Hüseyin Nihal Atsız – pan-Turkist writer

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Hüseyin Nihal Atsız (January 12, 1905 in Istanbul—December 11, 1975 in Istanbul) was a Turkish writer and an ideologist of the pan-Turkist or Turanism camp. He is an author of over 30 books and numerous articles. He was in strong opposition to the government of İsmet İnönü, which he criticized for cooperation with Soviet Union.

Nihâl Atsız is known for his exceptional views, his active campaign against Turkish communists and his embracing of shamanistic, ancient Turkic traditions. He is among the authors that influenced the ideology of the Ülkücü movement, (translated as "idealism"), a nationalist movement of Alparslan Türkeş. Atsız worked on Turkism as an ideologue and activist but never joined any party or political group because he considered politics to be a way to corruption. He and his comrades published several Turkist magazines such as Otuken, Yeni Hayat and Orkun. He wrote strong articles which criticized the oppressive government of İsmet İnönü and his tolerance on communism in the country. He and his colleagues were arrested and accused of holding "racist and Pan-Turkist" views, but eventually acquitted.

Atsız majored in History of Literature and published several academic essays about Ottoman literature and history. Atsız is also an important novelist and poet.

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Nihal Atsız's World-View and Its Influences on the Shared Symbols, Rituals, Myths and Practices of the Ülkücü Movement

Cenk Saraçoğlu (Sabancı Üniversitesi)
May 2004
Download PDF: www.let.leidenuniv.nl/tcimo/tulp/Research/cs.pdf

[img src="http://atsiz.org/resimler/atsiz_resim[1].jpg"]

INTRODUCTION

The shared symbols, myths and rituals have always had a vital importance in the
establishment, organization and maintenance of popular nationalist movements. While some
of these symbols and practices are common among all nationalist social movements, some
others are context-specific because they are meaningful, and have an organizing power only in
a certain social context. In fact, as the ideology of nationalism is constructed on the basis of
the idea of homogeneity and collectivity of a certain social group, the presence of contextspecific
shared elements in a certain form of nationalism becomes necessary to create the
sentiment of we-ness within the group so that the given social group could imagine itself as a
distinctive or sui-generis social entity and perceive outsiders as the “others.” For these shared
symbols, myths and rituals to be effective in constructing a group-consciousness, rather than
to be directly political and rigid1, they should be flexible and ambiguous enough to be
interpreted and internalized in different ways within the group.2 In other words, the shared
elements in a nationalist movement should be amenable to different interpretations, so that
varieties of individual perceptions of them would not create a dissolving crisis in this group.
That is why most of the nationalist symbols, myths and rituals are mystical and constructed to
be ineffable. When the mysticism and ineffableness becomes embedded in the shared
elements of nationalist movements, the range of the varieties of the individual interpretation
and of internalization of these shared elements becomes wider.
Although the group members consider these shared symbols and practices given and
self-evident, they are constructed and recognized within historical and social processes, and
through interaction within the group. Hence, their maintenance depends on the ability of the
social group to reproduce them within the realm of social relations. Art and literature are some
of the most appropriate spheres for the reproduction of the nationalist symbols, rituals and
myths4. However, apart from reproducing existing shared elements of a nationalist movement,
art and literature can be the spheres of the invention and creation of new symbols and new
myths; and in some cases the artistic and literal works, themselves, can be nationalist symbols.
Turkish nationalism is not an exception to the fact that literal and artistic works
effectively provide or reproduce nationalist symbols and practices. However, as Turkish
nationalism’s configuration has been subject to change along with the socio-economic
conditions of Turkish society, the shared symbols, rituals and myths that have been
incorporated into Turkish nationalism has varied throughout the history of modern Turkey.
This is, of course, not to deny the fact that there have been some continual symbols and myths
within the ideology of Turkish nationalism.
Turkish nationalism does not solely consist of its official interpretation by the Turkish
state; it has always had some variants. Although the main skeleton of Turkish nationalism was
historically created by Turkish state elite, how it manifested itself and was practiced inevitably
differed within the private sphere, because Turkish society has had a heterogeneous social
structure constituted by different social groups with different characteristics and hence
different tendencies and perceptions. For instance, one can easily realize that the practice of
Turkish nationalism in the urban context is strikingly different from its practice in the rural
context. As the Turkish society developed through capitalist lines and as new social classes
come into scene in the urban context and consequently as the new political identities started to
flourish in the political sphere, these differences have become even more visible. Especially
after 1960s, when various political ideologies came into the political scene, one could observe
that Turkish nationalism acquired different and even contradictory forms as a result of its
integration with different political ideologies. Therefore, the nationalist symbols, rituals and
myths utilized in Turkish nationalism varied according to also the political ideology with
which Turkish nationalism integrated. However, one should note that this does not mean that
such diverse manifestations of Turkish nationalism represent a complete rupture with official
Turkish nationalism. In most cases, the “unofficial manifestations of Turkish nationalism”5
was built on the basis of the ideological assumptions and symbols of the Turkish nationalism
of the Turkish state.
The Nationalist Action Party (MHP) or the idealist movement (ülkücü hareket) in the
popular language is one of the political and social movements who adopted and developed a
distinct understanding of Turkish nationalism. In terms of its dynamic structure, what we
claimed about the Turkish nationalism in general is also valid for the nationalism of the
ülkücü movement in particular: there is not one strict form of MHP nationalism. Its form and
even its content are subject to change according to time and also according to specific social
contexts. Therefore, the symbols, practices, discourses, assumptions, rituals etc. employed by
the Nationalist Action Party do not exhibit a homogenous and fixed character. However, at the
same time, it is still possible to argue that there have also existed certain continual symbols
and practices, which has been adopted by almost all sympathizers of the ülkücü movement. In
fact, the presence of these shared elements, without an exception among all ülkücüs make it
possible for them to develop and maintain a group identity. However, I should remark that
even if all ülkücü movement has collectively shared symbols and practices, how they are
understood, imagined or manufactured might vary. As I mentioned at the beginning such
flexibility is necessary for a shared element to be effective and influential in nationalist
movements.
While some of the shared elements in the ülkücü nationalism were produced by the
movement itself, through its own social and political practice, a great part of these shared
symbols, rituals and myths were transferred from official Turkish nationalism. For instance,
one can argue that the Turkish nationalist elements in the “dominant official ideology”6 of the
Turkish state were reproduced by the ülkücü movement in their extreme and crudest forms.
Apart from the elements in official Turkish nationalism7, the symbols and representations
used in some independent literal and artistic works have become a source of inspiration for the
organization and mobilization of the Nationalist Action Party. Nihal Atsız, for instance, was
one of the most important figures that have influenced the ülkücü movement.
This situation demands the following significant question: Although there never
emerged any complete correspondence between the ideology of the Nationalist Action Party
and the ideological outlook of Nihal Atsız as we shall see later, what factors prepared the
conditions for the fact the latter is very influential over the former? In this paper, I will
attempt to answer this question and my answer, at the end, would provide us some hints for
understanding both the nature of the ülkücü movement and Nihal Atsız’s perspective on the
world. While answering this question I will establish some links between some continual
structural characteristics of the ülkücü movement and the general political outlook of Nihal
Atsız. However, before undertaking such an attempt, first of all it will be necessary to define
and show some general characteristics of the ülkücü movement and then to present some
evidence that shows the idea that Nihal Atsız’s works were really influential on the
mobilization of ülkücüs. In the latter part, while discussing the factors that could facilitate
Atsız’s influence over the ülkücüs, I will explore the parallelism between the ideas, symbols
and notions in Atsız’s novels of Bozkurtların Ölümü, Bozkurtlarin Dirilişi and Deli Kurt ,
some of his articles, poems, stories and the practices, assumptions, on the one hand and
discourses of the ülkücü movement, on the other.

