After so much fuss on the TV that created the perfect advertising for this novel, the curiosity won and I bought last Saturday this novel to read.

Are there people who read this novel already, if yes what do you think of the novel? (Skywalker?)

@3er

I haven't read the Book "Metal Storm", but I only heard about this Book.

I havent read it also 3er.

LOL perhaps you should tell us how the book was :lol:

After you have read it, could you perhaps give us brief summary of the scenario of the war?

This is the book that's about Turkey getting attacked by the US right??

It seems a little interesting, do you know where I can get on in Canada?

Sure, I'll sumarize it when i've read it.

I have read only the first 5 pages now, and start already interesting with a Turkish group of soldiers spying an American base from a hilltop (northern Iraq), but they are detected and come under attack of the Americans.

I tell you more when I've read the book.

The short version is that in 2007, the US attacks Turkish troops in N. Iraq, then proceeds to invade the country (by the worst possible route, no less, the Taurus range) and bombs the shit out of Ankara, Istanbul and several other important cities. Turkey invites Russia and EU in and they push the Americans out.

Quite fancy story if you want my opinion. In the list of impossible things, this should be 2nd or 3rd. :D

3er, when you read it, can you tell us what Greece does in the scenario? :)

@Koursaros

That's easy. The politicians in Athens will make pleas to the UN, Hague, EU, Banana Republic, etc. and thus allow "diplomacy" to work its magic. They have such a proven track record on this, it would just be silly to suggest that they would act otherwise! :charge:

I have read 30 pages now, I hope I can summarize well.

Summary:

Date 2007 in Northern Iraq, hundreds of Turkish troops are stationed in Northern Iraq for in case to interfere if Kurds start massacres in Kirkuk and hold close watch on the Americans since they are acting very suspiciously lately as they are in a kind of military buildup (to attack Syria?).

A Turkish team of 15 soldiers are on a reconnaissance mission watching an American base from a hilltop (northern Iraq), but they are detected and come under attack, suddenly they hear a helicopter sound and a fierce blast kills halve of the men followed by a rain of illuminated bullets that target them. The surviving team members take shelter between rock formations and the team commander radios the Turkish headquarters in Kirkuk that they’ve come under attack of the Americans and suffered casualties.

In the headquarters (Kirkuk) there is a big confusion and anger, why the hell are Americans attacking their longtime allies? Centcom in Ankara gets into alarm situation, the prime minister and Generals are called for an emergency meeting. Meanwhile the headquarters in Kirkuk decide to send a special forces team of 20 men to the area to try to rescue the team under attack. When the rescue team arrives there, the clash is still going on, from a hilltop they see the US forces using rocket propelled grenades and heavy machine guns firing on the trapped reconnaissance team where sporadically some desperate shots are returned. The rescue team commander decides to attack the US forces from their uphill position and they start to fire down on the US troops, using also RPG’s, first they have the upper hand and inflict casualties to the Americans until an Apache arrives at scene and starts bombarding the Turkish troops. A missile takes down the Apache but the US troops are overwhelming and the clash ends with all Turkish troops death.

Washington, the US chief of staff informs the defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld that operation “metal storm” has begun. The CNN is already spreading disinformation of a sneak Turkish attack on a US base near Kirkuk which resulted in 13 US casualties and 30 wounded and that the US will retaliate the attack.

In Ankara the prime minister confers with the army commanders how to react, in the meantime 5 US aircraft carriers and 22 cruisers have entered the Mediterranean, two cruisers have taken position near Cyprus. Reports flock in that US troops have entered Syria heading towards the Turkish borders and the first US brigades have been airdropped on the Syrian side of the Turkish-Syrian border.

Situation looks extremely bad for Turkey, with its troops in Northern Iraq trapped and 60,000 Turkish troops cut of by sea in N. Cyprus (the number of troops where increased due to heightened tensions with Greece and Southern Cyprus in the last months).

The Turkish prime minister and the chief of staff are brainstorming about their options as it becomes more and more clear that the US has no good intentions. For an exit strategy for the Turkish troops trapped in Iraq the US Stryker brigade has to be taken out, but such an operation would mean a first strike by Turkey making Turkey the aggressor. The trapped 60.000 troops in Northern Cyprus is even a bigger problem due to the huge air and naval superiority the US has. All options are considered but the prime minister and the generals decide to try to use diplomatic ways.

The Turkish foreign minister with a team of advisors has departed by plane to Washington to start diplomatic negotiations there. NATO, UN, EU, Moscow everywhere and in almost all countries the governments are alerted by the unexpected situation and are calling for emergency meetings.


To be continued :)

As far as I remember, there is no mention of Greece at all. Definetly not as the supporter of US etc. Perhaps they were among the countries who objected this invasion. Anyway, I read it during a long travel but I was not impressed at all.

Very nice 3er, thanx.

ALthough the story has some holes and the likability of it is very slim, its still an interesting scenario.

You’re welcome Cid.

There have been some discussion programs on TV with the writers of this novel and some retired generals. The generals are quite pissed of by this novel, because according to the generals the novel describes Turkey as a walkover for the US army.

I for my part think the novel is quite realistic since there is such a huge gap between the Turkish army and the US army in technology and firepower, that it is a fact she is not a match. In fact there are maybe only 5 countries in the world that would not be a walkover for the US army.

