Comprehensive notes, question answers, and MCQs for Chapter 15 'Mustafa Kamal'. Covers the Turkish War of Independence, the abolition of the Sultanate, and Mustafa Kamal's great reforms.
The war was over. Throughout the entire Near and Middle East the armies of the democracies had been hailed not so much as conquerors, but as deliverers. Turks themselves were only too glad to be able to lay down arms after almost continuous fighting since 1911. A government formed from the old Liberals was in power in Istanbul; its members and the Padishah himself alike were eager to collaborate with the Allies. Their conception of the best interests of the nation was that of loyalty to the Armistice and co-operation with the occupying forces of the conquerors.
At Istanbul the old British Embassy was now the British High Commission, supported by military and naval detachments. Allied officers were supervising the police and the ports and the normal machinery of the government was practically superseded by orders and suggestions from the Allies.
At this time far away in Eastern Anatolia, one Kiyazim Karabekir with some undefeated remnants of the Ottoman Army, began to obstruct the Allied control officers, refusing to disband his men. Week by week little encounters increased; it was apparent that the Turks were steadily growing bolder. Even in the streets of Anatolia towns their bearing changed. This caused consternation not only among the Allies but in Istanbul itself. "Some one must go as the representative of the Padishah and deal with the situation on the spot — a strong capable soldier was wanted." Every indication seemed to point to one man as being suitable for the work, and Mustafa Kamal was the man.
At first the British High Commissioner demurred but his objections were for once overruled and Mustafa Kamal sailed on the 15th of May, 1919, for the north-east coast of Anatolia as Governor General of the Eastern Provinces. Scarcely had the small steamer bearing Mustafa Kamal entered the Black Sea than the authorities of Istanbul became suspicious of his intentions and issued orders for the ship to be intercepted. But it was too late.
The very same day it became clear beyond all doubt that the Allies had condemned the Ottoman Empire to be partitioned to the very walls of Istanbul. On the 15th of May, the Admiral of the Allied Detachment Force informed the Ottoman governor of Izmir that this great seaport and the rich province of Aydin were to be occupied by the Greeks. The Ottoman troops were hurriedly withdrawn into barracks as the Greek Metropolitan raised the Cross as the first Greek soldiers disembarked.
To all Turkish patriots these events meant that there was only one policy to be pursued. Even those most friendly to the Allies were infuriated by this foreign occupation of the richest and most essentially Turkish of their provinces. Turkish patriotism was no longer vague and undecided: it was a flame burning in the hearts of men and women of all classes — a flame of indignation not of hatred for the Allies, but for the Anatolian Greeks. A magnificent Greek Royalist officer protested to his Government but invasion continued.
In a heavy storm Mustafa Kamal's small ship staggered towards the landing stage at Samsun on the coast of Anatolia. At Amisya he met Ali Faut, the commander of a small army corps centred on Ankara, and at a secret meeting of the patriots he sketched out his plan of resistance. First of all, guerilla bands must hold up the Greeks, and covered by these irregulars the patriots must build up the National army, but without any help from Mehmet IV or any one at Istanbul.
"As the Sultan and the Central Government are in enemy hands we must set up some temporary government in Anatolia," he continued. "A congress of delegates to represent the real free Turkey should be called as quickly as possible." Meanwhile Mustafa Kamal set out to tour the villages, preaching resistance and in every place appointing representatives to form centres for patriotic organization. But even the energy and personality of Mustafa Kamal would not have been so successful had not news arrived that the Greeks were advancing into the interior. Everywhere the local Turks vowed that death was preferable to rule by Greeks. Moreover the Allies who had made these plans were far away while near at hand was an un-disbanded Turkish army corps at Diyarbekir. Men came crowding back to the ranks with guns and ammunition raided from the Allied arms dumps.
As soon as Mehmet heard of these activities he ordered Mustafa Kamal to return. The patriot's reply was a long personal telegram to the Padishah urging him, as leader of his people, to come over to Anatolia and himself take the lead against the Greeks and all the foreign enemies. It would be Mehmet's last chance to save himself, the throne of his forefathers and the Turkish nation. But Mehmet's conception of the best interests of Turkey was co-operation with the powerful conquerors. In these circumstances the only imaginable reply to Mustafa Kamal's invitation was a peremptory command: the rebel must report himself immediately at Istanbul. Back along the wire went the most momentous telegram in the history of the Ottoman Empire: "I shall stay in Anatolia until the nation has won its independence."
Mehmet IV could see no other way to regain the provinces of Anatolia for the throne than by subtlety. With a sudden movement he unexpectedly proclaimed himself willing to summon a government pleasing to the Nationalists. The delegates in Anatolia could transfer their activities to Istanbul, put Mustafa Kamal's ideas into practice and yet no longer stand in opposition to the Padishah, the Shadow of God. The patriots, who could scarcely imagine their state without a Sultan as its head sooner or later, grasped at these promises. It was only Mustafa Kamal himself who fought hard for a parliament in Anatolia.
He suggested that it should sit in the upland town of Ankara, where it would be centrally situated, well protected, free, and absolutely independent of the Allies, in a thoroughly Turkish town associated with the history of the Turks and their forefathers. But for once he was defeated and Mustafa Kamal was left almost alone when on the 19th of January, 1920, the National Assembly assembled in the "City of the Sultan" and began the hopeless task of trying to work up resistance under the very eyes — and guns — of the Allies.
