Crescent and Iron Cross Part 6

We pa.s.s, then, to the second avowed object of the Allies, namely, the expulsion from Europe of the Ottoman rule, which has proved itself so radically alien to Western civilisation. This must be taken to include not only the expulsion of the Turkish control from Thrace and Constantinople, but from the eastern side as well of the Bosporus, the Sea of Marmora, and the Dardanelles. At no future time must Turkey be in a position to command even partially a single yard of that momentous channel through which alone our Allies, Russia and Rumania, have access to the Mediterranean. Though this was not formally stated in the Allies'

reply to President Wilson, it is clearly part and parcel of the object in view, for while the Ottoman Empire retains the smallest control on either side of either of the Straits, she is so far able to interfere in European concerns, in which she must never more have a hand. The east sh.o.r.e, then, of the Straits and the Sea of Marmora, as well as the west, must be under the control of a Power, or a group of Powers, not alien to Western civilisation. Germany and her allies therefore, no less than Turkey, must be excluded from the guardians.h.i.+p of the Straits.

As we have had previous occasion to note, this ejection of the Turkish power from Constantinople is the absolute reversal of European and, in especial, of English policy for the last hundred years. No crime that the Ottoman Government could commit, no act of barbarism, would ever persuade us to do away with the anachronism of Turkey's existence in Europe; but at last the seismic convulsion of the war has knocked this policy into a heap of disjected ruins, and it can never be rebuilt again on the old lines. For among our other avowed objects in prosecuting the war to its victorious end, we have pledged ourselves to uphold the right which all peoples, whether small or great, have to the enjoyment of full security and free economic development. But while Turkey can close the Straits at her own arbitrary will, or at the bidding of a superior and malevolent Power, and block the pa.s.sage of s.h.i.+ps from Russian and Rumanian ports into the Mediterranean, the economic development of both these countries is seriously menaced. Three times within the last six years has she exercised that right, and while she holds the sh.o.r.es of the Straits she can at any moment blockade all southern Russian ports. That such power should be in the hands of any nation is highly undesirable; that it should be in the hands of a corrupt despotism like Turkey, especially now that Germany, as things stand, can dictate to Turkey when and what she pleases, is a thing unthinkable by the most improvident of statesmen. Already we have paid dearly enough for the pusillanimity of a hundred years: it is impossible that we should ever allow a similar bill to be again presented.

Whatever be the guardians.h.i.+p of the Straits, whoever the holder of Constantinople, it will not be Turkey.

At the beginning of the war, and indeed till after the revolution in Russia, it was announced and stated as an axiom that on the conclusion of peace, Russia should be the door-keeper of what after all is her own lodge-gate. Subsequently, in the unhappy splits and disintegration of her Government, it was announced that she favoured peace without annexation--in other words, that she neither claimed nor desired the guardians.h.i.+p of Constantinople. But I think we should be utterly wrong if we regarded that as an expression of the will of the Russian people: it is far more probable that it was the expression of the will of Germany, directly inspired by German influence with a view to concluding a separate peace with Russia. As we have seen, it had its due effect in Turkey, and Talaat Bey gave vent to pious e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns of thanksgiving, that now all cause of quarrel with Russia was removed, and Turkey and she could be friends. It is possible that when out of the confused cries there again rises from Russia the clear call of the people's voice, we shall find her wis.h.i.+ng to set in order her own house before she projects herself on new missions, but, as far as the manifesto of 'peace without territorial annexation' goes, we shall be wise to regard it for the present with the profoundest suspicion. It sounds far more like the tones of the Central European wolf than those of Little Red Riding Hood's proper grandmother.

But be Russia's decision what it may, the Turk will hold sway no longer in Thrace or Constantinople, or on the sh.o.r.es of the Straits of the Sea of Marmora. There is, of course, no question of deporting the whole of the Turkish population that lives in those regions, nor would it be desirable, even if it were possible, to realise Gladstone's robust vision of seeing every Turk, 'bag and baggage,' clear out from the provinces they have desolated and profaned. But if not under Russia, then under the joint control of certain of the Allied Powers there will be a complete reconstruction of the administration of those districts.

