What follows is not so much a quest to debate or define the deep state’s existence but to trace the history of how and why the phrase entered American parlance. It was as a result of this book, and the exposure he received thereafter from Alex Jones and others, that many Americans first entertained the notion that a deep state lorded over the United States. Our discussion occurred within weeks of the publication his newest work, The Road to 9/11, in which he used the term the “deep state” for the first time. In 2007, I had a chance to interview Scott on a (thankfully) short-lived podcast I had published while a professor at Long Island University. His 1993 book published by University of California Press, Deep Politics and the Death of JFK, caught my attention as one of the few academic studies to frame American history in a light similar to Turkish discussions of the deep state. Among the works that inspired me to look more closely at Turkey’s deep state phenomenon were books and articles written by a Canadian diplomat-turned-professor named Peter Dale Scott. For more than a decade much of my research has been dedicated to understanding many of the individuals, institutions and events associated with the Turkish deep state. Serious people not only accepted the existence of a Turkish deep state, but they tended to believe it comprised an important element that defined Turkey’s past. When I began to first visit Turkey in the early 2000s, anyone who spoke of the deep state did not do so facetiously or critically. As a historian of the Republic of Turkey, I was first exposed to the term almost 20 years ago as a graduate student. The concept of the deep state has been a subject of interest for me for some time now. When asked if they believed there was “a group of unelected government and military officials who secretly manipulate or direct national policy,” almost three-quarters of respondents agreed such a “deep state” existed.
According to a Monmouth poll from the spring of 2018, a total of 37 percent of respondents had heard of a thing called the deep state. News analysis of the phenomenon has done much to shed light on how the worldview of right-wing activists such as Steve Bannon and Alex Jones helped introduce administration allies to the concept of the “deep state.” Though the term has been cause for much circumspection within political media, it is now clear that the notion of the deep state has assumed some importance for the American public. Over the following months the president and supporters of his administration publicly embellished upon the deep state’s meaning and significance, making it into a catchphrase for perceived internal adversaries within Washington. It was in early February 2017, just weeks after the inauguration of President Donald Trump, that news reports first mentioned the term’s increased use within the president’s inner circle. Almost two years have passed since the “deep state” became a part of the American lexicon.
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