While the delegates were wasting their time on the Bosphorus, Mustafa Kamal was making exceptionally good use of the freedom which the absence of the talkers had given him. For the next few weeks Allied agents were kept busy reporting large armed formations seen in the interior — regular troops of the old Imperial army, armed peasants, women transporting ammunition and supplies as Turkish women had done in the days before Islam. The position was becoming really serious for the Allied Army of Occupation.
On the 16th of March, 1920, the Allied forces in Istanbul formally occupied the city, arrested leading patriots and dissolved the Parliament. Leading Patriots hid or escaped; again they made straight for Ankara to join Mustafa Kamal. There on the 23rd of April, 1920 the revolutionary Turkish Grand National Assembly met with Mustafa Kamal as President. Its first act was to make clear to the world the position of the new Turkish Government. "The Grand National Assembly sitting in Ankara will preside over the destiny of Turkey as long as the capital is in the hands of the foreigners. It has appointed an Executive Council which has taken in hand the government of the country. Istanbul, the Sultan, and the Government being in the hands of the enemy, all orders from there are automatically null and void. The nation's rights have been violated. The Turkish nation, though calm, is determined to maintain its right as a sovereign independent state."
At last the month of May, 1920 was drawing to its close and the Allies published the terms of peace which they were willing to make with Mehmet IV. A small and helpless Ottoman Empire was to be entirely under the supervision of the Allied powers; all the Arab provinces were to become Mandated Territories; the whole of Eastern Anatolia was to be added to the state of Armenia; around Izmir was to be a large Greek district; Cicilia was to go to the French; the Ottoman capital itself was to be an international centre under the control of Britain, France and Italy. Only the immediate hinterland of Istanbul was to remain of the once extensive Turkey in Europe.
The terms were so harsh that the Ottoman Government at Istanbul was branded by the patriots as a puppet government of traitors and dotards, and almost the entire Turkish nation accepted the Turkish government at Ankara. There was no one to enforce the terms of the treaty, in the event of Mehmet signing it.
On the 21st August, 1921 the Greeks attacked. In the mountain country above the Sakarya river, some fifty kilometers west of Ankara the two valiant peoples fought almost man to man for fourteen days under the burning heat of the sun, the Greeks attacking with reckless abandon, the Turks hanging grimly on the heights; Mustafa Kamal now their Commander-in-Chief. By the 4th of September, the critical moment had come: the Greeks were at the end of their strength. On the 12th they crossed the Sakarya and began to retire steadily.
It was in the end of August, 1922 that Mustafa Kamal was able to sound his famous battle-call: "Soldiers! Your goal is the Mediterranean. Forward!" Nine days later the advance guard of Turkish National forces drew within sight of the Mediterranean. There lay Izmir, crowded with refugees. There were ships for the Greek soldiers but none for the Greek and Armenian population. On the 9th of September, 1922, Mustafa Kamal entered Izmir.
Mustafa Kamal now realised that he must at last persuade the Ankara Government to make an end of the puppet show in the old capital. He proposed that the Sultanate should be abolished. The Grand Turkish National Assembly gave the verdict. By the unanimous Vote of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, the Sultanate is abolished.
On the 4th of November, 1922, Riffat carried out a coup d'etat at Istanbul. On the following day the Ottoman cabinet resigned. For a few days Mehmet stood his ground. On the 17th of November, 1922, a British motor ambulance drew up at a side door of the palace where Mehmet was staying. Some baggage was brought out of the palace and placed in the car. An elderly man followed. A British officer took his umbrella as he entered the vehicle. The door was closed and the ambulance drove away. The last of the Sultans was on his way to exile.
On the 29th October, 1923, the name of the Ottoman Empire was wiped from the slate of history; a salute of a hundred and one guns proclaimed the foundation of the Turkish Republic with Mustafa Kamal as President and General Ismet Inonu as Prime Minister.
On assuming power, Mustafa Kamal's first object was to educate the people. Mustafa Kamal declared the old script to be abolished and replaced by the Roman script. Thereupon he set out on a series of tours round the country to demonstrate, chalk in hand, how the new script should be used. The whole population went back to school.
Once he had simplified the Turkish script, Mustafa Kamal started upon a rather more difficult task — that of simplifying the language. He set up a committee for the purification of the language by substituting genuine Turkish words for those Arabic and Persian foreign words. The word "Pasha" was abolished; every man became Bay, and every woman became Bayan.
No less revolutionary was the abolition in 1925 of the national head-dress, the Fez. The Fez was in origin Greek, but it had come to be associated with Turkish life. When the wearing of hats was made compulsory there were barely enough hats to go round, so that the houses of the foreigners were ransacked and even men went about in Paris models.
Most striking was the abolition of the veil. As early as 1923 he had addressed the people of western Anatolia on the subject of women's rights: "Our nation has decided to be strong," he had said, "and our absolute need today is the higher education of women. They shall be instructed in every field of science and receive the same degrees as men."
No less great was the economic advance. In 1919, there was only one railway in Turkey and no roads at all judged by modern standards. Mustafa Kamal inaugurated great development and construction schemes both for railways and motor roads. In 1919, there were 150 factories in Turkey; in 1933, 2000. The banking system was organized and the Ottoman public debt was reduced to one-tenth of its former size.
It would be no exaggeration to say that at the time that Mustafa Kamal set to work, the mental and political development of the masses in Turkey was on a level with that of the people of Western Europe in the mid-eighteenth century. The Turks have now traversed in a few years the road which the people of Western Europe took 150 years to travel.