A) WHO ARE ÜLKÜCÜS?

In this paper, as most of the scholars do, Ülkücü movement will be taken as the
political movement that developed under the leadership of Alparslan Türkeş. Türkeş, as a
former army officer, held the presidency of Republican Peasants Nation Party (CKMP) in
1965 and reconstructed the party through ultra-nationalist and anti-communist lines with its
Nine Lights doctrine8 and in the end, renamed it as the Nationalist Action Party in 19699.
Although it is the beyond the scope of this paper to discuss whether the formation of the
ülkücü movement was the direct the product of the deliberate attempt of the Turkish state to
counter a rising socialist political struggle in Turkey10 one can easily observe the fact that the
ülkücü movement until 1980s portrayed the “dangers” posed by communism as its raison
d’etre and as an important tool for organization, motivation and mobilization. The ülkücü
movement, then, will be thought of as the political movement that emerged under the actual or
symbolic leadership of Alparslan Türkeş and under the banner of nationalism and anticommunism
and then continued, after the death of Alparslan Türkeş, by persisting to convey
certain historically essential characteristics of ülkücü identity but with some changes, as we
shall see later. However, my identification of the ülkücü movement on the basis of its political
party and leader should not mislead us to consider the characteristics of this movement as
consisted solely of the party’s official political activities and perspectives. Ülkücü movement
is also a distinctive political and social culture, as well as a means to constructing a social
identity. This situation emerged as a result of the party’s distinct ways of popularizing itself.
The party established some additional institutions like Ülkü Ocakları (Idealist Club),
Komunizmle Mücadele Dernekleri (Associations for the Struggle Against Communism),
where the ülkücüs socialized themselves and, developed and reproduced their own ülkücü
identity and, got involved in the local political struggle with local agendas. This made it
possible for the Nationalist Action Party to create and maintain a “calcified” popular support
with a specific nationalist culture and identity.
As I mentioned before, political and ideological outlook of the ülkücü movement had a
very dynamic structure as its configuration changed according to social and economic
developments in Turkish society. At a certain level of abstraction and by disregarding the
variants within the ülkücü movement itself, it is possible to periodize the historical
development of the Nationalist Action Party by analyzing the changing political tendencies of
the ülkücüs. The first period of the ülkücü movement is the era between 1965 and 1969,
within which the party leadership prioritize the agendas of anti-comunism and Turkish
nationalism. The period between 1969 and 1980 marks the era in which the Islamic elements
were increasingly incorporated in the party’s Turkish nationalism and anti-communism11. In
the period between 1980 and 1990 the ülkücü movement experienced a political identity crisis
because of both the fact that Turkish left, increasing power of which had been one of the
important justifications for the existence of the ülkücü movement, lost effectiveness on
Turkish politics and that the ülkücü movement’s leadership remained indecisive and
inconclusive about developing a consistent attitude and policy towards the 1980 military
intervention, which hit also the most prominent ülkücü cadres and its party organization.
During this period, ülkücüs inclined to more intensify already existing Islamic elements in
their world outlook at the expense of Turkist sentiments.12 However, post-1990 period,
without completely leaving the Islamist discourse, witnessed the revitalization of the Türkist
elements in the ülkücü movement, as a result of the independence of the Turkic republics of
the former Soviet Union and of the rise of a Kurdish separatist movement13. Such a
periodization of the history of the ülkücü movement will be very helpful for us to set the
reasons for the changing intensities of Nihal Atsız’s influence on ülkücüs. This periodization
will be embedded in my analysis throughout this paper.

B) THE CONTINUAL INFLUENCE OF NİHAL ATSIZ OVER THE ÜLKÜCÜ
MOVEMENT

Given the facts that Nihal Atsız’s political outlook involves an extreme and pure
Turkish racism and that the ülkücü movement in the discursive level rejected and criticized
the ideology of racism, one can doubt the existence of an ideological and emotional link
between Nihal Atsız and ülkücüs. It is true that after 1969, when the ülkücü movement
incorporated Islamic elements into its Turkish nationalism, Atsız’s organic connection with
ülkücüs was completely broken.14 However, this does not necessarily mean that Atsız ceased
to be an important and inspiring figure for ülkücüs.15 Almost in all periods of the ülkücü
movement Nihal Atsız’s works have provided conceptional and symbolic inputs to the
cognitive world of ülkücüs and that he has always, but with different intensities, been an
important and respected figure within the ülkücü movement.
Once the similarities between the ülkücü practices, symbols and rituals, and the
elements used in Nihal Atsız’s literal works are traced, one can easily have the sense that
Nihal Atsız had many “contributions” for the ülkücü style of action. In fact, this reasoning can
be supported with some material evidences. For instance, a former ülkücü scholar, Mustafa
Çalık, who undertook an empirical study among “Gümüşhane MHP elite composed of 144
people” in 1977 asked the question to ülkücüs that “Which authors or books became the most
influential over you?” Interestingly nobody gave the name of Alparslan Türkeş’s works.
While Necdet Sevinç is the most frequent answer with 23 people, Nihal Atsız follows him
with 21. Osman Yüksel Serdengeçti is the third with 12 ranks.16 One can easily claim that
Necdet Sevinç is not a surprising answer when we consider the fact he was the editor of Bizim
Anadolu(Our Anatolia) that was the official newspaper of the Nationalist Action Party. In
1977, this was the only official party publication that can be distributed to rural places of
Anatolia. Therefore, what is much more important and surprising and hence worth analysing
than the readability of Necdet Sevinç is the popularity of Nihal Atsız among Gümüşhane
ülkücüs given the facts that there was not an organic connection between the Nationalist
Action Party and Nihal Atsiz in 1977 and that the publication and distribution opportunities
were limited in 1977 Turkey, and that after 1970s Nationalist Action Party started to give an
increasing emphasis on the Islamic elements in its ideology at the expense of Turkism, a
tendency which would clash Nihal Atsız’s world outlook.17
There are some other indications of the popularity and importance of Nihal Atsiz
among ülkücü community. The current party president Devlet Bahçeli’s following
interpretation of the 3 Mayis 1944 case about Racism and Turanism in Turkey (Irkçılık,
Turancılık Davası), in which the prominent Turkist figures like Nihal Atsiz, Rıza Nur and
Alparslan Türkeş were charged with having racist and Turanist ideas, shows that Nihal Atsiz’s
significance and prestige among the ülkücü community is still strong:

Bilindiği gibi, Türk Milliyetçiliği tarihinde önemli dönüm noktalarından biri olan 3
Mayıs 1944 hadisesinin üzerinden tam 49 yıl geçmiş bulunmaktadır. Ama 3 Mayıs 1944’ü
doğuran şartlar ve gelişmeler önemini ve sıcaklığını bugün de korumaktadır.İşte böyle bir
dönemde kararlı ve ilkeli bir grup Türk Milliyetçisi aydın, rejimin yarattığı baskıcı ortama
rağmen, tehlikeli gidişata “dur” demek için kamuoyuna ve devlet yönetimine uyarılarda
bulunmuşlardır. Büyük fikir ve dava adamı rahmetli Nihal Atsız’ın önderlik ettiği ve rahmetli
Başbuğumuzun da yer aldığı bu aydın hareketine duyarlı Türk gençliği de destek olmuş;
böylelikle Türk Milliyetçiliği, fikir akımı hüviyetinin yanında sosyal bir hareket mahiyeti de
kazanmaya başlamıştır. (…) Bu vesileyle, Başbuğumuz Alparslan Türkeş Bey ve kıymetli fikir
adamı Nihal Atsız Bey başta olmak üzere zorlu bir dönemde adını tarihe yazdıran bütün dava
büyüklerimizi rahmet ve minnetle anıyorum. Ruhları şâd, mekânları cennet olsun18.

Some other examples and cases show not only the fact that today, among the
ülkücü community, Nihal Atsiz is a prominent figure, who became very effective in
the construction of the cognitive world of and style of action of ülkücüs, but also the
fact that Nihal Atsiz, himself, has become a symbol of ülkücü movement. The
following sentences from a popular ülkücü newspaper is an appropriate occasion to see
how Nihal Atsiz has become a symbolic personality for the ülkücü movement:

Değerli okurlarımız, geçen hafta verdiğimiz Başbuğ Alparslan Türkeş posterine gösterdiğiniz yoğun
alâkaya teşekkür ederiz. İlgi ve taleplerinizi dikkate alan yayın kurulumuz bundan böyle
Türk Milleti’ne hizmeti geçmiş abide şahsiyetlerin posterlerini siz değerli okurlarına armağan etmeyi
kararlaştırmıştır. Bu çerçevede gelecek hafta Türk Milliyetçiliği’nin ölümsüz önderlerinden Hüseyin
Nihal Atsız’ın 35x50 ebadında bir posterini vereceğiz. Hayatı Türk Milliyetçiliği mücadelesiyle geçmiş
bu Ülkü Devi’nin orijnal tablosunu kaçırmayın.19

After this point, I will attempt to analyze the factors that could create the convenient
context for this situation to occur. I will claim that seven interrelated essential characteristics
of the ülkücü movement prepared a convenient context for Nihal Atsiz’s ideas, symbols and
myths to be influential over the cognitive world and action style of the ülkücü movement.

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C) SEVEN STRUCTURAL AND CONTINUAL CHARACTERISTICS OF ÜLKÜCÜ
MOVEMENT and NİHAL ATSIZ’S WORLD VIEW

1) Ülkücü Movement’s Tendency to Differentiate Itself from Existing Political Forces and Its Marginalism

Although in some historical periods, it seems difficult to differentiate Nationalist
Action Party from the parties in central right in terms of the policies developed and political
strategies pursued, the supporters of the Nationalist Action Party tended to consider that they
have a separate and distinctive political identity. Most of the time, the party elite, also, had to
develop some marginal policies and discourses to differentiate the party from “status qou”
politics. These policies, to some extent, satisfied party’s supporters’ sense of distinctiveness
and marginality.21 Developing a marginal discourse was necessary especially for drawing a
continual political support from local middle-class and small capital holders of Central
Anatolia, who economically suffered from the penetration of the big capital owners into the
local markets that they had occupied beforehand and hence were alienated from existing socio
economic transformation of Turkish society.22 One can argue that after 1990s, this radicalism
became necessary for attracting the urban poor, who were alienated from the existing social
order to a great extent as a result of deepening unequal distribution of economic resources in
the urban context. However, as the ideology of central right of Turkish politics and the
dominant official ideology of the Turkish state had a changing conceptional and discursive
outlook, as a result of the changing political and economic strategies of the dominant social
forces in Turkey23, the ülkücü movement also had to arrange its political stance and discourse
according to the nature of the political discourse of the central right and of the Turkish state.24
This situation was combined with the ülkücü movement’s own political maneuvers for getting
a popular support from Turkish society. Therefore, although ülkücüs have had some continual
20 See Muharrem Şemsek interview in Ruşen Çakır, Nereye Gitti Bu Ülkücüler (İstanbul: Metis, 2003), p. 20.
21 The declaration of the Nationalist Movement Party in 1977 says “Bugüne kadar iktidara gelmiş bulunan
kapitalist ğartiler, işverenlere zenginlere, esasen müreffeh ve eğemen sınıflara imtiyaz ve iltimasla hareket
etmiştir. Hasbelkader iktidara gelen sol görüşlü partiler ise işçilere, memurlara ve kendi görüşüne uygun sınıflara
imtiyaz ve iltimasla davranmıştır.” From these sentences, one can understand that The Nationalist Action Party
tends to give the image that the ülkücüs are neither a capitalist nor a leftist, but having a separate, distinctive
identity.
and stable political elements and discourses within their ideological outlook, the incorporation
of these stable elements into some other varying ideological elements rendered the ülkücü
movement’s political perspective fluctuating and hence fluid. For instance, the party’s
ambiguous strategies towards incorporation of Islam and liberalism into Turkish nationalism
have always constituted a dynamic of crisis within the party25. Especially, the party’s
understanding of Islamic politics and its formulation of the relationship between Turkish
nationalism and Muslimhood were very unstable and unclear. This unclear nature of the
iülkücü movement’s ideology and hence the party’s inability to create a separate and stable
ülkücü doctrine26 made it possible for ülkücüs to be nourished by different and even
inconsistent literal resources27. Therefore, despite the fact that Nihal Atsız’s symbols, ideas,
and discourses were not officially recognized and even, in some periods rejected by the party’s
official political line28 the unstable and unclear ideological context of the party made it
possible for ülkücüs to be strongly inspired by Nihal Atsız.
Taking into consideration the ülkücü movement’s tendency to be distinctive in Turkish
politics, one can argue that Nihal Atsız’s continual Turkist and even explicitly racist ideas,
and his radical and strict discourse provided ülkücüs the necessary ideational materials and
symbols to develop a separate, distinctive, and a marginal identity29. Atsız’s continual clash
with the state and central right politics, and his “criminal” and anti-systemic character30
rendered Nihal Atsız an ideal charismatic ülkücü31 in the eyes of the supporters of Nationalist
Action Party32 who had a continual tendency towards marginalism.

