{"id":57181,"date":"2012-09-18T20:33:38","date_gmt":"2012-09-18T17:33:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/?p=57181"},"modified":"2023-04-03T16:39:37","modified_gmt":"2023-04-03T13:39:37","slug":"fighter-jets-in-democratic-conventions-military-montage-were-turkish-not-american","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/2012\/09\/18\/fighter-jets-in-democratic-conventions-military-montage-were-turkish-not-american\/","title":{"rendered":"Fighter jets in Democratic convention\u2019s military montage were Turkish, not American"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Neil Munro<\/p>\n

The Democratic Party\u2019s national convention in Charlotte, N.C.,\u00a0may have doubled down on insulting the U.S. military community.<\/p>\n

The Democratic National Committee has already apologized for using a photo of four Soviet-era\u00a0Russian warships in a giant stage backdrop intended to illustrate the party\u2019s support for military personnel and veterans.<\/p>\n

That huge image, visible in the Time Warner Cable Arena during speeches by Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry and retired Admiral John B. Nathman,\u00a0also depicted a synchronized formation of jet aircraft that convention-goers assumed were American fighter planes.<\/p>\n

But the F-5 fighter planes in the photo are part of the air force of\u00a0Turkey, a nation whose government is now jailing journalists and establishing Islam as a state religion.<\/p>\n

Brad Woodhouse, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee, did not respond when the The Daily Caller asked why the convention planners displayed Turkish-flown aircraft alongside Russian warships while seeking support from the American military community.<\/p>\n

On Sept. 12, Democrats apologized for using the picture of Soviet-era, Russian-operated ships after the slip up was first reported by the Navy Times. The Navy Times also\u00a0received\u00a0a tip that the planes depicted may have been from the Turkish Air Force.\u00a0(NAVAL EXPERT: Ships shown during Democratic convention tribute to veterans were Russian)<\/strong><\/p>\n

The vessels, with their distinct radars and blue-cross-motif Russian naval flags, occupied the center of\u00a0the massive backdrop. The aircraft were depicted flying in a seven-plane formation on the upper right.<\/p>\n

At least three of the ships in the image were designed and built by the Soviet totalitarian state that killed 20 million of its own citizens. Amid steady pressure from the U.S. military, the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, marking its defeat in the four-decade Cold War. One of the warships may now be part of the Ukrainian Navy.<\/p>\n

The Russian ships and Turkish aircraft were shown during the final night of the Charlotte convention\u00a0on Sept. 6, shortly before President Barack Obama accepted his party\u2019s nomination to serve a second term.<\/p>\n

The image first appeared in the closing minutes of an address by Sen. Kerry.<\/p>\n

Obama is \u201ca commander-in-chief who gives our troops the tools and training they need in war,\u201d Kerry said, reinforced by visuals of foreign ships and aircraft operated by foreign-trained military personnel.\u00a0(SEE ALSO: TheDC\u2019s complete coverage of the 2012 DNC)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Martin Rosenkranz, a military aircraft expert and editor-in-chief of a military aviation\u00a0journal\u00a0in Austria, revealed the fighter jets\u2019 origin to The Daily Caller.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe aircraft in this image displayed are not U.S. [operated] aircraft,\u201d he told TheDC.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe jets are most likely from the Turkish air force [because] the formation and the type (F-5) flown is very typical of the seven-ship formation flown by the Turkish Air Force Display Team known as the \u2018Turkish Stars,\u2019\u201d said Rosenkranz.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no other display team worldwide\u201d that uses a similar\u00a0seven-aircraft formation.<\/p>\n

Rosenkranz\u2019s argument is bolstered by two other factors.<\/p>\n

The aircraft shown at the Democrats\u2019 convention are old F-5 aircraft. They were were designed in the United States and sold to many countries, including Turkey \u2014 whose\u00a0display team uses that same model.<\/p>\n

Also, the planes depicted in the Democrats\u2019 Sept. 6 photo montage display an unusual red and white striped pattern painted on the underside of their fuselages \u2014 most visible\u00a0on the lowest and best-lit of the F-5s in the image.<\/p>\n

During a June 2012 airshow in Norway, seven of the \u201cTurkish Stars\u201d F-5s flew in formation above a cheering crowd. They all featured that same striped paint job, which can be seen 45 seconds into an\u00a0amateur video\u00a0available online.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The latest Charlotte faux pas comes as Obama has called for help from Turkey\u2019s prime minister, Recep Erdogan, to stem widespread Islamist riots against U.S. facilities and diplomatic personnel.<\/p>\n

Obama and Islamist leaders agree the riots were spurred in part by\u00a0an anti-Islamic video\u00a0produced in California, although many regional experts say upsurge was caused by Islamist groups competing for support from anti-American voters.<\/p>\n

After blaming the video, the White House asked YouTube on Sept. 14 to consider removing the footage from its Web servers. That same night, just after midnight Pacific time, California police drove the film\u2019s producer to an interview with federal law enforcement authorities to discuss a possible parole violation.<\/p>\n

David Martosko contributed reporting.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Daily Caller<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Neil Munro The Democratic Party\u2019s national convention in Charlotte, N.C.,\u00a0may have doubled down on insulting the U.S. military community. The Democratic National Committee has already apologized for using a photo of four Soviet-era\u00a0Russian warships in a giant stage backdrop intended to illustrate the party\u2019s support for military personnel and veterans. That huge image, visible […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":57182,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[89,34],"tags":[8377,2462,4101],"class_list":["post-57181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-turkey","category-usa","tag-fighter-jets","tag-white-house","tag-youtube"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}