Step One in Setting Up an Authoritarian State

Torture people.

Human rights group Amnesty International recently said it had "credible reports" of detainees [in Turkey] being subjected to "beatings and torture, including rape", while Human Rights Watch documented several cases of alleged abuse, facilitated by a state of emergency that extends police detention from four to 30 days and denies access to a lawyer for up to five days.

The BBC uncovered more testimony of alleged abuse, not just from suspected coup-plotters but from others caught up in the purge accused of "support for terrorism", including Kurds and leftists.

It's a fair bet that if the coup had been successful, that many of the people doing and approving of torture would have been themselves subjected to it. Hell, the lower-level torturers may have been torturing for the coup plotters.

None of this should be surprising. When the authorities think they can get away with torturing people, they do. Torture was winked at by the legal system here for a very long time. Only the rise of European fascism began to make torture unappealing to Americans.

But, as we saw fifteen years ago, our government and law enforcement will resort to torture in the blink of an eye. So while people may be horrified at what is going on in Turkey, don't kid yourselves for a picosecond that it can't happen here.