It is a well-known fact that Germany, while carefully organising
the conflict that was to lay waste the whole world and give her the
hegemony of the globe, had not neglected Turkey. Her manœuvres ended,
before the war, in concluding a Turco-German treaty of alliance, signed
in Constantinople at four o’clock in the afternoon of August 2, 1914,
by Baron von Wangenheim and the Grand Vizier Said Halim, an Egyptian
prince, cousin to the former Khedive of Egypt and Mehemet Ali’s
grandson. It seems that the Turkish negotiators had plainly told the
German representatives that they only meant to fight against Russia,
and they did not even require any guarantee against the action of
France and England.
The spirit in which these negotiations were carried on has been lately
corroborated by a statement of M. Bompard, former French Ambassador at
Constantinople, who, in answer to a newspaper article concerning the
circumstances under which Turkey entered into the war, and the episode
of the _Goeben_ and the _Breslau_,[10] wrote in the same newspaper:[11]
“Owing to the treaty of August 2, Turkey was ipso facto a
belligerent; yet though the military authorities acted in
conformity with the treaty, the civil authorities—_i.e._, the
Government, properly speaking—had a somewhat different attitude. In
the first place, the Government denied it was at war with France
and England. The Grand Vizier had even made a formal declaration
of neutrality in Paris and London; it only had to do with Russia;
besides, the thing was not urgent, as the Russian decree of
mobilisation had just been issued.”
In the first article of the treaty it was stated that both Powers
should maintain a strict neutrality in the conflict between
Austria-Hungary and Serbia. This clause, however, was only intended to
give the treaty a pacific appearance, for it was said in Clause 2 that
if Russia intervened and thus compelled Germany to support her ally,
Austria-Hungary, Turkey should be under the same obligation.
Now, on the previous day, Germany had declared war on Russia, and thus
the second article came into effect immediately. So by this treaty
Germany really wanted to throw Turkey into the war by the side of the
Central Powers.
The other clauses laid down the conditions of a military co-operation.
The most important one was that Turkey pledged herself to let the
German military mission have the control in the conduct of operations,
“according to what was agreed between His Excellency the War Minister
and the President of the Military Mission.” Theoretically the treaty
was to come to an end on December 31, 1918, but, if not denounced six
months before that date, it was to be renewed for five years more.
Clause 8 and last expressly said that the agreement was to be kept
secret.
On October 29, 1914, two Turkish torpedo-boats entered the port of
Odessa, sank a Russian gun-boat, and fired at the French liner
_Portugal_, and a Turco-German squadron made a surprise attack upon
Theodosia and Novorossisk. Then the Allied Powers declared war on
Turkey on November 5.
Yet, after keeping neutral during the first three months of the war,
Turkey seems to have had some hesitation in entering the conflict,
notwithstanding German pressure. Most of her statesmen, who had weighed
the financial and political consequences of her intervention, did not
seem to consider they were to the advantage of their country; but
the ambitious aims of Enver Pasha, who was devoted to Germany, for
his success depended on her triumph, prevailed upon Turkey to yield.
On the other hand, the Grand Vizier, Said Halim Pasha, pointed out
on October 2, 1914, to the Austrian ambassador, who urged Turkey to
utilise her fleet, that if the latter was ever defeated by the Russian
fleet, Constantinople would be endangered. But a few days after, on
October 15, he declared that the only obstacle to Turkish intervention
was the penury of the treasury. Indeed, it is probable that Javid Bey,
Minister of Finance, who had just signed an agreement with France
concerning Turkish railways and finance, was not very eager to declare
war on a country whose financial help was indispensable. He had even
made overtures on several occasions to the ambassadors of the Entente,
on behalf of the moderate members of the Ministry. In August, 1914,
he offered to come to an agreement with the Entente providing that
the Capitulations were suppressed, and in September he asked them to
recognise the suppression of the Capitulations in order to be able to
demobilise the Ottoman army. He resigned after the declaration of war,
but consented to be member of a new Cabinet the next year.