2) The Continual Presence of Turkist Elements in the Ülkücü Worldview

We mentioned that the ülkücü movement, in its history, has not been able to develop a
consistent ideological framework that would be binding for all its supporters and we added
that this situation made it possible for many different and even contradictory notions to ooze
into the cognitive world of ülkücüs. However, the ülkücü movement always tended to
harmonize these new elements with already existing Turkist elements in its ideological
framework. Most of the time33, the way of interpretation and internalization of these new
elements were, in the last analysis, determined by Turkist components within the ülkücü
ideology34. For instance, the articulation of Islamic elements into ülkücü ideology is
rationalized with the idea that Islam is commensurable with Turks’ essential characteristics
and their omnipresent monotheistic beliefs. From the ülkücü point of view, Islam was the best
belief system that would help Turks to further increase and intensify their superior
characteristics.35 Therefore we can argue that Turkish nationalism and Turkism have always
been prominent and decisive sentiments within the Nationalist Action Party36. However, we
should note that the forms and intensities of ülkücüs’ Türkism have been subject to change
according to socio-economic developments within Turkish society37. Although the party
leadership always declared that its interpretation of Turkism is not in the form a Turkish
racism38, one can realize that, most of the time, the Turkish nationalism of the Nationalist
Action Party was carried to a level of Turkish racism in the ülkücü discourse and practice39. In
this sense, one can argue that the correspondence between Nihal Atsız’s Turkism combined
with an explicit racism40 and ülkücü movement’s continual Turkist and latent racist discourse
created a convenient milieu for the former to be effective on the latter.
Without a doubt, the sentiment of the superiority of Turkish nation and of Turkish
culture constituted the essence of ülkücü movement’s Turkist outlook. Ülkücüs, as most of the
Turkists do, have looked for the origin, sources and the purest forms of Turks’ superior
national and cultural characteristics in the pre-Islamic and allegedly Turkish originated
societies or tribes in the Central Asia. They understood the Turkish history in a unified form
starting with the ancient Central Asian Turkish nomads and extending towards current
Turkish Republic41. The following remarks of Mehmet Doğan, who is one of the prominent
figures of Nationalist Action Party very well summarizes such an understanding of Turkish
history:

MHP’nin varoluşunu belirleyen ana ölçütleri, Türk Tarihi’nin gelişim sürecindeki ‘öz’ tavırlarda
bulmamız mümkündür. Mete Han’ın davranışları, Çiçi Yabğu’nun başkaldırışındaki espri, Orkun
Kitabeleri’ndeki refah ve bağımsızlık uyarıları, Oğuzlar’ın 9.yüzıldan sonra ‘bağımsızlık ve refah içinde
yaşama endişesiyle’ Batı’ya yönelmeleri, Selçuklu’nun yarattığı refah ve imarlı Anadolu, Osmanlı’nın
gayretleri ve Cumhuriyet’in varoluş sebebi ve ilkeleri…42

According to this interpretation, the current Turkish society in Anatolia, as the latest of all
Turkish civilizations in history, inevitably carry the essential superior characteristics of the
Turkish nation as all previous Turkish societies did in history43. The construction of these
alleged essential superior characteristics of Turks was, most of the time, through the
reinterpretation44 of existing “scientific” and historical research over the pre-Islamic, Central
Asian Turkish tribes or civilizations45. It is possible to claim that the findings in Nihal Atsız’s
own historical research, also, contributed ülkücüs in the process of the “exploration” and
construction of Turks’ original superior characteristics. However, what was much more
important than Nihal Atsız’s historical research was his effective embodying and elaboration
of the so called original superior characteristics of the Turkish nation in his novels like
Bozkurtların Ölümü and Bozkurtların Dirilişi. By operationalizing these essential Turkish
characteristics within the fictive world of his novels, within which early Turkish figures
presented their superiorities in their most extreme forms and already existing Turkish myths
were reproduced in an exaggerated and mystical manner, Nihal Atsız undeniably ensured
imaginability of the “original Turkish life style”46 and of the superiority of Turkish nation, on
the one hand and understandability, communicability and hence popularization of the Turkist
sentiments, symbols and notions of the ülkücü movement, on the other. In his novels,
Bozkurtların Ölümü and Bozkurtların Dirilişi, while literally describing the Turkish life style
under Göktürk state and narrating the relationship between so called Turkish and Chinese
originated societies in Central Asia, Atsız, in its most extreme and crudest form, reproduces
the myth that all Turks, which were idealized in terms of their physical strength and military
capability, are racially superior to Chinese people, who are physically and genetically unable
to develop military capabilities and hence, desperately concentrated on the activities of settled
life, which are considered much less valuable than a military and “barbaric” life style. The
following passage from Atsız’s novels, in which almost all so called Turkish and Chinese
individuals are described through same qualities, shows that Atsız reproduces the idea that
Turkish nation and culture is superior to others, which was embedded in the ülkücü worldview

Çinli çerilere en kolay şeyleri öğretmek bile güç oluyordu. Çin kağanının özel çerisindeki Türklerle başı
hoştu. Bunları ok atmasını, kılıç savurmasını ata binmesini zaten biliyorlardı. Hep birlikte saldırış
borusu ile toplanış, birden yüzgeri ediş de onlar için su içmek gibiydi. Fakat on sekiz yaşına kadar eline
pusat almamış, ata binmemiş Çinliler’den çeri yetiştirmek üzücü bir işti. Kavrayışları da yoktu. Çinliler
çeri olmak için değil dokuma yapmak, yemiş yetiştirmek ve filozof olmak için yaratılmış yarıbuçuuk
kişilerdi.47

One can argue that Nihal Atsız’s literal elaboration of already existing Turkist sentiments and
symbols transformed ülkücüs’ Turkist sets of assumptions and knowledge about Turkish
nation into “a belief system.”48
In fact, when the party lacked a consistent ideology and a concrete political project,
Turanism, which is the ideal of unifying the Turkic world under one political entity, has been
the vital component of the party’s Turkism49. Especially after the demise of real socialism and
following the political independence of Turkic republics of the former Soviet Republic in
1990s, the Turkist and Turanist tone of the party became more prevailing50. It is even possible
to argue that the political project of Turanism was one of the most important inspirations for
the mobilization of the ülkücü community51. At this point, Nihal Atsız’s novels, Bozkurtların
Ölümü and Bozkurtların Dirilişi, both of which strongly emphasized the necessity of the
unification of Turks for being politically successful against Chinese Empires, reinforced the
ülkücüs’ political commitment of the unification or at least rapprochement of “Turkish
world”. In Bozkurtların Ölümü, one of the most significant factors leading to Chinese
Empire’s enslavement of Turks was the dissociation of Göktürks into two segments (Doğu
Kağanlığı and Batı Kağanlığı) and the disconnectedness and antagonism between the Turkish
tribes in the region. Following segments from Atsız’s novels is explicitly through these lines:

Eskiden Türkelinde tek kağan varken budunun boğazı tok, sırtı pek, yağısı azdı. El ikiye bölününce ilk
iş olarak birbirlerine yan bakmaya başladılar.52
Buyruk Senindir Tegin! Batı Elinde doğdum ama dirliğimin çoğu doğuda geçti. Doğulu da sayılırım.
Zaten benim için Türkün doğulusu, batılısı olmaz. Türkleri doğulu, batılı diye ayırmak kağanların
teginlerin işidir53.