The headquarters of the protectorate will doubtless be at Constantinople, which will be reorganised somewhat on the lines of the Treaty Port of Shanghai, and will be open to the s.h.i.+ps of all nations.

The security of the town must be a.s.sured by a military garrison either of mixed troops of the controlling nations, or possibly by a rotation of troops drawn from the armies of each in turn. More important even than this will be the adequate control of the Straits by sea. A naval base must be formed, which by the gospel of the freedom of the seas (but not according to St. Goeben and the submarine disciples) will const.i.tute a patrolling police force of the waters. Whether the system of fortifications and defences that lately rendered the Dardanelles impregnable shall be retained or not is a question demanding the most careful consideration. Some will hold that they should be maintained in order to insure that none but the guarantors of the freedom of the Straits shall ever take possession of them: others that they shall be utterly dismantled and destroyed, so that the closing of the Straits shall be an impossibility. The matter really turns on the question as to the extent to which the Allies will have the prudence to cut Germany's claws when the war is over. It is eminently to be hoped that they will be cut so short that never again will they be able to show those chiselled talons beyond her velvet--that sense, in fact, will allow sentiment no word to say. Unfortunately, there are a great many people the basis of whose character consists of a washy confidence in the good intentions of everybody. Most mistakenly they call it Christianity.

Here, then, has been outlined the effect of the Allies' declared aims.

Such territories as Turkey holds in Europe, such control as she possesses over the free pa.s.sage of the Straits must pa.s.s from her, and the alien peoples, who for centuries have fainted and bled underneath her infamous yoke, must be led out of the land of bondage. As we have seen throughout preceding chapters, it was the fixed policy of the Ottoman Government to rid itself of their presence, and already it has gone far in its murderous mission. Indeed the avowed aims of the Allies, when accomplished, will do that work for her, for the Allies are determined to remove those peoples from Turkey. The difference of execution, however, consists in this, that they will not remove Arabs and Greeks and Italians and Jews, as Turkey has already done with the Armenians by the simple process of ma.s.sacres, but by a process no less simple, namely, of taking out of the territories of the Ottoman Empire the districts where such peoples dwell. The Allies will accomplish, in fact, for the Turks that policy of Ottomanisation which was the aim of Abdul Hamid, and has been the aim of his more murderous successors.

Turkey shall henceforth be for the Turks: she shall no more be in 'danger' from the defenceless nations, who at present exist within her borders. The Sultan of Turkey, in some year of grace now not far distant, will find that his Ottomanisation has been done for him, and, though his realm is curtailed, he will have his rest broken no more by the thought of Arab risings, nor will he have to devise measures that will solve the Arab question. Except for a strip along the west and south coast, all Asia Minor and Anatolia will be his from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean, but Syria, Armenia, the coast of Asia Minor, Palestine, and Mesopotamia shall have pa.s.sed from him. It is no dismemberment of an Empire that the Allies contemplate, for they cannot dismember limbs that never belonged to the real trunk. It was a despotic military control that the Osmanlis had established, they always regarded their subject peoples as aliens, whom they did not scruple to destroy if they exhibited symptoms of progress and civilisation. Henceforth the Turkish Government shall govern Turks, and Turks alone. That for many years has been its aim, and, by the disastrous dispensation of fate, it has been largely able to realise its purpose. Now, though by different methods, the Allies will see thorough accomplishment of it. There will be no question, of course, of turning out or of deporting Turks who live in Syria, in Armenia, in Constantinople, for the ways of the Allies are not those of Talaat and Enver and Jemal the Great. Where to-day Turks dwell, there shall they continue to dwell, but they must dwell there in peace in equal liberties and rights with the once-subject peoples whom the Allies shall have delivered. If they do not like that they can migrate, not by forced marches and under the guardians.h.i.+p of murderous Kurds, but in protection and security, to the lands where they can still enjoy the beneficent sway of their own governors, and be Ottomanised to the top of their bent. But Syrians and Armenians and Greeks and Jews will be Ottomanised no longer.

