It has been 54 years since the execution of Deniz Gezmiş, Hüseyin İnan, and Yusuf Aslan—leaders of the Turkish revolutionary movement—on May 6, 1972.

The revolutionary stance, struggle, and the legacy of resistance handed down by the “Three Saplings” (Üç Fidan – referring to Deniz Gezmiş, Yusuf Aslan, and Hüseyin İnan), who were executed while still in their mid-twenties, continue to grow today. From university lecture halls to every segment of society, this struggle expands by overcoming barricades against neoliberal plunder, NATO expansionism, and imperialist encirclement.

The significance of that 1969 action, when the people drove the 6th Fleet into the sea, is now much clearer in the face of the U.S. Ambassador to Ankara and Special Representative for Syria, Tom Barrack, and his eagerness to impose “monarchies.”

On that day, the 6th Fleet’s expulsion into the sea was the people’s will to take control of their own destiny, accompanied by cries of “Yankee go home.”

Standing against Barrack’s imposition of a “moderate monarchy”—who today does not hesitate to set the region ablaze in the name of imperialist interests—means carrying forward the torch of independence lit by the Deniz, Hüseyin and Yusuf.

That barricade erected at Dolmabahçe stands today as the strongest bulwark defending the people’s sovereignty against those who harbor monarchist fantasies.

Their executions laid the groundwork for the country’s regression and paved the way for today’s one-man regime.

Today, imperialism is not merely an external force; it has infiltrated every aspect of life through the AKP government, plundering nature with mines, enslaving labor through precariousness, and manifesting as an “internal phenomenon” in every cell of the political Islamist regime.

The 1960s went down in history as a period when imperialism sought to institutionalize new colonialist relations in Turkey, yet was met with a profound rise in social opposition.

The rising national liberation movements around the world deeply influenced social opposition in Turkey as well. The Turkish Workers’ Party (TİP), founded in 1961, secured 15 seats in the 1965 elections and took its place in Parliament.

Two years later, in 1967, the Revolutionary Workers’ Trade Unions Confederation (DİSK) was founded, facilitating the rapid spread of revolutionary ideas among the working class.

THEY MADE HISTORY

The youth movements of 1968 came to the forefront with anti-imperialist stances, university occupations, and boycotts.

This was followed by workers’ rallies and the first mass June 15–16 workers’ resistance in Turkish history, creating a revolutionary wave across the country.

This revolutionary wave did not align with the TİP’s parliamentary structure. The revolutionary forces gathered around the TİP began to break away from the party, seeking different tools and methods of struggle.

The struggle against imperialism was not merely a matter of “foreign policy”; it was also a comprehensive fight for democracy and freedom against fascism, exploitation, and the trusteeship regime that usurped the will of the people. In the face of the rising social opposition, police and state-backed civilian fascists attempted to suppress the revolutionary upsurge by force of arms.

Under these conditions, and in line with global traditions of struggle, new movements began to emerge. Anti-imperialist revolutionary organizations such as the Turkish People’s Liberation Army (THKO), the Turkish People’s Liberation Party-Front (THKP-C), and the Turkish Workers’ and Peasants’ Liberation Army (TİKKO)—which were based on armed struggle and advocated for an organizational structure rooted in urban and rural guerrilla warfare—took their places on the historical stage.

THE MOST CLEAR-CUT ANSWER

In their struggle against the March 12 coup, they left a profound and lasting impact on the social struggle of the Turkish people—an impact that resonates even today.

Today, in the face of the deep poverty created by neoliberalism, the regression in education, and imperialism’s drums of war in the region, the determination of the Denizs stands as the clearest answer to those seeking to silence the voice of the streets at the ballot box.

Exactly 54 years ago today, Deniz Gezmiş, Hüseyin İnan, and Yusuf Aslan—who were sentenced to death—founded the THKO. The THKO was not established through traditional methods such as congresses or conferences. Organized through action and emerging as a product of that action, the THKO primarily carried out armed actions with an anti-imperialist focus.

Following the kidnapping of American soldiers, a statement dated March 4, 1971, prepared by Hüseyin İnan, Deniz Gezmiş, Yusuf Aslan, and Sinan Cemgil, announced to the public that the THKO’s aim was “to purge the country of imperialism and its local collaborators to establish a fully independent Turkey; and to wage a people’s liberation war based on armed struggle as a strategic approach.”

The THKO was a revolutionary uprising movement against imperialism and the collaborationist system, as well as their oppression, violence, and terrorism.

It was a struggle organization against the new colonialist system, the plan to create a soulless society through a corrupt culture, and the policy of subjugating society under the dominance of capital to crush and eliminate revolutionaries.

It was an organization that established a tradition of militant revolutionary struggle by rejecting passive parliamentary politics.

Their stance continues to remind us of the necessity of an independent, revolutionary line rooted in the people, in opposition to the new models of exploitation that imperialism markets today under the guise of “green transition” or “democracy.”

Note: This article is translated from the original article titled Yankee Go Home!, published in BirGün newspaper on May 6, 2026.

Kaynak: BirGün