It seems probable, too, that Talaat for rather a long time favoured
an attitude of neutrality in order to obtain for Turkey, among
other political and economic advantages, the suppression of the
Capitulations, and that only later on he finally, like Jemal, Minister
of Marine, sided with Enver Pasha and the Germans. On September 6
Talaat Bey told Sir L. du Pan Mallet that there was no question of
Turkey entering the war,[12] and on September 9 he declared to the same
ambassador, with regard to the Capitulations, that the time had come to
free Turkey from foreign trammels.[13]
Ghalib Kemaly Bey, Turkish Minister at Athens, in a telegram addressed
to Said Halim Pasha on June 15, 1914, had informed him he had just
learnt that “Greece, by raising a conflict, expected a general
conflagration would ensue which might bring on the opening of the
question of Turkey-in-Asia.” On August 7, 1914, he stated in another
dispatch sent from Athens to the Sublime Porte:
“In the present war England, according to all probabilities, will
have the last word. So if we are not absolutely certain to triumph
finally, it would be a highly venturesome thing for us to rush
into an adventure, the consequences of which might be—which God
forbid—fatal to our country.”
In a long report dated September 9, 1914, he added:
“The present circumstances are so critical and so fraught with
danger that I take the liberty humbly to advise the Imperial
Government to keep a strict neutrality in the present conflicts,
and to endeavour to soothe Russia....
“The compact lately signed in London by the Allies shows that the
war is expected to last long.... A State like the Ottoman Empire,
which has enormous unprotected sea-coasts and remote provinces open
to foreign intrigues, should certainly beware of the enmity of a
malignant and vindictive country like England....”
So it appears that the decision of Turkey was not taken unanimously and
only after much hesitation.
Henceforth the operations engaged in by both sides followed their due
course.
In Europe the Franco-British squadrons under the command of Admiral
Carden began on November 3 to bombard the forts which guarded the
entrance of the Dardanelles. On February 25, 1915, a combined attack of
the Allied fleets took place, and on March 18 a general attack was made
by the Franco-British squadrons, in which three of their ironclads were
sunk, four were severely damaged, and other ships were disabled.
On April 25 to 27 the English and French troops landed in Gallipoli,
and after driving back the Turks advanced on May 6 to 8. But when the
expeditionary corps had failed to reach Krithia and the Kareves-Dere,
then, after a violent offensive of the Turks, which was repulsed
on June 21, and the failure of a diversion against the Sari-Bair
Mountains, it was withdrawn on January 8, 1916.
In Asia, after the Turkish naval action in the Black Sea, and the
march of the Turkish troops against Kars and Tiflis, the Russians
invaded Armenia, in Asia Minor, on November 4, 1914, and took Ardost.
On November 8 they captured Bayazid and Kuprikeui; Ardahan and
Sary-Kamysh, where, as will be seen later on, the Armenians were partly
responsible for the Turkish retreat, December 21 and 22; on May 19,
1915, Van fell; then, in the following year, Erzerum (February 16,
1916), Mush (February 18), Bitlis (March 2), Trebizond (April 18),
Baiburt (July 16), and Erzinjan (July 25). Thus the Russian troops had
conquered the four provinces of Erzerum, Van, Trebizond, and Bitlis,
extending over an area of 75,000 square miles.
In Mesopotamia the British brigade of Indian troops came into action on
November 8, 1914, and captured the little fort at Fao, which commands
the entrance of the Shatt-el-Arab. On November 17 it was victorious
at Sihan, took Basra on the 22nd, and Korna on December 9 of the same
year. Next year, on July 3, 1915, the British troops captured Amara,
Suk-esh-Shuyukh on July 21, Naseriya on the 25th of the same month, and
on September 29 they occupied Kut-el-Amara, which the Turks recaptured
on April 18, 1916, taking General Townshend prisoner. On February 28,
1917, Kut-el-Amara fell again to British arms, then Baghdad on March
11. On April 2, 1917, the English and Russian forces joined together at
Kizilrobat on the main road to Persia, and all the Indian frontier was
wholly freed from the Turco-German pressure.
But after the Russian revolution, the Turks successively recaptured all
the towns the Russian troops had conquered in Transcaucasia and Asia
Minor, and soon threatened Caucasus.
Meanwhile in Arabia the Turks had suddenly invaded the Aden area, where
they were beaten on the 21st by the British at Sheikh-Othman and on
the 25th at Bir-Ahmed.