In 1990s, ülkücüs envisioned the social life in newly independent Turkic republics
through the lenses of their historically constructed knowledge, myths and symbols about pre-
Islamic social life in Central Asia, as if the social life in Central Asia never underwent a
transformation until the “Ergenekon” case54. Given the reality that the social life, culture and
language in Turkey are so different from those of new Turkic Republics in Central Asia, these
imagined symbols and myths55 remained to be the only channel through which ülkücüs could
develop an emotional link with newly independent Turkic societies. At this point, the role of
Nihal Atsız’s stories and novels are so important in terms of containing these symbols and
myths, which would help ülkücüs to “imagine” the social life in the Central Asia and to
develop an emotional affiliation with it. In fact, the language used by Atsız, which contained
the idioms, names56 and words specific to pre-Islamic Turkish life style,57 became very
effective in making ülkücüs realize the distinctiveness of Turkishness. His descriptions of the
Central Asian plateaus and of the social life of Turkish horse nomads in positive terms
reinforced ülkücüs’ romanticist idealization of the original pre-Islamic Turkish life in the
Central Asia on the one hand, and of the newly independent Turkic Republics of the Soviet
Union, which were believed to continue to carry these original characteristics, on the other.
The following passages from Atsız’s novels provided significant inputs for the ülkücüs’
imagination of the Turkic social life in Central Asia:

Güz gelmişti. Türk ellerinin yaman güzü Çin beği Şen-king’i bayağı sayrı etmişti. Bu Türk ülkesini hem
beğeniyor hem de yadırgıyordu. Burada açık ve temiz bir hava, insanı sağlamlaştıran kımız ve gürbüz,
sağlam kızlar olduğu için Türk ellerini seviyordu. Fakat güneşinin keskin, soğunun sert, kişilerinin çetin
ve kızlarının sarp olmasını hiç beğenmiyordu. 58
Yazın ilk günlerinden bir gündü. Birden Yamtar’ın içi sıladı. Ah Ötüken ah!…Şimdi Türkelinde olsaydı
yeşil yamaçlarda, sonsuz bozkırda nasıl at koşturur, dağlarda nasıl geyik avlardı. Bu Siganfu şehrinde
ise tıpkı Çinliler gibi boğucu sokaklarda salına salına yürümekten, uyuşuk uyuşuk gezmekten başka bir
şey yaptığı yoktu59.

In short, the continual existence of the ideas of Turkism and Turanism in the ideology of the
Nationalist Action Party rendered the ülkücüs receptive of Turkist symbols, myths and
descriptions in Nihal Atsız’s novels. Especially after 1990s, with the independence of the
Turkic Republics of the former Soviet Union, the Turkist elements in Atsız’s works helped
ülkücüs to establish an emotional attachment with the Turks of the Central Asia. Therefore,
Nationalist Action Party’s inclination to show an “official” respect to Atsız after 1990s60 is not
a simple coincidence.

3) THE STATE FETISHISM OF THE ÜLKÜCÜ COMMUNITY AND THE NOTION OF STATE IN NİHAL ATSIZ

The ülkücü movement, in his history, has always had a tendency to declare that their
essential political commitment is the protection, maintenance and vivification of the Turkish
state61. For ülkücüs, state is a sacred and omnipotent entity to which all Turks should respect
and show their loyalty62. However, this should not be confused with their conceptualization of
the notion of government. Ülkücü movement distinguishes the state from government, as the
former is an eternal, perfect and continual entity, while the latter corresponds to persons or
groups who are in the position of running the state. In this sense, as a worldly political body,
the government might be temporary and even corrupt, while the state, as a spiritual and sacred
entity, always has an unquestionable moral value in the eyes of ülkücüs. In this sense, if there
is an infirmity in the operation of political affairs, this is because of not the nature of state
structure but of the corrupt or faulty policies of government offices. Therefore whatever the
conditions are one should abstain from reacting against the state and from seeing it
responsible for any negative political development. Such an ambiguous formulation, which is
amenable to unintended misinterpretations, constituted a crisis dynamics within the ülkücü
movement, given that in some historical moments ülkücü activities directly came face to face
with the constitution of state and even with the state security forces. 1980 coup, after which
ülkücüs were officially accused of threatening and violating the maintenance and security of
the state, marked a crisis of legitimacy for the ülkücü movement63, who, until that moment of
history, had justified its policies and activities with the idea and sentiment that it is struggling
for the protection of the state. However, even after this development, the ülkücü movement
did abstain from reacting against state and from leaving its state-fetishist discourse64.
The permanent and unquestionable obedience to the state was one of the themes that
constituted the backbone of Nihal Atsız’s novels. Especially in Bozkurtlar Diriliyor, in
Kürşad’s son Urungu’s loyalty to the state authority, although he has a legitimate right to
claim for the position of Khan, and in Deli Kurt, as a novel in the context of 15th century
Ottoman society, in İsa Çelebi’s(an Ottoman prince) son Murad’s satisfaction with modest
positions in the Ottoman army, one can see the embedded ethical message that under any
condition, state’s security concerns are preponderant over individual ambitions. One can see
this theme in the following dialogue between Urungu and his mother in Bozkurtlar Diriliyor:

-Urungu! Bozkurt soyunun yüce bir oğlusun. Çünkü Kür Şad’ın oğlusun. Bununla övünmek hakkındır.
Ben de KürŞad’ın konçuyu olduğum için bütün ömrümce övündüm. Fakat bunu açığa vurmadım. Kağan
olmak hakkı iken baban bu haktan vazgeçerek vuruştu. Sen de babana yaraşır oğul olmak istiyorsan
Bozkurt soyundan olduğunu kimseye söylemeden yaşa. Kurtbaşlı gönder Ötüken’e dikilinceye kadar
vuruş. Bir tegin olarak değil. Urungu olarak kal!
(…)
- Niçin ana?
- Çünkü en güçlü, en iyi insan hakkından vazgeçen insandır. En büyük kahramanlık da hiçbir karşılık
beklemeden yapılandır.65

Such a latent parallelism between ülkücü movement’s fetishist perception of the state and
Nihal Atsız’s emphasis on the utmost importance of state security is the another element that
prepared the context for Nihal Atsız’s continual influence over ülkücü community.

