When the history of Turkey’s descent into Islamist dictatorship, financial ruin, and insecurity is written, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will be the central focus of most accounts.
But, when historians ask who enabled Erdogan’s rise, perhaps no Turkish politician deserves that title more than Devlet Bahçeli, the chairman of the Nationalist Movement Party (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi, MHP), Turkey’s right-wing and nationalist party.
When American or European politicians lead their…