Dedication
TO
ALL AMERICANS
BETWEEN ALASKA AND ANGORA
Foreword
This book contains my own observations and my own deductions from them. The responsibility for them is mine alone. I have never engaged in commercial, educational or missionary work. My interest in the Near and Middle East began with a newspaper assignment, and has continued with curiosity as its motive. This book is the result.
My thanks are due to the proprietors of Current History, New York, and Fortnightly Review, London, for their courteous permission to re-print herein parts of certain articles which have previously appeared in their pages.
Clair Price.
| CONTENTS | |
|---|---|
| PAGE | |
| CHAPTER I | |
| MUSTAPHA KEMAL PASHA, THE MAN | 1 |
| His personal appearance—The Eastern tradition of government under which he was born—The Western tradition which he has sought to transplant to his country—The diversion of the Turks from a military to an economic life, which he is beginning—“Do you think you will succeed?” | |
| CHAPTER II | |
| THE OLD OTTOMAN EMPIRE | 11 |
| Kemal’s birth at Salonica—How he became a Young Turk—What the old Ottoman Empire was like—The division of its population into religious communities—The Western challenge of its Rûm (Greek) community—Its duty to Islam. | |
| CHAPTER III | |
| THE YOUNG TURKISH PROGRAM | 22 |
| Kemal’s arrest and his exile to Damascus—His eventual return to Salonica—What the Young Turks wanted—The religious conservatism which confronted them—The role of American missionaries and educators—Christendom vs. Islam. | |
| CHAPTER IV | |
| THE RUSSIAN MENACE | 38 |
| How Russia and Great Britain fought across the old Ottoman Empire—How Russia entered Trans-Caucasia and came into contact with the Armenians—How it approached the back of British India through Central Asia—How Great Britain finally surrendered in the Anglo-Russian Treaty of 1907. | |
| CHAPTER V | |
| THE YOUNG TURKISH REVOLUTION | 48 |
| “On the morning of July 23, 1908”—The Old Turkish counter-revolution and its defeat—How Islam and the Christian communities nullified the Young Turkish program—Kemal’s break with Enver and his retirement from politics—The Balkan wars and nationalism. | |
| CHAPTER VI | |
| GERMANY AND THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE | 56 |
| British policy at Constantinople—The Bagdad railway concessions—Russia’s veto and the change of route—The Achilles’ Heel of Aleppo—Germany and Islam—The British Indian frontier in Serbia—The Great War. | |
| CHAPTER VII | |
| CHRISTENDOM AND THE WAR | 65 |
| CHAPTER VIII | |
| THE WAR AND ISLAM | 68 |
| Kemal hurries back to Constantinople and Rauf Bey asks the British Embassy to finance neutrality—Enver enters the war and Persia attempts to follow him—The hard position of Islam in India. | |
| CHAPTER IX | |
| THE ARMENIAN DEPORTATIONS OF 1915 | 76 |
| Enver and the Armenian Patriarch—Where the Armenians lived—American missionaries and the Armenians—Russia and the Armenians—Great Britain joins Russia in the 1907 Treaty—Enver’s demand for British administrators in the Eastern provinces—The War and the Armenian deportations. | |
| CHAPTER X | |
| THE 1907 TREATY AND THE CALIPHATE | 89 |
| Great Britain promises Constantinople to Russia—Arab nationalism and the Holy Places of Islam—The Hejaz becomes independent of Constantinople—The British capture Jerusalem—The Caliphate agitation in India. | |
| CHAPTER XI | |
| THE COLLAPSE OF CZARIST RUSSIA | 98 |
| The Czar abdicates—The French depose Constantine at Athens—Kemal urges Enver to withdraw from the War—Mr. Lloyd George’s new war aims in Turkey—The Anglo-Russian Treaty of 1907 abrogated—Pan-Turanianism leaps into life on the heels of the Russian rout—The Mudros Armistice opens the British road to the chaos in Russia. | |
