AHMED RUSTEM BEY

Greece had always coveted Anatolia which was a part of the Ottoman Empire but had been in antiquity a Greek dominated area. Further, people of Greek ethnicity and culture, who hundreds of years ago use to be the vast majority were after the hundreds of years of Ottoman rule and migration were then the largest minority in Anatolia. After the Turks lost the First World War as a consequence of their allying with Germany, and had been stripped of its Arab territories and was determined to keep the territories that they still had. Also, Turkey had just undergone a revolution and the old order was displaced. Venizelos and the Greeks saw this as an opportunity to get back Anatolia and sent a military invasion force to land at Smyrna (Ismir to the Turks), the largest city of Anatolia where despite the Greek minority in all of Anatolia, Greeks were a small majority in Smyrna and many of the ethnic Greeks not only aided the Greeks once they had landed but participated in atrocities against the minority of Turkish Muslims of Smyrna. The Ambassador was then trying to rationalize the heavy hand with which the Turks dealt with the indigenous Greeks many of whom were guilty and many of whom were not.

This classic, but feeble, claim that Turkey was going to be neutral in WWI. He the ambassador admitted that Turkey had mobilized all its male population, and that a German General on active duty was in command of the Turkish army for “training”, yet they intended to be neutral. Shortly thereafter Turkey and Germany announced an axis alliance which was a great foreign policy blunder for Turkey. Then they (with Germany) lost the war, the Ottoman Empire was broken up in the peace treaty and Turkey went from a huge empire to just a country. Incredibly, later in WWII Turkey made the same blunder and allied and fought with Hitler and Germany again.

Greece had always coveted Anatolia which was a part of the Ottoman Empire but had been in antiquity a Greek dominated area. Further, people of Greek ethnicity and culture, who hundreds of years ago use to be the vast majority were after the hundreds of years of Ottoman rule and migration were then the largest minority in Anatolia. After the Turks lost the First World War as a consequence of their allying with Germany, and had been stripped of its Arab territories and was determined to keep the territories that they still had. Also, Turkey had just undergone a revolution and the old order was displaced. Venizelos and the Greeks saw this as an opportunity to get back Anatolia and sent a military invasion force to land at Smyrna (Ismir to the Turks), the largest city of Anatolia where despite the Greek minority in all of Anatolia, Greeks were a small majority in Smyrna and many of the ethnic Greeks not only aided the Greeks once they had landed but participated in atrocities against the minority of Turkish Muslims of Smyrna. The Ambassador was then trying to rationalize the heavy hand with which the Turks dealt with the indigenous Greeks many of whom were guilty and many of whom were not.

This classic, but feeble, claim that Turkey was going to be neutral in WWI. He the ambassador admitted that Turkey had mobilized all its male population, and that a German General on active duty was in command of the Turkish army for “training”, yet they intended to be neutral. Shortly thereafter Turkey and Germany announced an axis alliance which was a great foreign policy blunder for Turkey. Then they (with Germany) lost the war, the Ottoman Empire was broken up in the peace treaty and Turkey went from a huge empire to just a country. Incredibly, later in WWII Turkey made the same blunder and allied and fought with Hitler and Germany again.