In this chapter, through an alternative reading of biopolitics and by way of merging the literature on necropolitics with critical geography, we develop the concepts of necrogeopolitics and necropolitical spaces. We argue that the Turkish sovereign has very little difficulty in making death and selfsacrifice a desired behaviour by spatialising necropolitical power domestically and internationally. Necrogeopolitics emerges as a discursive practice that conditions the subject to die for the geopolitical and security interests of the sovereign; necropolitical spaces, on the other hand, are both material and discursive spaces that aim for the same goal at the domestic level. Both spaces condition the subjects to believe that death should be the appropriate response if/when the state is under attack. This modification of social behaviour is engineered by the Turkish state in a very subtle, silent and everyday manner. We discuss these instances of intervention through the necrogeopoliticisation of Turkey’s territorial self, as well as the specific necrospatial changes that took place in the aftermath of the 15 July 2016 coup attempt.

When on the night of 15 July 2016 the first tanks appeared on what was then called the Bosphorus Bridge, blocking the traffic flowing from the Asian side of Istanbul to the European city, most citizens of Turkey thought that this was yet another security measure taken to foil a potential terrorist attack or, perhaps, some sort of a military drill. But when the news of low-flying F-16s, coupled with gunfire inside the headquarters of the Chief of Staff in Ankara, reached various media outlets, either possibility was quickly discarded. The tanks over the bridge were the sign of a military coup led by putschist soldiers with ties to the cleric in self-imposed exile–Fethullah