I know a retired pilot who operated out of Incirlik, he said basically what you just stated.
I had asked him about the bomb storage there, worrying about the security? He said it they have been gone a very long time. Others here agreed with that.
Erdogan is totally insane. He believes his own lies.
One of the more amusing stories I can tell:
During Northern Watch...the Brits, French and Americans utilized the base. The French came one day to decide “enough” and were going to leave. They had brought around thirty of these small Renault-trucks as part of their support apparatus. They had no interest in keeping the trucks (I’d say they were all 3-to-4 years old and with low mileage, but prone to break-downs).
So the Brits got with the French and made a deal. Far as I know....no money exchanged hands...just that on morning after the French left...a French officer would hand the keys to the trucks over to the Brits, and the trucks were all in a locked compound. Simple deal.
So the morning arrives. The Brit officer shows up and the French officer, but the gate is wide-open and the trucks gone. Then they notice a Turkish Army private driving by in one of the trucks. They end up going to investigate and conclude that the Turks have this unwritten rule...whatever is abandoned on Incirlik....is their property, end of the story.
The trucks were now Turk property.
If you notice, no permanently based aircraft have ever been taken into Incirlik. Everything comes and goes. The Americans know the rule by heart.
Whichever idiot Air Force officer gets stuck with closing Incirlik is looking at a massive amount of stress. Everything will be grabbed at various stages and it’ll impossible to announce this closure without it happening within forty-eight hours....forget about some six-month schedule. They might as well truck everyone to the nearest sea-port and board some cargo vessels to leave.
Was deployed there while in the Marine Corps a couple of times. Horrible for an Air force expeditionary Airbase, great for the Marines though. Couldn’t trust the Turks to protect us so we bought shotguns off base and kept them in our tents (Turks wouldn’t allow Marines to bring weapons into the country). Air force made us put them in the Armory at least once every 24 hrs. So we would turn them in and get back in line to check them out, that lasted about three days then they said we could keep our weapons. Good shotguns (Hugla ), lousy ammo. Found one guy who would sell us Israeli ammo, hypocrites