On June 10, 1916, the Arab rising broke out. On June 14 they were
masters of Mecca. On July 1 they took Jeddah, then Rabagh, then
Yambo on the Red Sea. On November 6, 1916, the Sherif of Mecca, the
Emir Hussein, was proclaimed King of the Hejaz, under the name of
Hussein-Ibn-Ali.
As early as November 3, 1914, Turkey, which occupied all the Sinai
Peninsula, threatened Egypt. A first Turkish offensive against the
Suez Canal was checked from February 2 to 4 simultaneously before
El-Kantara, Al-Ferdan, Toussoun, and Serapeum. A second Turkish
offensive, started on July 29, 1916, was also crushed before Romani
near the Suez Canal, on the 5th at Katia and on the 11th at Bir-el-Abd.
The British army then launched a great offensive in December, 1916,
which resulted, on December 21, in the capture of El-Arish, on the
boundary of the Sinaitic desert, and in the occupation of Aleppo on
October 26, 1918. On January 9, 1917, they took Rafa, then Beersheba on
October 31, 1917, Gaza on November 7, and Jaffa on November 17; and on
December 11, 1917, General Allenby entered Jerusalem.
In September, 1918, a new offensive took place, backed by the French
troops that took Nablus, and the French navy that made the British
advance possible by bombarding the coast. General Allenby entered Haïfa
and Acre on September 23 and Tiberias on the 24th, and on the 28th he
effected his junction with the troops of the King of the Hejaz. He
entered Damascus on October 1 with the Emir Feisal, who commanded the
Arabian army. On October 6 the French squadron sailed into the port
of Beyrut, which was occupied on the 7th. Tripoli was captured on the
13th, Homs on the 15th, Aleppo on the 26th of October, 1918. By this
time Syria, Lebanon, Mesopotamia, and Arabia had fallen into the hands
of the Allies.
Meanwhile the disintegration of the Turkish troop was completed
by General Franchet d’Espérey’s offensive and the capitulation of
Bulgaria. Turkey applied to General Townshend—who had been taken
prisoner at Kut-el-Amara—to treat with her victors. The negotiations of
the armistice were conducted by Rauf Bey, Minister of the Navy; Reshad
Hikmet Bey, Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs; and Sadullah
Bey, head of the general staff of the Third Army.
As early as 1916 Turkey of her own authority had suppressed the
Capitulations—_i.e._, the conventions through which the Powers, as has
been seen, had a right, amongst other privileges, to have their own
tribunals and post-offices; and by so doing she had freed herself from
the invidious tutelage of Europe.
The Ottoman Government, in a note sent on November 1, 1916, by the
Turkish ambassadors in Berlin and Vienna to the German and Austrian
Ministers of Foreign Affairs, notified to their respective Governments
and the neutrals that henceforth they looked upon the two international
treaties of Paris and Berlin as null and void.
Now the treaties of Paris in 1856 and of Berlin in 1878 were the most
important deeds that had hitherto regulated the relations between
the Ottoman Empire and the other European Powers. The treaty of
Paris confirmed the treaty of 1841, according to which the question
of the closing of the Straits to foreign warships was considered as
an international question which did not depend only on the Turkish
Government.
The Berlin treaty of 1878, too, asserted a right of control and
tutelage of the Powers over Turkey, and in it Turkey solemnly promised
to maintain the principle of religious liberty, to allow Christians to
bear evidence in law-courts, and to institute reforms in Armenia.
As the King of Prussia and the Emperor had signed the treaty of Paris,
and the Austrian Emperor and the German Emperor had signed the treaty
of Berlin, Turkey could not denounce these treaties without the assent
of these two allied countries, which thus gave up the patrimonial
rights and privileges wrested from the Sultan by Western Europe in the
course of the last three centuries. This consideration accounts for the
support Turkey consented to give the Central Powers and the sacrifices
she engaged to make.
In order to understand the succession of events and the new policy
of Turkey, the reader must be referred to the note of the Ottoman
Government abrogating the treaties of Paris and Berlin which was handed
on November 1, 1916, by the Turkish ambassadors in Berlin and Vienna
to the German and Austrian Ministers of Foreign Affairs. This note,
recalling the various events which had taken place, pointed out that
they justified Turkey in casting off the tutelage of both the Allied
Powers and the Central Powers:
“Owing to the events that took place in the second half of the last
century, the Imperial Ottoman Empire was compelled, at several times,
to sign two important treaties, the Paris treaty on March 30, 1866,
and the Berlin treaty on August 3, 1878. The latter had, in most
respects, broken the balance established by the former, and they were
both trodden underfoot by the signatories that openly or secretly broke
their engagements. These Powers, after enforcing the clauses that were
to the disadvantage of the Ottoman Empire, not only did not care for
those that were to its advantage, but even continually opposed their
carrying out.
