Since Atatürk is a very convincing source of legitimacy in Turkish politics, almost every political movement seeks to provide legitimacy through Atatürk. Since the center of legitimacy in Turkey has been shaped by Atatürk for many years, various movements from the right and the left have emerged with the claim of interpreting Atatürk's words, revolutions, principles and practices according to the necessities of the age. In addition, the legitimacy tools of the military coups, which have the characteristics of intervening in democracy in Turkey with anti-democratic methods, have been the discourse of "protecting Atatürkism". However, with this legitimacy, each coup administration revealed the state imagination in its mind with its own interpretation of Atatürkism. So much so, that the 12 September Junta, which closed the institutions established by Atatürk and eliminated the left-Kemalists from these institutions in this way, legitimized all these through their Atatürkism understanding and created a more passive society around Atatürkism, which was heavily supported by symbols. Therefore, this article discusses both how and why the September 12 administration eleminated the left-Kemalists, who were their allies in this elemination process, and what kind of result all of these led to. In addition, this article makes a distinction between left-Kemalism and 12 September Atatürkism.