| CHAPTER XII | |
| THE ANGLO-RUSSIAN WAR OF 1918-’20 | 108 |
| How Mr. Lloyd George tried to impose alone upon Islam that fate which Great Britain and Russia had agreed to impose together in 1907—The Anglo-Persian Agreement—The “Central Asian Federation”—The American Mandate in Trans-Caucasia—The return of Soviet Russia. | |
| CHAPTER XIII | |
| THE GRECO-TURKISH WAR BEGINS | 120 |
| Constantinople and the growth of Greek Nationalism—Surrounded by British forces, the Turks go back to peace—Application of the secret treaties which the Allies had drawn up during the War—The Oecumenical Patriarchate breaks off its relations with the Ottoman government. | |
| CHAPTER XIV | |
| SMYRNA, 1919 | 127 |
| Kemal returns to Constantinople—Turkish confusion in the capital—The Turks ask for an American mandate—How Kemal and Rauf Bey left for Samsun and Smyrna, respectively—The Greek Pontus program—The Greek occupation of Smyrna—The Turks go back to war. | |
| CHAPTER XV | |
| THE ORTHODOX SCHISM IN ANATOLIA | 142 |
| Kemal falls to the status of a “bandit”—Turkish Nationalism begins to re-mobilize and re-equip its forces—The Erzerum Program and the Nationalist victory in the Ottoman elections—How Papa Eftim Effendi broke with the Oecumenical Patriarchate—The Turkish Orthodox Church—Papa Eftim himself. | |
| CHAPTER XVI | |
| THE TREATY OF SEVRES | 154 |
| Rauf Bey takes the Nationalist Deputies from Angora to Constantinople—India compels Mr. Lloyd George to leave Constantinople to the Turk and General Milne breaks up the Parliament, deporting Rauf and many of his colleagues to Malta—The Sevres Treaty and how Damad Ferid Pasha secured authority to sign it. | |
| CHAPTER XVII | |
| ANGORA | 160 |
| Fevzi, Rafet and Kiazim Karabekr Pashas and their military dictatorship under Kemal Pasha—The “Pontus” deportations—Mosul, the Kurds and the split in Islam—The Franco-Armenian Front in Cilicia, the Greek Front before Smyrna, and the Allied Front before Constantinople—How the broken parliament was reconstructed at Angora—Ferid’s counter-revolution at Konia. | |
| CHAPTER XVIII | |
| TURKISH NATIONALISM | 177 |
| The Western tradition of government to which the Grand National Assembly was built—How Nationalism was created—Greek defeat at the Sakaria River—Peace with the French in Cilicia—How a civilian administration was begun at Angora while Fevzi Pasha was re-mobilizing and re-equipping the Turkish Armies. | |
| CHAPTER XIX | |
| SMYRNA, 1922 | 199 |
| Allied efforts to hitch the Sevres Treaty to Turkish Nationalism—Greeks transfer troops from Smyrna to Eastern Thrace for a move on Constantinople and when Fethy Bey is refused a hearing in London, Fevzi Pasha launches his attack—The Turkish recovery of Smyrna—Mr. Lloyd George resigns and the Ottoman Sultan flees—Lausanne. | |
| CHAPTER XX | |
| THE REAL PROBLEM OF TURKISH NATIONALISM | 219 |
| Economic beginnings in the new Turkish State—Mustapha Kemal Pasha opens the Smyrna Congress—The Chester Concession a step from imperialism to law. | |
| CHAPTER XXI | |
| THE REBIRTH OF TURKEY | 229 |
| ILLUSTRATIONS | |
|---|---|
| FIELD MARSHAL MUSTAPHA KEMAL PASHA | Frontispiece |
| FACING PAGE | |
| HUSSEIN RAUF BEY GENERAL RAFET PASHA | 16 |
| FIELD MARSHAL FEVZI PASHA ALI FETHY BEY | 48 |
| LIEUT.-GEN. SIR CHARLES A. HARINGTON, G. B. E., K. C. B., D. S. O. GENERAL ISMET PASHA | 80 |
| PAPA EFTIM EFFENDI MELETIOS IV | 112 |
| ASSEMBLY BUILDING AT ANGORA | 144 |
| REAR-ADMIRAL COLBY M. CHESTER REAR-ADMIRAL MARK L. BRISTOL, U. S. N. | 176 |
| GENERAL MOUHEDDIN PASHA MEHMED EMIN BEY | 208 |