The Turk was always a fighter, disciplined and courageous, and he has never lost that virtue of valour. But he has been a fighter because he has always lived under a military despotism which demanded his services, and it is much to be doubted whether his qualities in this regard will for the future be exercised as they have been in the past. For the Turkish armies, in so far as they have consisted of Turks, have been chiefly, if not wholly, recruited from the peasantry of Anatolia, who, when not summoned to their country's colours, or ordered to maltreat and ma.s.sacre, are quiet, rather indolent folk, content to plough their lands and reap an exiguous but sufficient harvest. And for their lords and governors, who, until Prussia a.s.sumed command of the Turkish armies, there will no longer be either the possibility of further conquests as in the old Osmanli days, or, in less progressive times, the necessity for securing Ottoman supremacy over the huge ill-knit lands which it governed. But now, instead of having alien and defenceless tribes within their borders, tribes forbidden to bear arms and chafing at the Turkish yoke, they will see free peoples under the protectorates of Powers that are capable of self-defence and, if necessary, of inflicting punishment.

Russia, France, England, Italy, all allied nations, will be established in close proximity to the Turkish frontiers, and the New Turkey will be as powerless for aggression as she will be for defence, should she provoke attack. But within their borders there may the Osmanlis dwell secure and undisturbed, so long as they conform to the habits of civilised people with regard to their neighbours, and it is a question whether, now that the military despotism which has always misguided the fortunes of this people, has no possible fields for conquest, and no need of securing security, the nation will not settle down into the quiet existence of small neutral countries. Perhaps the last chapter of its savage and blood-stained history is already almost finished, and in years to come some little light of progress and of civilisation may be kindled in the abode where the household G.o.ds for centuries have been cruelty and hate.

_Crescent and Iron Cross, Chapter VII_

THE GRIP OP THE OCTOPUS

It will not be sufficient for the fulfilment of the Allies' aims as regards Turkey to free from her barbarous control the subject peoples dwelling within her borders, for Turkey herself has to be delivered from a domination not less barbaric than her own, which, if allowed to continue, would soon again be a menace to the peace of the world. We have seen in a previous chapter how deeply set in her are Germany's nippers, how closely the octopus-embrace envelops her, and we now have to consider how those tentacles must be unloosed from their grip, and what will be the condition of the victim, already bled white, when that has been done. In the beginning, as we have seen, Germany obtained her hold by professing a touchingly beautiful and philanthropic desire to help Turkey to realise her national ideals, and her Pecksniffs, Tekin Alp and Herr Ernst Marre, were bidden to write parallel histories, the one describing the aims of the Nationalist party, the other the benevolent interest which Germany took in them. Occasionally Herr Ernst Marre could not but remember that he was a German, and permitted us to see the claws of the cat, without quite letting it out of the bag, but then he pulled the strings tight again, and only loud comfortable purrings could be heard, the Prussian musings over the 'liberation' of Turkey which she was helping to accomplish. But nowadays, so it seems to me, the strings have been loosened, and the claws and teeth are clearly visible. It is not so long since Dr. Schnee, Governor of German East Africa, sent a very illuminating doc.u.ment to Berlin from which I extract the following:--

'Do you consider it possible to make a regulation prohibiting Islam altogether? The encouragement of pig-breeding among natives is recommended by experts as an effective means of stopping the spread of Islam....'

That seems clear enough, and I can imagine Talaat Bey, with his sword of honour in his hand, exclaiming with the Oysters in _Alice in Wonderland_:--

'After such kindness that would be A dismal thing to do.'

