Javid Bey has even published an account of the condition of Turkey, in which he finds arguments to justify the adhesion of his country to the policy of Germany.
Nevertheless it seems that Turkey, where the average taxation is now from 23 to 25 francs per head, can raise fresh taxes. The revenue of the State will also necessarily increase owing to the increase of production, as a tithe of 10 to 12 per cent. is levied on all agricultural produce. Finally, the building of new railway lines and the establishment of new manufactures—to which, it must be said, some competing States have always objected for their own benefit but to the prejudice of Turkey—would enable her to make herself the manufactured goods she bought at a very high price before, instead of sending abroad her raw materials: silk, wool, cotton, hemp, opium, etc.
The soil of Turkey, on the other hand, contains a good deal of mineral and other wealth, most of which has not been exploited yet. There is a good deal of iron in Asia Minor, though there exists but one iron-mine, at Ayasmat, opposite to Mitylene, the yearly output of which is only 30,000 tons. The most important beds now known are those of the Berut Hills, north of the town of Zeitun, about fifty miles from the Gulf of Alexandretta, which may produce 300,000 tons a year. Chrome, manganese, and antimony are also found there.
There is copper everywhere in the north, in thin but rich layers, containing 20 per cent. of metal. The chief mine, which is at Argana, in the centre of Anatolia, is a State property. A French company, the Syndicate of Argana, founded for the prospecting and exploitation of the copper concessions at Argana and Malatia, and the concessions of argentiferous lead at Bulgar-Maden, had begun prospecting before the war.
Lead, zinc, and silver are found, too, in the Karahissar area, where is the argentiferous lead mine of Bukar-Dagh, once a State property. Before the war a French company of the same type as the one above mentioned, the Syndicate of Ak-Dagh, had obtained the right to explore the layers of zinc and argentiferous lead in the vilayet of Angora. The mines of Balia-Karaidin (argentiferous lead and lignite) lying north-east of the Gulf of Adramyti in the sanjak of Karassi, are controlled by French capital. The English syndicate Borax Consolidated has the concession of the boracite mines in the same sandjak.
The range of Gumich-Dagh, or “Silver Mountain,” contains much emery. At Eskishehr there are mines of meerschaum, and in the Brusa vilayet quarries of white, pink, and old-blue marble, lapis-lazuli, etc.
A few years ago gold layers were being exploited at Mender-Aidin, near Smyrna, and others have been found at Chanak-Kale, near the Dardanelles. Some gold-mines had been worked in Arabia in remote ages.
There are oil-fields throughout the peninsula, lying in four parallel lines from the north-west to the south-east. The best-known fields are in the provinces of Mosul and Baghdad, where nearly two hundred have been identified; others have also been found near the Lake of Van, and at Pulk, west of Erzerum, which are not inferior to those of Mesopotamia; and others fifty miles to the south of Sinope.
There are almost inexhaustible layers of excellent asphalt at Latakieh, on the slopes of the Libanus, and others, quite as good, at Kerkuk, Hit, and in several parts of Mesopotamia.
Finally, some coal-mines are being worked at Heraclea which are controlled by French capital, and coal outcrops have been found lately in the Mosul area near the Persian frontier, between Bashkala and Rowanduz and Zahku, close to the Baghdad Railway. But the treaty, as will be shown later on, is to deprive Turkey of most of these sources of wealth.