eyes of the PKK. He is also accused of using these men as death squads, smuggling drugs and weapons. They are considered by Turkish politicians as being "out of control."
The fourth passenger was one that started an uproar in the press and government. He was the president of the Erog Police Academy in Istanbul. Although it sounds like a comedy role, Huseyin Kocadag is one of the creators of the Special Teams--groups of civilians who execute suspected terrorists and sympathizers. They too are accused of competing with the PKK to smuggle heroin, launder political donations, sell arms and carry out personal vendettas.
The truck driver who slammed into the car was given a "most respected citizen honor" from a minor leftist party. Around 1000 pro PKK civilians have disappeared in Bucaks region along with 100 people who have disappeared while in police custody. About 23,000 people have been killed in Turkey since 1984 as a result of the conflict with the PKK and the army.
Bucak was seriously injured, and yanked out of the car by his bodyguards who were following behind in a second car. They left the others to die, crushed and bleeding in the wreck. Bucak has recuperated with the assistance of his bodyguards who guarded him 24 hours a day.
The parliament finally confirmed the connection between organized crime and the security establishment and some politicians. Unfortunately the generals that really run Turkey are more concerned about the rise of Islamic fundamentalism, a greater threat to the west than the war in the east.