CREATING TURKISHNESS: AN EXAMINATION OF TURKISH NATIONALISM THROUGH GÖK-BÖRÜ GÜLDEN İZ KIBRIS SABANCI UNIVERSITY SPRING 2005 1 CREATING TURKISHNESS: AN EXAMINATION OF TURKISH NATIONALISM THROUGH GÖK-BÖRÜ By GÜLDEN İZ KIBRIS Submitted to the Graduate School of Arts and Social Sciences in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Sabanci University Spring 2005 2 CREATING TURKISHNESS: AN EXAMINATION OF TURKISH NATIONALISM THROUGH GÖK-BÖRÜ APPROVED BY: Assoc. Prof. Halil Berktay (Thesis Supervisor) ........................................................ Asst. Prof. Y. Hakan Erdem ....................................................... Asst. Prof. E. Burak Arıkan ......................................................... DATE OF APPROVAL: 12 August 2005 3 © GÜLDEN İZ KIBRIS 2005 All Rights Reserved 4 Abstract CREATING TURKISHNESS: AN EXAMINATION OF TURKISH NATIONALISM THROUGH GÖK-BÖRÜ Güldeniz Kıbrıs History, M.A. Thesis Supervisor: Assoc. Prof. Halil Berktay 2005, ix + 113 pages This M.A. thesis attempts to exhibit the cross-fertilization between the Pan- Turkist and Kemalist varieties of Turkish nationalism through their definitions of ‘Turkishness.’ In the same vein with contemporary nationalisms, the late Ottoman/Republican nationalist elite created ‘Turkishness’ by referring to a mythical past. In that creation process, the Pan-Turkist and Kemalist nationalist discourses historically developed in the same pool and used similar intellectual sources. Though their ultimate goals were different, the two varieties scrutinized very similar racist and nationalist references in their imaginations of Turkish identity as racially superior. In the name of revealing the similarities and differences, a Pan-Turkist journal, Gök-Börü [Grey Wolf] has been examined. Published and edited by Reha Oğuz Türkkan, the journal appeared between 1942 and 1943 as a byproduct of the special aggressive international environment. A discourse analysis shows that like the Kemalist elite, writers of the journal emphasized the superiority of the Turkish race the difference being that in order to ‘prove superiority,’ the latter highlighted the uniqueness of the Turkish race whereas the former put fingers on the similarities with the ‘Western’ civilization. Thus, it has been argued that Gök-Börü’s Pan-Turkist discourse was not a deviance from the official ideology of the Kemalists; instead it was complementary to it. Combining theories of nationalism with practice and focusing mainly on similarities among different varieties, this thesis offers an examination of Turkish nationalism from a broader and continuous historical perspective. Keywords: Turkish Nationalism, Racism, Gök-Börü, Turkish History Thesis, Second World War. 5 Özet TÜRKLÜ ĞÜ YARATMAK: GÖK-BÖRÜ ÜZER İNDEN B İR TÜRK MİLL İYETÇ İLİĞİ İNCELEMES İ Güldeniz Kıbrıs Tarih Yüksek Lisans Programı Tez Yöneticisi: Doç. Dr. Halil Berktay 2005, ix +113 sayfa Bu çalı şmada, Pan-Türkçü ve Kemalist ‘Türklük’ tanımlarından yola çıkılarak, Türk milliyetçili ğinin bu iki çe şidi arasındaki kar şılıklı beslenmenin sergilemenmesi amaçlanmaktadır. Di ğer milliyetçiliklerinde oldu ğu gibi, Türklük kavramı da geç Osmanlı/erken Türkiye Cumhuriyeti milliyetçi elitlerinin mitsel bir geçmi şe atıfta bulunmasıyla yaratılmı ştır. Bu yaratım sürecinde, Pan-Türkçü ve Kemalist milliyetçi söylemler tarihsel olarak aynı havuzda geli şmi ş ve benzer entelektüel kaynaklar kullanmı şlardır. Nihai amaçları farklı olmasına ra ğmen, Türk milliyetçili ğinin iki çe şidi de Türk kimli ğini ırksal açıdan en üstün bir şekilde tahayyül ederek neredeyse aynı milliyetçi ve ırkçı referansları kullanmı ştır. Sözü edilen benzerlikleri ve farklılıkları açı ğa çıkarmak amacıyla, 1942-1943 yılları arasında İkinci Dünya Sava şı’nın yaratmı ş oldu ğu agresif siyasi ortamın bir yan ürünü olarak ortaya çıkmı ş, Reha O ğuz Türkkan tarafından basılan Gök-Börü isimli Pan-Türkçü dergi örneklem olarak kullanılmı ştır. Derginin söylem analizi gösterir ki; Kemalist elit gibi Gök-Börü yazarları da Türk ırkının üstünlü ğü vurgulamı ştır. Vurgulamadaki fark şöyledir; Kemalistler Türklerin Batı kadar üstün oldu ğunu kanıtlamaya çalı şırken, Gök-Börü Türklerin kendine has ve üstün oldu ğunu anlatmaya çalı şır. Bu çalı şmada faklılıklar da belirtilerek, Gök-Börü’nün resmi ideolojiden bir sapma de ğil; aksine onun bir tamamlayıcısı oldu ğu savunulmu ştur. Milliyetçilik teorilerini pratikle birle ştiren ve farklı varyasyonlar arasındaki benzerlikleri özellikle vurgulayan tez, Türk milliyetçili ğinin geni ş ve devamlılık arz eden tarihsel bir incelemesini sunmaktadır. Anahtar Kelimeler: Türk Milliyetçili ği, Irkçılık, Gök-Börü, Türk Tarih Tezi, İkinci Dünya Sava şı 6 Acknowledgments First of all, I want to thank my supervisor, Professor Halil Berktay, to whom I owe a large debt of gratitude for sharing me his wealth of knowledge about historiography and Turkish nationalism. He not only guided me through his inspiring lectures, but also encouraged me while coping with the burden