But I am afraid that Germany is contemplating (as indeed she has always done) a quant.i.ty of dismal things to do, and is now, like the Walrus and the Carpenter, beginning to let them appear. She has taken the Turkish oysters out for a nice long walk, and when the war is over she proposes to sit down and eat them. And did she not also interfere in the affair of Jewish ma.s.sacres and declare that 'Pan-Turkish ideals have no sort of meaning in Palestine'? That must have been almost an unfriendly act from Turkey's point of view, for it cannot be stated too clearly that part of the price which Germany paid for Turkey's entry on her side into the war, was the liberty, as far as Germany was concerned, of managing her internal affairs, ma.s.sacres and the rest, as best suited the d.a.m.nable doctrines of Ottomanisation. The other Powers could not interfere, for they failed to force the Dardanelles, and Germany promised not to. That promise, of course, was binding on Germany for just so long as it suited her to keep it, and it suited her to keep it, on the whole, during the Armenian ma.s.sacres. And in that matter her refusal to interfere is, among all her crimes, the very flower and felicity of her vileness.

Signs are not wanting that Turkey is beginning to realise the position in which she has placed herself, namely, that of a bankrupt dependant at the mercy of a nation to whom that quality is a mere derision. Lately a quant.i.ty of small incidents have occurred, such as disputes over the owners.h.i.+p of properties financed by Germany and the really melodramatic depreciation in the German coinage, which unmistakably show the swift ebb of Turkey's misplaced confidence. More significant perhaps than any is a transaction that took place in May 1917, when Talaat Bey and Enver Pasha took the whole of their private fortunes out of the Deutsche Bank in Constantinople, and invested them in two Swiss banks, namely, the Banque Nationale de Suisse, and the Banque Federale: they drew out also the whole funds of the Committee of Union and Progress, and similarly transferred them. This operation was not effected without loss, for in return for the Turkish 1 they received only thirteen francs. But it is significant that they preferred to lose over fifty per cent. of their capital, and have the moiety secure in Switzerland to leaving it in Constantinople.[1] It is certain therefore that at both ends of the scale a distrust of German management has begun. A starving population has wrecked trains loaded with food-stuffs going to Germany, and at the other end the men with the swords of honour and dishonour deem it wise to put their money out of reach of the great Prussian cat. That the Germans themselves are not quite at their ease concerning the security of their hold may also be conjectured, for they are, as far as possible, removing Turkish troops from Constantinople, and replacing them with their own regiments. An instance of this occurred in June 1917, when, owing to the discontent in the capital, it was found necessary to guard bridges, residences of Ministers, and Government offices. But instead of recalling Turkish troops from Galicia to do this, they kept them there in the manner of hostages, mixed up in German regiments, and sent picked bodies of German troops to Constantinople. Fresh corps of secret police have also been formed to suppress popular manifestations. They are allowed to 'remove' suspects by any means they choose, quite in the old style of bag and Bosporus, but the organisation of them is German. And well may the German Government distrust those signs of popular discontent in a starving population: already the people have awoke to the fact that the German paper money does not represent its face-value, and, despite a.s.surances to the contrary, it is at a discount scarcely credible. Three German 1 notes are held even in Constantinople to be the equivalent of a gold 1, while in the provinces upwards of five are asked for, and given, in exchange for one gold pound. It is in vain that German manifestoes are put forth declaring that all Government offices will take the notes as an equivalent for gold, for what the people want is not a traffic with Government offices, but the cash to buy food. Even more serious is the fact that Austrian and Hungarian directors of banks will no longer accept these sc.r.a.ps of paper. In vain, too, is it that the hungry folk see the walls of the 'House of Friends.h.i.+p' rise higher and higher in Constantinople, for every day they see with starving eyes the trains loaded with sugar from Konia, and the harvests raised in Anatolia with German artificial manures guarded by German troops and rolling westwards to Berlin. According to present estimates the harvest this year is so vastly more abundant than that of previous years, that no comparison, as the Minister of Agriculture tells his gratified Government, is possible. But the poorer cla.s.ses get no more than the leavings of it when the armies, which include the German army, have had their wants supplied. The governing cla.s.ses, whom it is necessary to feed, are not yet suffering, for the Germans grant them enough, issuing rations to such families as are proved adherents of the German-Turkish combination, and until the pinch of want attacks them we should be foolishly optimistic if we thought that a starving peasantry would cause the collapse or the defection of Germany's newest and most valuable colony. There is enough discontent to make Germany uneasy, but that is all.[2] Long ago she proved the efficiency of her control, and the successful pulling of her puppet-strings, and no instance of that is more complete than the brief story of Yakub Jemil and the extinction of him and his party, which, though it happened a full year ago, has only lately been completely transmitted. Yakub Jemil was an influential commander of a frontier guard near the Black Sea coast. In July 1916 he went to Constantinople, accompanied by his staff (which included the informant from whom this account is derived), and, being cordially received by Enver and Talaat, discussed the situation with them. He pointed out the demoralising effect of the Armenian ma.s.sacres, and the danger of Jemal the Great's att.i.tude towards the Arabs in Syria, realising, and seeking to make them realise, the stupendous folly of making enemies of the subject peoples, and urging the re-establishment of cordial relations between the Turks and them. That, considering that Enver and Talaat were responsible (under the Germans) for the Armenian ma.s.sacres, was a brave outspeaking. He went on to say that Turkey was at war not on behalf of herself, but on behalf of Germany, and that it would be wise of the Government to consider the possibility of a separate peace with the Powers of the Entente. He was heard with interest, and took his leave. He remained in Constantinople, and his views obtained him many adherents, not only among Turkish officers whose sympathies were already alienated from Germany, but among members of the Committee of Union and Progress. But before long his adherents began to disappear, and he asked for another interview with Talaat. He was received, as the informant states, 'with open arms,' for Talaat seized and held him, called for the guard, and he was searched, and on him were found certain doc.u.ments which proved him to hold the views he had already expressed. That now, was enough. He was 'interrogated' for two days (interrogation is otherwise called torture), and was then hanged.

