Turkey President Abdullah Gül hosted Turkey’s Victory Day celebrations and major changes in military-civil relations occur as a controversial army memo has been removed online.

The military’s removal from its website Monday of a 2007 memorandum criticizing the nomination of AKP ranks coming President Abdullah Gül marked the latest in a series of symbolic steps shrinking the turkish army’s influence ahead of Victory Day.

The new momentum break in normalizing civil-military ties was accelerated by new top commander Gen. Necdet Özel’s proposal that Turkey President Abdullah Gül, in a break with decades-old tradition, receives greetings on Victory Day, the Aug. 30 holiday that commemorates the final battle in the Turkish War of Independence in 1922 against emperial forces of England, Italy and France and their errand boy Greece.

Turkey Military shrinks in power as civilian control takes over the army

Since Gen. Özel’s appointment as chief of General Staff after Gen. Işık Koşaner and the rest of military’s top level’s resigned in late July in protest against the arrests of high-ranking military officers following court cases like ”Ergenekon’ and ” Balyoz”( Sledgehammer), a number of steps have been taken to solidify the elected government’s oversight of the turkish military. President Gül’s new role at Victory Day was preceded by milestone changes in the seating arrangements at both the Supreme Military Council, or YAŞ, and the National Security Council, or MGK. Illustrating the growing civilian control over the army, these symbolic moves have had visible effects on the Turkish political landscape as both sides show willingness to adopt a more European standard in defining civil-military relations in Turkey, which has experienced military coups since the 1960s periodicly.