[BAWIR$AQ]

4) ÜLKÜCÜ MOVEMENT’S CONTINUAL TENDENCY TO CREATE ENEMIES AND NİHAL ATSIZ

The formation or reinforcement of group identity and of the sentiment of we-ness
through antagonizing and otherizing external groups is one of the common characteristics of
nationalist movements. As a radical nationalist movement, the Nationalist Movement Party,
throughout its history, tended to politically position itself vis a vis certain political or ethnic
“enemies66”. Needless to say, combined with the ülkücü community’s inclination to identify
itself with the state security, these external enemies has become those social and political
groups, which, in the eyes of ülkücü community, carried the potential of violating the security
of the state and of Turkish nation67.
Between 1960s and 1980s, the reaction to and confrontation with Turkish left, which
was considered the most dangerous threat to the “security of nation and state”, was a raison
d’etre for the ülkücü movement, par excellence68. Anti- communism, in this period, was the
major source of legitimization69 and almost only motive for mobilization70 and popularization
for the ülkücü movement. As the party combined its anti-communism with an anti- Russian
sentiment, with the idea that the underlying intention behind the communist ideology is the
Russian expansion, ülkücüs did not perceive their anti-communist stance as a separate agenda
from Turkism and Turanism.
Nihal Atsız, at this point, with his elaboration of anti-communism within an anti-
Russian and a Turkist framework71, provided symbolic inputs and motivating elements for the
ülkücü movement.72 The following remarks of Nihal Atsız indicates that, like ülkücüs, he does
not separate his anti-communism from an anti-Russian sentiment:

Komunizm, ruh ve seciye bakımından soysuzlaşmış binlerce casusu bulunan bir Moskof
emperyalizmidir. Hırslarına sınır bulunmayan; Akdenize, Atlasa, Hint Okyanusuna çıkmak isteyen;
bütün dünyayı elde etmek hülyası ardında koşan kaba ve Moskofa yakışan bir emperyalizm… Bütün bu
doymak bilmez hırsın dayanağı da düşyaya ictimai adalet götürmek efsanesi..73

In his articles, Atsız did not hesitate to grant an explicit support and encouragement for anticommunist
mobilization of the ülkücü movement. The classical Turkist symbols, especially
the Bozkurt figure, that he used to praise ülkücü anti-communism was in turn reproduced
within the ülkücü discourse

Türkiye'de faşist, şu veya bu değil, Türkçü gençler vardır. Bunlar göğüslerine millî alâmet olan
Bozkurtlu rozet takarlar ve kendilerine Bozkurt derler. Komünistlerin gemi azıya aldığı yıllarda Adalet
Partisi, kasdî mi olduğu hâlâ anlaşılmayan bir acz içinde olaylara seyirci kalırken millî duyguyu ve hattâ
devleti bilek gücü ile savunanlar, düşmanları tarafından komando diye adlandırılan bu Bozkurtlardı.74

The disappearance of radical Turkish left from political scene, as a result of the strict
pressures of the 1980 coup regime, marked the beginning of an identity and legitimacy crisis
for ülkücüs throughout 1980s. However, after 1990s, when state’s perception of present threat
shifted from “the communist expansion” to the rise of Political Islam and of the Kurdish separatist
movement, the ülkücü community turned towards developing an anti- Kurdish and anti-
Islamist stance. However, given the presence of Islamic elements in the ülkücü ideology and
considering the sensitivity of ülkücüs towards Islam, one can argue that ülkücüs’ already existing
but increasing reaction to Kurdish seperatism has become much sharper vis a vis its reaction
to political Islam.
Despite such a sharp attitude towards Kurdish movement, one can still encounter certain
inconsistencies in the ülkücü anti-Kurdish discourse. While the majority of the ülkücü community
continued to adopt the party’s official stance of denying the existence of any separate
Kurdish ethnic identity in Anatolia, which was an assimilative approach75, small, but a rapidly
growing group of ülkücü recognized the Kurdishness in Anatolia but developed a racist and
antagonistic attitude towards it76. The latter stance towards Kurds was the one that was insistently
defended by Nihal Atsız, as he, always, considered Kurds, an internal enemy of the
Turkish state.
When, within the ülkücü movement, there always exist a contradiction between the assimilative
official discourse, on the one hand, and increasingly popularizing racist discourse,
on the other, there appeared an appropriate context for outside-party approaches to ooze into
the ülkücü movement, especially for those who adopted a racist anti-Kurdishness In this
sense, although his explicit racist approach to the Kurdish issue does not resonate within the
official ülkücü understanding of Kurdish question, it carried the potential of having a reflection
on popular ülkücü anti-Kurdishness, which began to intensify especially after the rise of
Kurdish moment in 1990s and especially in ethnically stratified rural contexts. The following
remarks of Nihal Atsız on Kurds were supportive of the rise of the Turkist slogans like “Love
or leave (Ya Sev Ya Terket)” and “If you are a Turk, Praise with it! If not, Obey to Turk”
(Türkseniz İftihar Ediniz, Değilseniz İtaat Bekleriz) among ülkücüs after 1990s77:

Yani Türk Devleti şimdiye kadar bunlaro kendisinden ayrı tutmamış,onlara her makamı vermiştir.Fakat
ayrı Kürt devleti kurmak gayesi ile bir takım davranışları olan üniversiteli kürtlerin çoğalmasından sonra
devlet şüphesiz kürt asıllılara karşı daha uyanık olacak,bunları kritik noktalara getirmeyecektir.
Kürtler mevcut nisbetteki akıllarını başlarına devşirmeyerek yabancı kışkırtılara oyuncak olmakta devam
ve Kürt devleti hayali ardında koşarlarsa nasipleri yeryüzünden kazınmak olacaktır.Türk ırkı oluk
gibi kanı ve sayısız emeği pahasına yurt edindiği Türkiye'ye göz d**enleri ne yapabileceğini
göstermiş,1915'de Ermenileri,1922'de Rumları bu ülkede yok etmiştir78.
(…) yüzde yüz çoğunlukta olsalar bile Türkiye’nin herhangi bir bölgesinde devlet kurma hayalleri hayal
olarak kalacaktır. (…) onun için Türk milletinin başını belaya sokmadan kendileri de yok olmadan çekip
gitsinler. Nereye mi?Gözleri nereyi görürü, gönülleri nereyi çekerse oraya gitsinler. (…) Türk ırkının
aşırı sabırlı olduğunu fakat ayranı kabardığı zaman “Kağan Arslan” gibi önünde durulmadığını ırkdaşları
Ermeniler’e sorarak öğrensinler de akılları başlarına gelsin79.

In short, anti- communist (between 1960-1980) and anti-Kurdish sentiments (after 1990s) in
the ülkücü worldview as the aspects of ülkücüs’ continual tendency to build their political
stance on the basis of the confrontation with a political or an ethnic enemy, were ideologically
supported by Nihal Atsız’s permanent anti-communism and anti-Kurdishness.

5) MILITARISM AND VIOLENCE IN THE ÜLKÜCÜ WORLDVIEW AND NİHAL ATSIZ

The idea that warfare is an inherent cultural and even a racial tendency of Turkish nation
and that having superior military capability is one of the quintessential and defining characteristic
of Turkish identity has always been an officially supported, long-standing element of
almost all variants of Turkish nationalism80. The praise for and legitimacy of militarism, was
also an integral part of the ülkücü nationalism81. Ülkücüs, in all occasions, recognized and reproduced
the proposition that Turks are army-nations and that their inherent military capabilities
render them superior to other nations82. When Nihal Atsız, in Bozkurtların Ölümü and
Bozkurtların Dirilişi, describes Göktürks as if they were in the constant state of war, he provides
a literal support for the thesis that militarism and warfare have been the inherent characteristics
of Turkish nation and that this inherent quality makes them superior to other surrounding
cultures and civilization. In this mentality, what determines the victorious nation, in
the last instance, is the level of military capability.
More importantly, his presentation of this “militaristic spirit” in an exaggerated, mystical
and heroic manner facilitated ülkücüs’ internalization of the belief that Turks have always
had superior military capabilities. As it can be seen from following passages, in his novels,
Atsız’s constant glorification of militarism, warfare and physical strength and his underrating
the value of science, philosophy and culture had the potential to inspire ülkücüs, who
adopted the longstanding, official nationalist assumption that Turks were inherently militaristic.