Subsequently 111 officers and men in the army also disappeared. Some were marched into the Khiat Khana Valley, opposite Pera, and were stabbed: others were sent under escort to the provinces and murdered. No courts-martial of any kind were held.

[Footnote 1: Similarly, in October of this year, a new Turkish law was pa.s.sed, prohibiting the acquisition of Turkish land by foreign settlers.

This is aimed point-blank at Germany, and has naturally annoyed Berlin very much.]

[Footnote 2: The army rations have lately been reduced, each Turkish soldier receiving daily an oke of bread and a dried mackerel.]

And should anybody doubt the efficiency of German control in Turkey, and be disposed to be optimistic about the imminence of Turkey's detachment, he might do well to ponder that story.

Meantime the efficacy of our naval blockade is largely discounted by Germany's new source of supply. Possibly in the ensuing winter of 1917-18 conditions may get unbearable, but if the Turkish Government only two years ago ma.s.sacred more than a million of its subjects, it would be absurd to expect that the starving of a million more would produce much effect on the Ministers of the Turkish G.o.d of Love.[1] The people are, of course, told, with suitable statistics, how famine is decimating England and France, and how the total starvation of those unfortunate countries is imminent. Indeed, of all the signs of want of confidence in their German overlords, by far the most promising are the facts that Talaat and Enver have sent their money out of the country, and that Jemal the Great has a swelled head. On these facts there is a certain justifiable optimism to be based. It will do no good to consider them academically in London; but are there not practical channels to reach the instincts of the Turkish triumvirate that might be navigated?

[Footnote 1: The following list of prices in Constantinople is of interest:--

July 1914. July 1917.

Rice, per lb. 2-1/4 d. 3s. 4d.

Milk, per quart 5d. 2s.

Flour, per lb. 3d. 2s. 6d.

Petroleum, per lb. 1d. 4s. 6d.

