Depleted by coup, Turkish air force seeks to lure back seasoned pilots

Turkey’s air force in September made a public appeal to hundreds of former pilots to return to its depleted ranks to replace more than 350 airmen purged after July’s failed coup.

The call has largely gone unanswered, according to military officials and former pilots, as the deep divisions exposed by the coup attempt in Turkey’s military and other institutions remain unhealed.

Six pilots who left the air force over the past decade and would be eligible to return spoke to Reuters. Only one said he would re-register to help replace dismissed colleagues whom the government blames for being part of a network that planned the failed July 15 coup.

Air force pilots played a major role in the abortive putsch, commandeering jets and helicopters that bombed parliament and threatened the aircraft of President Tayyip Erdogan.

Turkish media have reported that only a tiny proportion of the several hundred pilots who left the force between 2010 and 2015 and would be eligible to return have actually re-registered. The numbers are “below expectations,” said a military source who is not authorized to speak publicly.

The depletion in air-force resources comes at a delicate time for Turkey, the second-most militarized member of NATO. Ankara is pursuing military incursions against Islamic State in Syria and battling Kurdish PKK militants in Turkey and northern Iraq.

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Image courtesy of Reuters