Evolution and transformation of the Turkish Navy's strategic culture

In the classical Turkish Naval Warfare History writing, it is emphasised that naval power has been given great importance since the early years of the Republic and that the naval forces have served as a harmonious part of a whole military structure since the establishment of the Republic with other forces under the roof of the General Staff. This argument is also repeated in studies using secondary sources. It has been observed that these repetitive writings only conducted research on official history books, but did not scan the minutes of the Turkish Grand National Assembly, British archives and Turkish Naval Journals. When the history of the Turkish Navy is analysed in the literature, several problems come to the fore. Firstly, the available sources mostly include national history research. However, despite the fact that the British naval system was primarily adopted by the navy during the Ottoman period, it was found that the British archives were ignored in this historiography. On the other hand, it has been observed that Turkish Naval Journals, which are important sources of information including the opinions, suggestions and criticisms of the naval staff on the military strategy of the period, have also not been included. In addition, the critical perspectives of those who took an active role in the command level of the naval forces, but could not bring up issues that could not be brought to the agenda while on their active duty, were not taken into consideration in the memoirs written after their retirement. It is seen that the same negligence is repeated in the parliamentary minutes, which constitute the source of the debates on "Airforce or Navy?" and "Land force or Navy?" of the period. These problems bring to the fore the fact that the historiography of the Turkish Navy is incomplete and limited. This situation also leads to the failure to reveal the differences of opinion between the forces and the degree of importance given to the naval forces. Thus, it leads to an incomplete conclusion that the naval forces have been given due importance from the first moment the Republic was founded and that the naval forces have an important place in the national security and military strategy on which the defence of the country is based. In this thesis, the difference of opinion between the forces through strategic culture, military culture and institutional culture will be revealed and the place of the naval forces in the strategy formed since the establishment of the Republic will be shown. The transforming strategy of the naval forces in three periods, namely the Early Republican Period 1923-1947, the Cold War Period 1947-1991 and the post-Cold War period, will be presented.