Anyway I can advise you to read the novel, the scenario is fascinating and keeps you reading.

The scenario is definetely interesting. Greece's position in such a case would be very nasty. Do you follow EU (since you are a part of it) and fight with Turkey, or do nothing (which will have its consequences)?

Do you guys seriously believe that if something like this happens the Kremlin will decide to jump in and help the Turks?? Russia would be a good ally during a war like that.

It would be terrible forr the US since other enemies of the USA would take advantage of this and maybe help us too? Im thinking of N.Korea when I say this.

And also lets not forget the big bad wolf-->Osama and his crew might take advantage of the situation and carry out some cowardly terrorist attack on civilians in the US.

Turkey Imagines the Unimaginable
http://antiwar.com/lind/?articleid=5021

by William S. Lind
The Feb. 15 Christian Science Monitor describes a situation that, to anyone familiar with American-Turkish relations in the post-World War II period, is almost beyond imagining: an American attack on Turkey. According to the Monitor's story,

"The year is 2007. After a clash with Turkish forces in northern Iraq, U.S. troops stage a surprise attack. Reeling, Turkey turns to Russia and the European Union, who turn back the American onslaught.

"This is the plot of Metal Storm, one of the fastest-selling books in Turkish history. The book is clearly sold as fiction, but its premise has entered Turkey's public discourse in a way that sometimes seems to blur the line between fantasy and reality.

"'The Foreign Ministry and General Staff are reading it keenly,' Murat Yetkin, a columnist for the Turkish daily newspaper Radikal, recently wrote. 'All cabinet members also have it.'"

Here we see in dramatic fashion America's loss of the "Global War on Terrorism" at the moral level. By invading and occupying Iraq, a country that posed no threat to us, and threatening to do the same to other countries around the world, we have made America into a monster – even in Turkey, the country that has been our closest Islamic ally since the onset of the Cold War. So dramatically has America managed to reverse its post-9/11 moral ascendancy that not only can Turks imagine us attacking Turkey, they see Russia coming to their rescue! Russia has been Turkey's number-one enemy for centuries.

It seems America has managed to bring about what historians call a "diplomatic revolution," a fundamental shift in alliances, by encouraging everyone else, ancient enemies included, to ally against herself. The Monitor goes on to report that

"Egemen Bagis, a member of Turkey's ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and chairman of the Turkey-U.S. friendship caucus in parliament, says the unpopular war in neighboring Iraq continues to fuel anti-American feelings.

"'This public feeling, this public tension, is not any different from what is happening in other European countries or other Middle Eastern countries,' Mr. Bagis says."

The Bush administration, one of whose 'droids reportedly said that "we create our own reality," will take comfort in the fact that Turkey's government, like governments elsewhere, remains our humble and obliging servant. To observers who seek rather than shun reality, that is cold comfort. In today's world, public opinion is strategically more important, not less important, than the attitudes of governments. It is one of the many ironies in the jumble of contradictions that make up this administration's policies that the democracy it promotes would quickly worsen, not better, America's diplomatic position.

The Monitor quotes an American diplomat, speaking of the situation in Turkey post-Metal Storm, "We're really pulling our hair out trying to figure how to deal with this." That unhappy diplomat now knows how it felt to work in the German Foreign Office before both World Wars. The task he faces goes beyond what diplomacy can hope to accomplish. So long as a powerful country is on the grand strategic offensive, demanding that everyone else in the world bow to its wishes and adopt its ideology or be subject to attack (Wilhelmine Germany did not actually go that far, though America's neocons now do), it will push everyone else into a coalition against it. Just as Bismarck's successor Holstein could not imagine an alliance between republican France and czarist Russia, and watched it happen nonetheless, Metal Storm now portrays an equally unimaginable alliance between Turkey and Russia. Will that too come to pass? An American attack on another Middle Eastern country, which I think likely, may bring about many unimaginable alliances.

Russell Kirk, the grand old man of the postwar American conservative movement, put it best:

"There is one sure way of making a deadly enemy, and that is to propose to anybody, 'Submit yourself to me, and I will improve your condition by relieving you from the burden of your own image and by reconstituting your substance in my image.'"

Not only will that make an enemy of anybody, it will make an enemy of everybody.

I couldn't imagine such a plot as the one in the novel.. i though Turkey was rather pro-American...

It seems that the scenario described in the last post by Modus is more than real.. US managed to be feared and hated by everyone..

In Greece there was a similar novel few years ago by K. Grivas called "The war and the shadow" but it was initially based on a war with Turkey which Greece unexpectedly wins, to continues with a US infiltration of the Greek community aiming to total detarioration... not that fictional scenario as this one but with the same moral.. US is the greatest enemy... :)

Russia coming to our aid, makes it very very fictional. Still its an interesting scenario.
They say EU helps out Turkey, however what is exactly GB stance within this novel? Also would like to know if they discribe the position of Israel China and Japan.

I had an interesting phone call with my little nephew who is on military duty now, he said this novel was forbiden inside the military compounts. He was very curious but it was strictly forbidden to bring the book to their barracks.

Seems some in the army are really pissed of by this book :lol:

Hey hey hey, it seems that this novel has also become bestseller in Egypt!!!!!!

The Arabic version of the book makes huge sales