After WW2, the Turks were the largest standing army in NATO, had performed excellently in the Korean War, were a linchpin between Europe and the Near East, and had a longstanding historical antipathy towards Russia. Basically, the Pentagon trusted the Turks to be more effective war fighters than anyone else in NATO at the time, and to be able to get to any particular front line faster than any other ally. Eventually, the demilitarization of West Germany placed an effective front-line force in place, but in the early Cold War the NATO allies were not really very united.

Did you mean "remilitarization" ?

I did indeed, thanks. :)

To this day Turkey has the largest standing army after the US of NATO members, it's not been a pushover for some decades now. Its also got a rather large number of armored units with few rivaling NATO members with the US as exception. It lacks Nuclear weapons (although it has the capacity to build and deliver, and participates in Nuclear sharing treaties, a bit like the Netherlands) and it's not better funded than say the UK, but it's pretty massive. Together with the reasons you mentioned (proximity) it makes a pretty decent case.

That's very much incorrect. China, India, North Korea and the Russian Federation precede Turkey as well. South Korea and Pakistan are close (and so is Iran but not so well equipped).

I don't know if the comment was amended, but they're talking about NATO members exclusively. Turkey has a 'deployable military' of 495k according to this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_states_of_NATO#Military_...

Those numbers...

F if i know how Norway manages to spend that much on military, when there is a constant complaint about it being underfunded.

Btw, i think you need to roll the next 7-8 into one before matching the US troop numbers. Nuts.

No, my mistake, thanks for spotting that.