July 15 and the Akıncı base (15): How did FETÖ massacre from the air?
On the night of the coup attempt of July 15, 2016, an order from the Akıncı Base was given to the quartet F-16 team that had recently taken off, according to radio records of the 141st fleet at 10:15 p.m.
“If you detect a move, shoot,” went the order.
F-16 pilot Staff Lieutenant Colonel Mustafa Azimetli, who was the leader of the quartet F-16 fleet and was codenamed “ASLAN 1,” relayed that question to the base, according to the record from 10.11 p.m.
“If we detect a move, we will not pass over it. Is that right?” Azimetli asked.
The fleet responded to him affirmatively.
The other F-16 pilot, staff captain Hüseyin Türk, codenamed “ASLAN 3,” and staff captain Uğur Uzunoğlu then told staff captain Ahmet Tosun, who was managing the operation from the desk of the 143rd fleet in the Akıncı base, according to the record from 11:55 p.m.
“A big shot will be conducted at the security gate of the A9 area,” they said.
Tosun responded by saying: “Agreed. Release fire.”
The “A9 area” referred to in the radio records was the Police Special Operations Department headquarters in the Ankara town of Gölbaşı.
Some 44 Special operation members were killed and 36 were injured – while they were preparing to intervene against coup plotters who raided the building of state broadcaster TRT - as the result of the bomb dropped by Uzunoğlu after he said “a big shot will be conducted.”
This was perhaps the biggest incident of all of the Fethullahist Terrorist Organization (FETÖ) attacks during the July 15 coup attempt.
Uzunoğlu, who also went on to fire at the Turkish Parliament in the early hours of July 16, described what happened, as included in the prosecutor’s indictment.
“Hüseyin Türk was with me in the F-16 jet. We were told that there was an activity going on somewhere. I found the area using the plane’s pod device. The unidentified person who spoke to us via radio ordered us to shoot the area. Staff Liet. Col. Azimetli, codenamed ‘ASLAN 1,’ in the leader plane also said ‘the area is active and shooting will be conducted over this area.’ I dropped a GBU-10 bomb over the area,” he said.
Actually, the bombing of police headquarters in Ankara was the second attack targeting police facilities during the coup attempt.
First of all, two F-16s that were the part of the quartet team fired at the Special Operations Aviation Department in Gölbaşı at 11:18 p.m.
Seven people were killed in this attack and five were injured.
The attacks did not end with these. On the same night, İlhami Algül, codenamed “ASLAN 4,” along with Mehmet Yurdakul, dropped two bombs on the Ankara Police Department. Two people were killed and 39 were injured in this attack.
Radio records from the prosecutor’s indictment in the Akıncı base case show that one of the main targets of the F-16s that took off from the Akıncı base was security units.
The command center in the Akıncı base tried to neutralize Special Operation units - which are capable of countering firepower from the air - by using military helicopters at both the Güvercinlik base and F-16s in the Akıncı base, after police officers took action against the coup attempt.
The center tried to suppress every act of the police from the air. For example, F-16s bombed immediately when they saw the refueling of helicopters at the Special Operations Aviation Department.
The order given to Captain Aygül, codenamed “ASLAN 4,” from the fleet of the Akıncı base at 00:42 p.m. was as follows: “Shoot the police headquarters. Destroy it.”