Pair of boots 1 8. ]

We need not trouble ourselves with considering what the Allies will have to do with the Turkish army when once the end of the war comes, for the collapse of the military party in Turkey, which owes its whole vitality to Germany, will be perfect and complete. But the economical future of Turkey is not so plain: at the present moment its bankruptcy is total. Early in the war Germany drained it of such bullion as it had, and has since then advanced it about 150,000,000, which, as far as I can trace, is entirely in German paper, and must be redeemed in gold at some period (chiefly two years) after the end of the war. That is wonderful finance, and one marvels that Turkey could have been so far blinded as to accept it. But I expect that the swallowing of the first loan was sweetened by a spoonful of jam of this kind. Germany pointed out that, though England was quite certainly going to lose the war, she had issued an immense paper coinage which had all the purchasing power of gold. Germany, on the other hand, with her dear Ally to help her, was just as certainly going to win the war. How, then, could there be the slightest risk of the German paper money depreciating a single piastre in value? That sounded very good sense to Turkey, who was equally convinced that she would be on the victorious side (else she would not have joined it), and down went the loan with a pleasant sensation of sweetness. A second loan was easily induced by the failure of the Dardanelles expedition, and about then the 'ignorant' Turkish peasant began to wonder whether the paper was quite as valuable as gold, and to prefer gold or even the ordinary silver piastre to its German equivalent. To counteract that, as we have seen, a law was pa.s.sed making it criminal to h.o.a.rd gold, and, to complete the ruin, the silver piastre was called in, and a nickel token was subst.i.tuted.... We can but bow our heads in reverence of the thoroughness of German swindling.

Now Turkey is completely bankrupt, and we must ask ourselves why Germany ever bargained for the repayment in gold, after the war, of the millions she had lent the Turks in paper, if she knew that Turkey could never repay her. True, the loans had only cost her the paper the notes were printed on, so that in no case could she prove a loser, but how could she be a gainer? The answer to that question shouts at us from every acre of Turkish soil. The immense undeveloped riches of Turkey supply the answer. Some indeed are already being developed, and the labour and most of the materials have been paid for by the German paper notes.

There are the irrigation works at Adana, there is the beet-sugar industry at Konia, the irrigation works in the Makischelin Valley, the mineral concessions of the Bagdad Railway, the Haidar Pasha Harbour concessions, the afforestation scheme near Constantinople, the cotton industry in Anatolia--there is no end to them. Turkey may not be able to pay in cash, but over all these concessions already working, and over a hundred more, of which the concessions have been granted, Germany has a complete hold, and her victim will pay in minerals and cotton and sugar and corn. She will pay over and over and over again, as none who have the smallest knowledge of Kultur-finance can possibly doubt. She is bled white already, and for the rest of time bloodless and white will she remain. Only one event can possibly avert her fate, and that is the victory of the Allies.

We have been so bold as to a.s.sume that this is not an impossible contingency, and on that a.s.sumption there is a brighter future for Turkey than the Prussian domination could ever bring her. Bankrupt she is, but, as Germany saw, she is rich in possibilities even with regard to the restricted territory to which she will surely find herself limited, and it is a pleasant chance for her that Germany has already been so busy in developing the resources of Anatolia. For Germany may safely bet her last piece of paper money that she will not lay a finger on them.

The Turkey of the future is to be for the Turks; not for the persecuted Armenians, nor for the Arabs, nor for the Greeks, and a.s.suredly it is not to be for the Prussians. While the war lasts, Germany may draw supplies from the fields her artificial manures have enriched, and from the acres that her paper money has planted, but after that no more. Her Ottomanising work will be over. Such development (and it is far from negligible) as she has done in Syria will be continued under French protection for the Arabs, such as she has done in Mesopotamia under English protection, and such as she has done in Anatolia will be continued by the Turks to drag them out of the utter insolvency that she has brought them to. Never before has a country so justly and so richly deserved the repudiation of a debt incurred by the confidence trick. Not a civilised Government in the world would dream of enforcing payment, any more than a magistrate would enforce a payment to some thimble-rigger returning from a race-meeting.

The roar of battle still renders inaudible all voices save its own, but already the dusk begins to gather over the halls where sit the War-lord and those who, for the realisation of their monstrous dreams, loosed h.e.l.l upon the world, and in the growing dusk there begin to steal upon the wall the letters of pale flame that to them portend the doom, and to us give promise of dawn. Faintly they can see the legend _Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin...._

THE END