Yamtar, başını kaldırdı:
- Biliyor musun şu acunda çok salak kişiler var, dedi.
- Nerden bildin
- Suğdaklarla konuştum da anladım.
- Suğdaklar sana ne dediler
- Yeryüzünde en tatlı işin alış veriş yapıp akça kazanmak olduğunu söylediler.
(…)
- Hay salak kötü kişiler hay! Demek savaşın tadını almamışlar. Öküze kımız versen
tadını alır mı? Bunlar da öyle83

In the proceeding parts of Bozkurtların Ölümü, while describing the “reawakening and deillusionment”
process of a Turkish soldier Yamtar, who attempts to learn philosophy with the
“deception” of a Chinese philosopher, Nihal Atsız uses the following words:

Açlığın verdiği mecburiyetle filozof olmuş, fakat felsefe onu bir türlü doyuramamıştı. Şimdi iyice doyduktan
sonra felsefeye, bilime dalmakta ne zoru vardı. Kişi oğlu savaşmak için doğar, savaşacak gücü
bulmak için yemek yerdi. Yamtar felsefeye doyacağını sanmakla aldanmış, uzun denemelere rağmen
açlığını giderememişti.84

However, we should note here that more importantly, the militaristic outlook in the
ülkücü movement have not remained within the limits of ideas and discourse but have resonated
within many practices, policies and even organizational structure of the ülkücü community.
Especially between 1960s and 1980s, when the socialist left was relatively influential in Turkish
politics, militaristic style of organization through the establishment of certain paramilitary
institutional extensions, on the one hand and the management of the organized violence
against communist political forces, on the other, was some of the most striking characteristics
of the ülkücü movement. Ülkücüs attempted to legitimize their use of violence and establishment
of a militaristic party organization by adopting the reasoning that present government
and military forces underestimated or were unaware of the seriousness of the threats that the
internal collaborators of the Russian-oriented communism posed and hence it was the duty of
the ülkücü movement to get rid of the communist threat in Turkey85. For ülkücüs, the situation
was so serious that unless there occurred a militaristic and violence-oriented ülkücü reaction
to communist forces between 1960s and 1980s, the Turkish state and nation could have vanished86.
Similar to the way through which ülkücüs legitimized their the use of violence against
socialists, Atsız, in his novels, legitimizes the military attacks to China with the idea that
when there is constant possibility of starvation for Turkish nomads, it was necessary and inevitable
to use violence for being able to protect Turkish race and to maintain the Turkish
state. The underlying common idea in ülkücüs’ and Atsız’s legitimization of the use of violence
is that Turks use their inherently superior military capabilities for only just reasons, in
the form of a self-defense and when it is necessary. As it can be seen from following passages,
in Atsız’s novels, there were only two alternatives for Turkish horse nomads in Central Asian
plateaus: to die or to attack.

Açlık ve kıtlıkla kırılmış, azalmış arıklamış olmalarına rağmen eldeki bütün kuvvetlerini toplayarak
Çin’le çarpışırlarsa doyacaklarına, başka çıkar yol olmadığına inanıyorlardı87
Burada bekleyip açlıktan ölecek miyiz? Yoksa yaşamak için akın ve çapul mu yapacağız88.

In short, as ülkücüs have the tendency to praise militaristic values and violence and that they
considered their violence-oriented political practice legitimate especially before 1980s, the
presence of militarism and of justification of offense in Atsız’s novels provided rich materials
for the formation of the ülkücüs’ cognitive world.

6) CULT OF LEADERSHIP IN THE ÜLKÜCÜ MOVEMENT AND NİHAL ATSIZ

Although, as we mentioned at the beginning, the ülkücü movement could not have
managed to form a consistent ideological framework and political outlook throughout its history,
there did not emerge strong centrifugal tendencies within the movement that would
shake the authority of the movement’s leadership. On the contrary, one can argue that the lack
of ideological consistency, itself, has created the need for a strong leadership whose authority
and wisdom would be unquestionable. This is because of the fact that a strong and collectively
respected leader could have both created a sense of togetherness among ülkücüs and ensured
the full bindingness and confidentiality of the party decisions. Therefore, respect to and compliance
with the leader has always been one of the main components of the ülkücü culture.89
When Alparslan Türkeş was alive, his authority was almost complete and his respectability
was unquestionable in the party90. His death created a short-term power vacuum, but Devlet
Bahçeli, even if he was not as respected and prestigious as Türkeş, filled this vacuum by prolonging
the cult of leadership in the ülkücü movement This situation was legitimized through
the idea that the obedience to the leadership was an essential and inseperable part of Turkish
custom and traditions91 and hence any disrespectful behavior towards the leadership would
mean the violation of the Turkish tradition itself.
The necessity to keep the obedience to the leader in every condition was one of the
themes that was widely elaborated in Nihal Atsız’s novels, stories and articles92. Nihal Atsız’s
idealized Turkish heroes in his novels Bozkurtların Ölümü, Bozkurtların Dirilişi and Deli
Kurt never attempt to disobey the rules and commandments of their leaders even if they do not
agree to some political decisions of their leaders and also they never challenge the authority of
their Khan even if they believe that the leadership has certain political weaknesses and is in
corruption93. For instance, in Bozkurtların Ölümü, although almost all soldiers are aware of
the fact that their leader, Kara Kagan’s marriage with İçing Katun, who is a Chinese woman,
and also former wife and murderer of previous leader Çuluk Kağan, is a politically wrong and
morally erroneous behavior, they never attempt to interfere with or object to their Khan’s such
a decision94. When İçing Katun’s increasing intrigues drag the Göktürk country into a political
turmoil, Khan’s subjects keep their respect and obedience to the Khan, as it can be seen from
following g passages:

“- Uluğ Tarkan! Beni artık kağanmışım gibi selamlama! Bir tutsağa saygı gösterilmez, dedi
Koca Tarkan, kırışmış yüzün ortasında hala sert bakan gözlerini yer dikti:
- Zamanı Tarı yaratmış, kişi oğullarını onun içine pusatsız atmıştır. Kılıç, kargı, ok…Bunlar ancak kişi
oğullarına karşı işe yarar. Tanrı bize ölüm verdiyse, Türk budununu kutsuz kıldıysa, bunu gidermek için
çalışalım. Tusak da olsan sen yine Göktürk kağanısın95.

Ülkücü movement’s continuous strategy of legitimizing the intra-community authoritarianism
and cult of leadership with the idea that obedience to the leader’s decisions and commandments
has been the constant aspects of Turkish customs and traditions has made ülkücüs take
inspiration from Atsız’s elaboration and the praise of the presence of the cult of leadership in
early Turks.

