TURKEY'S NEXT DCHOD: GENERAL HASAN IGSIZ

C O N F I D E N T I A L ANKARA 001411 SIPDIS EUR/SE E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/05/2018 TAGS: PREL PINS MARR TU SUBJECT: TURKEY'S NEXT DCHOD: GENERAL HASAN IGSIZ REF: A. ANKARA 1391 ¶B. ANKARA 1392 ¶C. 07 ANKARA 2601 Classified By: Ambassador Ross Wilson, Reasons 1.4 (b,d) ¶1. (C) Turkey's Supreme Military Council (YAS) (ref a) named General Hasan Igsiz (pronounced Ih-siz) as Turkey's next Deputy Chief of Defense (DCHOD),succeeding GEN Ersin Saygun. He is reportedly a protege of newly named CHOD Ilker Basbug (ref b). As general officers, Igsiz and Basbug have held a number of similar assignments. Both served as Turkey's National Military Representative at SHAPE and at Jandarma Command. Basbug himself was DCHOD from 2003 to 2005. Since August 2006, Igsiz has served as the commander of the Second Army, whose primary responsibility is to prosecute the war against the PKK in the southeast, and was directly subordinate to Basbug. Igsiz has kept a relatively low profile in his military career, but is considered an effective leader. He re-energized anti-PKK efforts and managed the tense moments in fall 2007 when dozens of Turkish soldiers and civilians were killed by PKK attacks, culminating in the Daglica ambush (ref c) in which the PKK killed twelve soldiers and captured eight. As Second Army Commander, he almost certainly played a role in the execution of the February 2008 operation in which Turkish land forces crossed into Iraq to attack the PKK. ¶2. (C) Igsiz served as Land Forces Logistics Commander in 2006, and as the 5th Corps Commander from 2003 to 2005. He has solid NATO experience, first as a planning officer in International Military Headquarters Plans and Principles Department from 1981 to 1984, and later as Turkey's NMR at SHAPE from 1999 to 2001. Igsiz held a number of personnel-related assignments, including as TGS chief of personnel from 2001 to 2003, Land Forces Chief of Personnel from 1997 to 1998, Land Forces Chief of Appointments 1993-1996, and as project officer and section chief in the TGS personnel department responsible for flag officer assignments from 1984 to 1991. Igsiz graduated from the US Army Staff College at Fort Leavenworth in 1979. He is fluent in English. ¶3. (C) As the DCHOD, Igsiz will be a key interlocutor on military issues. We expect Igsiz, like his predecessor, to lead the Turkish delegation for the annual High-Level Defense Group (HLDG) discussions (next HLDG meeting is scheduled to take place in January 2009 in Ankara). We believe it would be useful to maintain the channels that Generals Cartwright, Craddock and Petraeus have established with Igsiz' predecessor to maintain close mil-to-mil dialogue, especially on Iraq, and defuse any potentially contentious issues early on. He will take up his new duties during the week of August ¶25. We anticipate Igsiz will have good working relations with Basbug and, together, they will provide effective, pragmatic, level-headed leadership at TGS over the next two years. ¶4. (U) Igsiz was born in Istanbul in 1946 and is married to Ayse Igsiz. They have two children. Visit Ankara's Classified Web Site at http://www.intelink.sgov.gov/wiki/Portal:Turk ey WILSON