of academic life. I am also thankful to Professor Hakan Erdem as he read this work in a detailed manner and added his criticisms and suggestions. I am grateful to Professor Burak Arıkan for his academic guidance as a member of my thesis committee; and especially for his invaluable comments for the final version of my thesis. I would like to thank my dear friends Ayça Özdo ğan and Aylin Aydın for helping to alleviate the problems of life and making Sabanci University more enjoyable. My special thanks go to my home mate whose existence not only emotionally encouraged me, but also simplified my life while writing this work. I am deeply grateful to my parents, Fatma and İbrahim Kıbrıs, who have supported and encouraged me throughout my studies, for they believed in me and shared my enthusiasm all the way through. Lastly, I am thankful to my sister, Ezgi Şiir Kıbrıs, whose voice is like a melody erasing my loneliness. This thesis is dedicated to my family. 7 To my family……………….. “(işret, oyun, iffetsizlik, tembellik, eğrilik, zulümkarlık) bu fenalıkları havada, denizde ve karada yapmayacağıma, yapanları gücümün yettiği, dilimin döndüğü kadar yaptırmamaya çalışacağıma namusum, vicdanım, şerefim, hulasa, vatanım ve Türklüğün adına and içiyorum. Ömrüm oldukça bu sayılı fenalıklardan herhangi birini işlersem ve başkalarının fenalıklarını da usanmadan, asla fütur getirmeden telkin ve tatlılıkla men’e çalışmazsam gökler başıma yıkılsın, dağlar beni ezsin, yerler beni yutsun, ırmaklar ve denizler beni boğsun. Hasılı her türlü felaket beni yok etsin.” Nuri Demirağ Gök Okulu Öğrencileri Andı -1943 8 TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract v Özet vi Acknowledgments vii INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER I. THEORIES OF CREATING NATIONS 8 1.1. Imagining and Myth-Making 8 1.2. Nihil Humanum a me alineum puto 15 CHAPTER II. CREATING TURKISHNESS: FROM OTTOMAN EMPIRE TO THE TURKISH REPUBLIC 22 2.1. From ‘Ottomannes’ to ‘Turkishness’ 23 2.2. ‘Turkish Nation State’ 34 2.3. The Outline for ‘Turkishness:’ The Turkish History Thesis 39 CHAPTER III. SUPREMACY OF ‘STATE’ AND REACTIONS TO ANONYMITY 49 3.1. The Kemalist Regime and ‘Outside Influences’ 49 3.2. Reactions to Anonymity 53 3.3. New Hopes: Second World War 59 3.4. ‘Ready to Fight!’ 63 CHAPTER IV. GÖK-BÖRÜ 70 4.1. The Birth of Gök-Börü 70 4.2. Gök-Börü at the First Sight 73 4.3. Gök Börü’s Self-Definition and Other Pan-Turkists 76 4.4. Gök-Börü and Ülkü 79 4.5. Race and Nationalization 85 4.6. The Great Turkestan 97 9 CONCLUSION: “THE PAST IS A FOREIGN COUNTRY...” 100 BIBLIOGRAPHY 103 10 INTRODUCTION: “Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, `and what is the use of a book,' thought Alice, `without pictures or conversations?' So she was considering, in her own mind (as well as she could, for the hot day made her feel very sleepy and stupid), whether the pleasure of making a daisy-chain would be worth the trouble of getting up and picking the daisies, when suddenly a White Rabbit with pink eyes ran close by her. There was nothing so very remarkable in that; nor did Alice think it so very much out of the way to hear the Rabbit say to itself `Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late!' (when she thought it over afterwards it occurred to her that she ought to have wondered at this, but at the time it all seemed quite natural); but, when the Rabbit actually took a watch out of its waistcoat- pocket, and looked at it, and then hurried on, Alice started to her feet, for it flashed across her mind that she had never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to take out of it, and burning with curiosity, she ran across the field after it, and was just in time to see it pop down a large rabbit-hole under the hedge. In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how in the world she was to get out again.” Thus, with these celebrated lines, begins the novel Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. As befits that title, the tale is about the trip of Alice, who follows a White Rabbit to the wonderland and meets there many imaginary characters. Until the very end of the tale, the reader fails to realize that the wonderland and the characters are in Alice’s mind. In reality, Alice created this imaginary atmosphere thanks to her imagination power, and also by taking some elements from the actual life and magnifying them. In fact, it is this mindset of magnifying, selecting from the reality and also sometimes transforming the image into reality which formed the discourse of Gök-Börü , a racist journal, published in Istanbul between 1942 and 1943 by Reha O ğuz Türkkan, a leading Turkish nationalist-racist. Aggressively contributing to attempts for defining ‘Turkishness’ through resonating them with the irredentist aim of ‘uniting all Turks,’ the cadre of Gök-Börü imagined the ideal ‘Turk’ as a member of the highest race amongst all ‘other’ human- beings and as the developer of the earlier civilizations in Mesopotamia and Egypt.