7) MORALITY AND MORALISM IN THE ÜLKÜCÜ MOVEMENT AND NİHAL ATSIZ

While introducing the general characteristics of the ülkücü movement at the beginning
of this paper, I mentioned that the Nationalist Action Party drew most of his supporters from
especially small capital holders and peasants in Anatolia, who were concerned with the eco-
nomic and social transformation that Turkish society has undergone with the development of
capitalism in Turkey. As the urban culture of big cities started to penetrate into the rural areas
of Anatolia, with the development of communication facilities; and as the transformation of
the Turkish economy through capitalist lines threatened the traditional interests of local bourgeois
groups in rural regions, there emerged a reaction to existing large-scale social and economic
change96. This reaction, most of the time, carried a religious tone and uttered the concerns
of “degeneration” and “alienation” of social life97. The ülkücü movement especially in
1960s and 1970s98, by developing extremely populist discourses, attempted to take advantage
of the rise of this kind of concerns and sentiments by integrating them with the movement’s
constant Turkism and anti-communism. By exhibiting the rapid social changes in Turkish social
culture as the moral degeneration of the original Turkish culture and by presenting the
Turkist solution of “return to essence”(öze dönüş) against the threat of degeneration, they, in a
Turkish nationalist line, succeeded to politicize and mobilize those people in Turkist and nationalist
lines. Moreover, by declaring the rise of communism and of “leftist culture” as responsible
for the “moral degeneration” of “pure” Anatolian Turkish lifestyle, they managed to
consummate those reactions under the banner of anti-communism.99
The moralism, which was in the form of a strong reaction to the rise of some cosmopolitan
aspects of urban culture, and to the external cultural influences over Turkish society
was one of the most directly presented themes in Atsız’s writings. As he has a strict model
of Turkishness in his mind, he perceived any deviation from this model as an indication of degeneration
and alienation.100 The following poem, called Topal Asker, shows the harshness
and the sense of resentment in Atsız’s moralism, which was incorporated into an anti-elitism:

Sen Şişli'de danserken her gece , gündüz
Biz ötede ne ovalar ,çaylar,ne dümdüz
Yaylaları geçtik,karlı dağları aştık;
Siz salonda dansederken bizler savaştık.
(…)
Güya sizin mezenizdi ! Yiyip içtiniz;
Zıpladınız,kudurdunuz arsız,edepsiz!...
Gerçi salonlarda "yıldız" dı senin adın,
Hakkikatte fahişesin ey alçak kadın
(…)
Ey allıklı ve düzgünlü yosma bil şunu:
Bütün millet öğrenmiştir senin fuhşunu.
Omuzunda neden seni fuzuli çeksin?
Kinimizin şiddetiyle gebereceksin!101

Like ülkücüs, Atsız thought that communists, who were under the influence of Russian culture
and assimilative Russian nationalism, embodied the most extreme form of this deviation and
degeneration.102 All these characteristics of Atsız’s moralism into consideration, one can argue
that ülkücü movement’s continual moralist reaction to large-scale social changes in Turkey is
inspired by Atsız’s expression of his moralism in a very crude and extreme way.

[BAWIR$AQ]

CONCLUSION

Throughout this paper, I attempted to answer the following question: Although
Hüseyin Nihal Atsız did not have any organic link with ülkücü movement and although he did
not share many ideas and policies developed by the leadership of the ülkücü community, what
might have led to his continuous popularity and influence over ülkücüs. While answering this
question, I indicated that certain continual structural characteristics of the ülkücü movement
created a convenient milieu for Nihal Atsız’s ideas and symbols to be inspiring for the ülkücü
community. Without a doubt, the answer to such a question would be impossible without the
analysis of Nihal Atsız’s worldview, itself. Therefore, this answer contained the analysis of
both the essential components of the ülkücü ideology and the nature of Nihal Atsız’s perspective.
I should remind that in order to fully understand how Nihal Atsız became popular within
the ülkücü community, one should take into consideration the interrelatedness of these essential
and continual characteristics of the ülkücü movement. For instance, one should not forget
that if ülkücüs’ did not have the tendency to differentiate itself from existing political
forces and if ülkücüs were not continually deprived of a consistent ideology, the parallelism
between the continual presence of Turkist elements in ülkücü ideology and Nihal Atsız’s explicit
Turkism would not by itself prepare the ground for the popularization of Atsız within
ülkücü community. I should, also add that even if the parallelism between seven continual
characteristics of the ülkücü movement and Nihal Atsız’s world outlook was a necessary factor
for the latter to be effective over latter, one should remind that if Nihal Atsız, in his writings,
did not present these parallel elements in a more direct, crude, understandable and communicable
way than the leadership of the Nationalist Action Party, which did not have an ability
to do this because of the inconsistencies in its overall ideology, his ideas, symbols and
myths would not easily penetrate into the cognitive world of ülkücüs. Therefore, throughout
the essay, I showed how Nihal Atsız expresses some of well-known ideas, myths and symbols
of ülkücü ideology in a crude and direct way. The last point is that the intensity and prominence
of each characteristic might vary according to specific socio-economic conditions of
Turkish society at a given historical moment, a fact which led to the change in the intensity of
Nihal Atsız’s continual influence over ülkücü community. In all these respects, the analysis
that I have made throughout this essay should not be seen as consisted solely of establishing
certain links between the continual and essential characteristics of the ülkücü movement and
Nihal Atsız’s worldview. Rather, my analysis also showed the interrelatedness of the essential
continual characteristics of the ülkücü movement that prepared the ground for Nihal Atsız’s
popularity, Nihal Atsız’s effective elaboration, in his writings, of the continual themes and
symbols that have been embedded in the ideology of ülkücü movement and changing forms
and intensities of his influence over the ülkücü community as a result of the fact that the ideological
formation of the latter took different in forms in different historical periods.

[H. İhsan Erkoç]

Thank you sharing this article.

I had some trouble because of some arguements in Turkish sites regarding Nihâl Atsýz

N. Atsýz has soe very extreme ideas, but it must be accepted that he is one of the most important figures in Turkish political-ideological history. He was also a good writer with a "strong pen", as we say in Turkish. His novels about Kür Shad (Jiesheshuai) are worth reading.

[Verinen Paroni]

I heard that he visited in Finland and admired Finns also.

[kokturk]

verinenparoni said:

I heard that he visited in Finland and admired Finns also.

I'm not sure about his visit but I can tell that he liked Mongols, Finns and Magyars -in fact did not like any non-Turks- because he thought that we are brothers. He even has a poem dedicated to "Our Heroic Magyar Brothers"

[Verinen Paroni]

kokturk said:

verinenparoni said:

I heard that he visited in Finland and admired Finns also.

I'm not sure about his visit but I can tell that he liked Mongols, Finns and Magyars -in fact did not like any non-Turks- because he thought that we are brothers. He even has a poem dedicated to "Our Heroic Magyar Brothers"

Well, it is true that he visited in Finland and called Finns to real-Turanians. Many Turk told me that and when USSR attacked against us he wanted Turkey to help Finland.

Great Man!