Voices from the Front: Turkish Soldiers on the War with the Kurdish Guerrillas

by Nadire Mater, Ayşe Gül Altınay (Translation), Cynthia Enloe (Foreword)

These riveting first-hand accounts of Turkish soldiers who have fought in the nasty internal war against the Kurds speak to universals: the shock of entering military life and the traumas of warfare; the changes in personality and relations with family and friends, the lingering emotional effects of violence, and the difficulties in returning to the 'real world', to borrow a phrase from Vietnam vets. Corruption, disillusionment and despair alternate with the small victories of humanity overcoming hellish conditions. Mater's reportage is in the best tradition of revealing the surreal, illuminating the universal truth of war's devastation. At a time when American troops are again caught in a vicious insurgency, the Kurdish issue has high visibility, and Turkey is a major actor in the Middle East, the experiences of these former soldiers resonate.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction, Turkish Literature

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

Reviews

[Hakkı Sayın · Rating 5 out of 5]

Başyapıt. O dönem için bir cesaret örneği.

[Sosyalci · Rating 5 out of 5]

barış hemen şimdi.

[Baris Ozyurt · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Köy yanarken seyrediyoruz. Görüyoruz, zaten yakın arazi, biz korumadayız. Merakımın bütün cevaplarını orada buldum. Devletin bunu sürdürmek istediğini görüyorum.”(s:128)

[omer kilic · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book criticizes compulsory military service in Turkey. It refers to the memories of the soldiers but the information about the soldiers is not included.

In today's time of compulsory military service in Turkey, it fell to 6 months and soldiers take education about war but they don't go war.