“The Paris treaty laid down the principle of the territorial integrity
and independence of the Ottoman Empire; it also stipulated that this
clause should be fully guaranteed by all the Powers, and forbade any
meddling, either with the relations between the Imperial Government and
its subjects, or with the interior administration of the Ottoman Empire.
“Nevertheless, the French Government kept on interfering by force
of arms in Ottoman territory, and demanded the institution of a new
administrative organisation in Lebanon. Then the Powers signatory to
the treaty were compelled to participate in this action by diplomatic
ways, in order not to let France have a free hand in carrying out her
plans, which were contrary to the Paris treaty and paved the way to
territorial encroachments.
“On the other hand, the Russian Government, pursuing a similar policy,
held in check by an ultimatum the action of the Porte against the
principalities of Serbia and Montenegro, where it had raised an
insurrection, and which it had fully provided with arms, supplies,
officers, and soldiers; and after demanding the institution of a new
foreign administration in some Ottoman provinces and of a foreign
control over their home affairs, it finally declared war against Turkey.
“In the same manner the clauses of the Paris treaty did not hinder
either the French Government from occupying Tunis and turning this
province of the Ottoman Empire into a French protectorate—or the
English from occupying Egypt to become the ruling power there, and
from encroaching upon Ottoman sovereignty in the south of the Yemen,
in Nejed, Koweit, Elfytyr, and the Persian Gulf. In spite of the same
clauses the four Powers now at war against Turkey have also recently
modified the condition of Crete and instituted a new state of things
inconsistent with the territorial integrity that they had guaranteed.
“Finally Italy, without any serious reason, merely in order to have
territorial compensations after the new political situation created in
Northern Africa, did not hesitate to declare war against the Ottoman
Empire, and did not even comply with the engagement she had taken, in
case of a contention with the Imperial Government, to refer the case to
the mediation of the Powers signatory of the treaty before resorting to
war.
“It is not necessary to mention all the other cases of interference in
the home affairs of the Ottoman Empire.
“The Berlin treaty, concluded after the events of 1877-78, completely
remodelled the Paris treaty by creating in European Turkey a new state
of things, which was even modified by posterior treaties. But soon
after the Berlin treaty the Russian Government showed how little it
cared for its engagements. Even before capturing Batum it managed to
annex that fortified place by declaring openly and officially its
intention to turn it into a free trade port. The British Government
consented to renew some of its engagements. Yet the Cabinet of
Petrograd, after fulfilling its aspirations, simply declared that the
clause relating to this case was no longer valid, and turned the town
into a naval station. As for the British Government, it did not carry
out any of the protective measures it had hinted at, which shows how
little it cared for the régime instituted by the Berlin treaty.
“Though the Imperial Ottoman Government scrupulously submitted to
the harsh, heavy clauses of the treaty, a few previsions that were
favourable to it were never carried out, in spite of its own insistence
and that of its protectors, because one of the Powers thought it its
own interest to raise difficulties to the Ottoman Empire.
“It ensues from all this that the fundamental and general clauses
of the treaties of Paris and Berlin, concerning the Ottoman Empire,
were annulled _ipso facto_ by some of the signatories. Now, since the
clauses of an international deed that are to the advantage of one of
the contracting parties have never been carried out, it is impossible
that the obligations contracted by this party should be considered as
valid still. Such a state of things makes it necessary, as far as the
aforesaid party is concerned, to annul such a treaty. It should also
be borne in mind that, since the conclusion of these two treaties, the
situation has completely changed.
“Since the Imperial Government is at war with four of the signatory
Powers, to whose advantage and at whose eager request the
aforesaid treaties were concluded, it follows that these treaties
have become null and void, as far as the relations between Turkey
and these Powers are concerned.
“Besides, the Imperial Government has concluded an alliance on a
footing of complete equality with the other two signatory Powers.
