From Ankara to the Yalu: Turkey's NATO Aspirations, Religious Mobilization, and the Experience of Turkish POWs in the Korean War

Abstract

This dissertation examines Turkey's participation in the Korean War. The first paper analyzes the Democrat Party (DP) government's decision to send Turkish troops to Korea, from the perspective of neoclassical realism, integrating the concept of two-level diplomatic games and national narratives. Drawing on a diversified range of sources from Turkish and U.S. archives, parliamentary records, press coverage, and underutilized Turkish-language sources, it argues that the DP government framed a narrative of Turkey as a responsible United Nations member committed to collective security, deliberately avoiding overt linkage between the Korean intervention and NATO aspirations. The second paper examines how the Turkish government instrumentalized religion to justify its troop deployment and to mobilize soldiers for overseas combat. Drawing on unexamined archival materials, memoirs, oral histories, religious publications, and military documents, it argues that the Democrat Party government framed the war as a jihad to defend the Turkish homeland from atheist communism. The paper situates this framing within Şerif Mardin's center-periphery model, emphasizing Islam remained central to the social life of the rural periphery, whose members were hesitant to fight in a distant war. To overcome this reluctance, the Directorate of Religious Affairs (Diyanet) played a key role to instill a sense of sacred duty. The third paper centers on Turkish prisoners of war and their resistance to Chinese indoctrination in captivity. Based on Turkish, Chinese, and English archival materials, memoirs, oral histories, and previously unexamined sources, it challenges the prevailing assumption that language barriers shielded Turks from reeducation by demonstrating that the Chinese authorities employed Turkish-speaking Uyghur interpreters and implemented a robust indoctrination campaign. This paper argues that Turkish POWs' resistance was rooted in two key factors: the strict military discipline and Islamic belief. These three papers offer a multifaceted study of Turkey's Korean War experience, contributing to the Modern Turkish Studies, International Relations, and the Cold War Studies.