Europe Since 1918

by Herbert Adams Gibbons

With Russian help the Nationalists were able to attack the French in Cilicia. The French were driven out of Marash, and, after a pitched battle on the Bagdad Railway, north of Alexandretta, the French retired from Cilicia altogether, leaving to the mercy of the Turks the Armenians, whom they had formed in battalions to help them fight, and abandoning enormous war supplies of every kind. Charges have been made that the French left these supplies purposely, and also that they abandoned the Armenians when the military situation did not necessitate their doing so. Color was given to the accusation by the fact that the French were already in secret negotiations with the Nationalists and by the statements later made at Angora by M. Franklin Bouillon that the Nationalists had reason to appreciate the good will France had shown in Cilicia.

The Nationalist successes in the Caucasus and Cilicia occurred in March, 1921. One month earlier the Angora Government had sent a delegation to the London conference, authority of which was recognized by the Constantinople Turks, who joined their delegation with that of Angora, and acknowledged the Nationalist leader, Bekir Sami Bey, as head of the joint delegation. Little progress was made at the London Conference, as we have seen elsewhere, in the solution of the Near Eastern question. But Bekir Sami Bey concluded at London secret treaties with France and Italy. The Italian treaty gave Italy important economic concessions, and promised the withdrawal of Italian troops from Turkish territory, in return for Italian support to secure the restitution of Smyrna and Thrace to Turkey. The Angora assembly was not satisfied with the French treaty and refused to ratify it, pending the outcome of the military operations in Cilicia.

On March 16, 1921, the Nationalists concluded a treaty with Soviet Russia, according to which each contracting party pledged itself not to recognize any treaty or other agreement imposed upon the other party by force, and the Russians promised to ignore the Constantinople Government. On July 30 the Angora National Assembly ratified by 202 votes against 1 the treaty with the Bolshevists.

Angora’s relations with Moscow, and the humiliation inflicted upon her in Cilicia and by the refusal of Angora to ratify the treaty concluded in London, did not deter France from continuing to seek favors at Angora. M. Franklin Bouillon, who was president of the Foreign Relations Committee of the French Senate, made two visits to Angora in June and September. The second proved more fruitful than the first, for in the meantime the Greeks had won notable victories and had extended their occupation in Western Asia Minor. It is a sad commentary upon the fundamental heartlessness and cynicism of international politics that France, who profited greatly in Syria by the Greek victories of the summer of 1921, should have used the advantage they gave her to help her enemies against her ally.

On October 20, 1921, Mustafa Kemal Pasha and M. Franklin Bouillon signed a treaty, which was ratified by the French Government ten days later. The convention was elaborate. France not only gave back to the Nationalists Cilicia (which she had received from Great Britain) without any stipulation for the protection of the unfortunate Armenians to whom the French authorities in Cilicia had appealed three years earlier to help France against the Turks, but returned to Turkish rule a strip of northern Syria that had been included in the mandate entrusted to France by the League of Nations. The section of the Bagdad Railway up to the Tigris was restored to Turkey. In return for extensive and exclusive economic concessions and preferential commercial treatment, France agreed to make the same promise that Italy had made, i. e., to support the Angora Government in ousting Greece from Smyrna and Thrace. The news of the treaty, leaking out almost immediately, caused a great outcry against France in Great Britain. Parliament and press united in denouncing the French act as a blow to the Entente alliance, a disloyal and underhand proceeding, and the betrayal of France’s glorious and traditional rôle as protector of the Christians in the Levant.

The success of the Kemalists in 1921 had as great an effect at Constantinople as at Athens. At the beginning of the year Mustafa Kemal Pasha had officially notified the Constantinople Grand Vizir that the Angora Nationalist Government was the only government in Turkey, and that no measures passed or decrees issued in Constantinople would thereafter be considered as valid. This was a warning to all the world. Gradually during the year Angora increased in prestige among the Turks, and the Sultan’s authority diminished. Despite the unfavorable military situation of the Kemalists in Western Asia Minor, the great mass of the Turks in Constantinople believed that salvation would come to Angora. On November 1, 1921, the Angora Government declared itself constitutional, with the cabinet fully responsible to parliament. A commission was appointed to suggest modifications to the Constitution of 1908. Mustafa Kemal Pasha announced that when his Government returned to Constantinople the power of the Sultan would be strictly limited.

In 1922 Angora became the Mecca of concession-hunters, Bolshevist and anti-Bolshevist agitators, and European agents for the sale of war materials. Because of the refusal of France and Italy to tolerate a Greek blockade, the Kemalists were able to import all the supplies they could buy for cash or on credit. In the spring they began to use the same means they had employed against the Armenians to exterminate the several hundred thousand Greeks living in the Black Sea regions, mostly in the old kingdom of Pontus, whose medieval capital was Trebizond. News of the massacres and deportations was carefully concealed; for the Turks knew that the principal misgiving Entente diplomacy had in the matter of the restoration of Western Asia Minor to Turkish rule was the fear of massacres of Christians, which would perturb public opinion.

The Nationalists seemed to have become friends with all the world except the British. Lloyd George and Curzon were rightly suspected of secretly encouraging the Greeks and of hostility to the Kemalist movement. Nationalism always being akin to fanaticism, it was not surprising that anti-British feeling should become one of the cardinal points of Kemalism. The British seemed to stand between the Turks and their escape from the consequences of the World War, while the French and Italians were willing to let them off scot-free. The British also were the opponents of Nationalism throughout the Mohammedan world, in Egypt, Mesopotamia, Palestine, Persia, and India. The attitude of the Nationalists toward Great Britain is illustrated by extracts from an article published in the spring of 1922 in the “Peyam Sabah,” an Angora newspaper, over the signature of one of Kemal Pasha’s leading satellites, Aka Goundouz:

One thing stands out definite, unshakable, eruptive like a volcano, stable and firm like the faith in God, infinite like time and darkness: hatred against the British.

The Mohammedan who really feels the need of purity of spirit in support of his religious convictions needs something else: hatred against the British.

It is the British who sow trouble and discord amongst you, O servants of Christ. You should therefore know that if the commandments of the Holy Spirit are ten in number, the eleventh should be hatred against the British.

There is a certain force which blows up civilization, kicks at virtue, and opposes humanity: it is England.

There is a typhoon which soaks with blood the cradles of the innocent, devastates the hearths, and causes foams of blood to cover lips that wish to smile: it is England.

And you, army of the Creator and Just One! Every time you massacre a Greek you are pulling down one of the corner-stones of the British Empire. So, for God’s sake, massacre. For the love of your country, massacre. O army of righteousness, on the day of your victory everybody will spit on the shameless face of the British.

In May and June the British press made much of reports of massacres, and the question of the responsibility of the Entente Powers was brought up in Parliament. Because the Kemalists had answered by blanket denials and by counter-charges against the Greeks, which were supported by the French and also by American concession-hunters, the British Government proposed a commission of investigation in which the United States was invited to participate. The commission was to visit the regions occupied by the Greeks as well as those over which the Kemalists held sway, and report to the Supreme Council. Secretary Hughes accepted the proposal. So did the Greek Government. But the Angora Government refused, on the ground that the commission would be made up of those who were technically still the enemies of Turkey. At the closing session of Parliament, on August 5, 1922, Lloyd George made a stirring speech against the claims of the Turkish Nationalists.