Henceforth the Ottoman Empire, being definitely freed from its
condition of inferiority and from the international tutelage some
of the Great Powers had an interest in maintaining, now sits in the
European concert with all the rights and privileges of a completely
independent State; and this new situation cancels even the causes
of the aforesaid international agreements.
“All these considerations deprive the aforesaid contracts of any
binding value.
“Nevertheless, that there may lurk no uncertainty on this head in
the mind of the contracting Powers that have turned their friendly
relations into an alliance with Turkey, the Imperial Government
begs to inform the German and Austro-Hungarian Governments that it
has annulled the treaties of 1856 and 1878.
“It also feels bound to declare that, in accordance with the
principles of international law, it will certainly avail itself
of such rights as are to its advantage, and have not yet been
recognised.
“On the other hand, the Imperial Government, under the pressure
of France, had been compelled to grant the sanjaks of Lebanon a
strictly administrative and restricted autonomy, that might be
a pretext to a certain extent to the intervention of the Great
Powers. Though this situation was never sanctioned by a regular
treaty, but by interior laws in 1861 and 1864, the Imperial Ottoman
Government, in order to avoid any misunderstanding, feels bound to
declare that it puts an end to that state of things, and, for the
reasons mentioned above, it institutes in this sandjak the same
administrative organisation as in the other parts of the Empire.”
After the military defeat of autumn, 1918, the leaders of the Committee
of Union and Progress who had governed the Ottoman Empire since 1905
disappeared, and the statesmen of the former régime came into office
again. In the very first days of October, 1918, the Talaat Pasha
Cabinet had offered its resignation, which had not been accepted at
first by the Sultan.
The new Ottoman Cabinet made a declaration of policy to Parliament on
Wednesday, October 23, 1918. In the opening address, read by the Grand
Vizier Izzet Pasha, an amnesty was promised to all political offenders.
Turkey stated she was quite ready to accept a peace, based on Mr.
Wilson’s fourteen points, and to grant at once to all the elements of
the population, without any distinction of nationality or religion,
full political rights and the right to a share in the administration
of the country. She also promised to solve the question of the Arabian
vilayets, to take into consideration their national aspirations, and to
grant them an autonomous administration, provided the bonds existing
between them, the Caliphate, and the Sultan, should be maintained. The
whole Chamber, with the exception of ten deputies who refused to vote,
passed a vote of confidence in the new Cabinet.
After the French victory in the East and the capitulation of Bulgaria,
the political changes, which had already begun in Turkey, soon became
quite pronounced. Talaat Pasha, whose ideas differed utterly from those
of Enver Pasha, and who had more and more confined his activity to the
war department, had gradually lost his influence over the policy of
the Empire since the death of Mehmed V. After having taken his share,
together with Enver and Jemal, in bringing Turkey into the war by the
side of the Central Powers in 1914, he now realised that the game was
up. Besides, the Ottoman Press now openly attacked the Cabinets of
the two Empires, and reproached them with neglecting the interests of
the Porte when the additional treaty of Brest-Litovsk was drafted,
during the negotiations of Bukharest, and later on in the course of the
negotiations with the Cabinet of Sofia.
Talaat, Javid, and Enver sought shelter in Berlin. Their flight greatly
affected the new Constantinople Government on account of some financial
malversations which had occurred while the leaders of the Committee of
Union and Progress were in office. So the Sublime Porte in December,
1918, demanded their extradition, which Germany refused to grant. In
April, 1919, Talaat, who lived in Berlin under the name of Sali Ali
Bey, and who later on opened a public-house in that city, was sentenced
to death by default in Constantinople, and a year later, in March,
1920, England, according to a clause of the Versailles treaty, put him
down on the list of the war-criminals[14] whose extradition might be
demanded.
Footnotes:
10: _L’Éclair:_ “Comment le Goeben et le Breslau échappèrent aux
flottes alliées,” by Henry Miles, June 16, 1921.
11: M. Bompard’s letter to the editor of the _Éclair_, June 23, 1921.
12: Blue Book, No. 64.
13: _Ibid._, No. 70.
14: Since the publication of the French edition of this book Talaat
was murdered on March 15, 1921, at Charlottenburg, by an Armenian
student named Solomon Teilirian, aged twenty-four, a native of Salmas
in Persia.