TURKEY The Quest for Identity Feroz Ahmad TurkeyPrelims.qxd 18/03/2005 16:15 Page v A Oneworld Book First published by Oneworld Publications 2003 This revised edition published in 2014 Contents Copyright © Feroz Ahmad 2003, 2014 The moral right of Feroz Ahmad to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act 1988 All rights reserved Preface viii Copyright under Berne Convention A CIP record for this title is available from the British Library Acknowledgements xi Notes on transcription xii ISBN 978-1-78074-301-1 Abbreviations xiii eISBN 978-1-78074-302-8 Maps xvi Printed and bound in Denmark by Norhaven A/S 1 THE OTTOMANS: FROM STATEHOOD TO EMPIRE, 1 1300–1789 Oneworld Publications 10 Bloomsbury Street The emergence of the house of Ottoman 1 London WC1B 3SR Growth of the military 3 England Early Ottoman conquests and expansion 5 Mehmed the Conqueror and his influence 8 Expanding Ottoman possessions 11 Süleyman the Magnificent 12 An age of revolution 16 The janissary–ülema alliance 20 Growing European influence 21 2 FROM REFORM TO REVOLUTION, 1789–1908 25 Reform of the military 25 The Sublime Porte and Mehmed Ali 29 The movement towards Westernization 31 Emergence of a new middle class 32 Tanzimat (restructuring) 33 The Young Ottomans movement 36 TurkeyPrelims.qxd 18/03/2005 16:15 Page v Contents Preface viii Acknowledgements xi Notes on transcription xii Abbreviations xiii Maps xvi 1 THE OTTOMANS: FROM STATEHOOD TO EMPIRE, 1 1300–1789 The emergence of the house of Ottoman 1 Growth of the military 3 Early Ottoman conquests and expansion 5 Mehmed the Conqueror and his influence 8 Expanding Ottoman possessions 11 Süleyman the Magnificent 12 An age of revolution 16 The janissary–ülema alliance 20 Growing European influence 21 2 FROM REFORM TO REVOLUTION, 1789–1908 25 Reform of the military 25 The Sublime Porte and Mehmed Ali 29 The movement towards Westernization 31 Emergence of a new middle class 32 Tanzimat (restructuring) 33 The Young Ottomans movement 36 TurkeyPrelims.qxd 18/03/2005 16:15 Page vi TurkeyPrelims.qxd 18/03/2005 16:15 Page vii vi TURKEY: THE QUEST FOR IDENTITY CONTENTS vii Bankruptcy and upheaval: unravelling of the Ottoman 39 The ‘Second Republic’ 122 empire Economic reforms 124 From autocracy to constitutionalism 41 Changing societal structures 126 Emerging traditionalism 44 The formation of new political parties 127 The new politics and the wider world 128 3 THE CONSTITUTIONAL REVOLUTION: REFORM 49 The Cyprus question 129 AND WAR, 1908–1918 Political fragmentation 132 The memorandum regime and after, 1971–1980 134 Restoration of the constitution 49 The general election of 1973 138 Counter-revolution 52 Coalition government: RPP–NSP 140 The accession of Mehmed V 54 Turkey’s renewed strategic importance 145 Balkan wars and Ottoman defeats 57 Mounting economic gloom 146 The repercussions of defeat 60 Alliance with Germany 63 7 THE MILITARY, THE PARTIES AND GLOBALIZATION, 149 The Ottoman role in the First World War 65 1980–2003 4 THE KEMALIST ERA, 1919–1938 75 Restructuring the political system 149 The establishment of new political parties 152 Atatürk’s background and rise to power 75 The general election of 1983 153 The birth of the national liberation movement 80 Former political leaders re-emerge 155 Birth of the republic 85 Economic problems return to the fore 158 Republicanism takes root 87 Turkey’s changing social and political landscape 161 Atatürk’s influence on the new republic 90 The Kurdish question 163 Turkey and the EEC 167 5 TOWARDS MULTI-PARTY POLITICS AND DEMOCRACY, 95 Turkey’s political malaise 167 1938–1960 New political coalitions 168 Inönü’s new presidency 95 Continuing political instability and its effects on the 170 War in Europe 97 economy The aftermath of the Second World War 99 Secularists and Islamists 172 The formation of the Democrat Party 100 The increasing importance of EU entry 175 The general elections of 1946 and 1950 102 The Cold War and its effects on Turkey 104 Postscript: Turkey 2005 – 2013 189 Domestic politics 107 Chronology of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey 213 Economic concerns 113 Glossary 259 The army enters the fray 115 Index 263 6 MILITARY GUARDIANS, 1960–1980 119 Government by junta 119 National Unity Committee: interim government 121 TurkeyPrelims.qxd 18/03/2005 16:15 Page vi TurkeyPrelims.qxd 18/03/2005 16:15 Page vii vi TURKEY: THE QUEST FOR IDENTITY CONTENTS vii Bankruptcy and upheaval: unravelling of the Ottoman 39 The ‘Second Republic’ 122 empire Economic reforms 124 From autocracy to constitutionalism 41 Changing societal structures 126 Emerging traditionalism 44 The formation of new political parties 127 The new politics and the wider world 128 3 THE CONSTITUTIONAL REVOLUTION: REFORM 49 The Cyprus question 129 AND WAR, 1908–1918 Political fragmentation 132 The memorandum regime and after, 1971–1980 134 Restoration of the constitution 49 The general election of 1973 138 Counter-revolution 52 Coalition government: RPP–NSP 140 The accession of Mehmed V 54 Turkey’s renewed strategic importance 145 Balkan wars and Ottoman defeats 57 Mounting economic gloom 146 The repercussions of defeat 60 Alliance with Germany 63 7 THE MILITARY, THE PARTIES AND GLOBALIZATION, 149 The Ottoman role in the First World War 65 1980–2003 4 THE KEMALIST ERA, 1919–1938 75 Restructuring the political system 149 The establishment of new political parties 152 Atatürk’s background and rise to power 75 The general election of 1983 153 The birth of the national liberation movement 80 Former political leaders re-emerge 155 Birth of the republic 85 Economic problems return to the fore 158 Republicanism takes root 87 Turkey’s changing social and political landscape 161 Atatürk’s influence on the new republic 90 The Kurdish question 163 Turkey and the EEC 167 5 TOWARDS MULTI-PARTY POLITICS AND DEMOCRACY, 95 Turkey’s political malaise 167 1938–1960 New political coalitions 168 Inönü’s new presidency 95 Continuing political instability and its effects on the 170 War in Europe 97 economy The aftermath of the Second World War 99 Secularists and Islamists 172 The formation of the Democrat Party 100 The increasing importance of EU entry 175 The general elections of 1946 and 1950 102 The Cold War and its effects on Turkey 104 Postscript: Turkey 2005 – 2013 189 Domestic politics 107 Chronology of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey 213 Economic concerns 113 Glossary 259 The army enters the fray 115 Index 263 6 MILITARY GUARDIANS, 1960–1980 119 Government by junta 119 National Unity Committee: interim government 121 TurkeyPrelims.qxd 18/03/2005 16:15 Page viii TurkeyPrelims.qxd 18/03/2005 16:15 Page ix PREFACE ix said to have ‘turned Turk’. Turkey was also the English-language synonym for the Ottoman Empire; thus when Lord Byron wrote to his mother from Ottoman Albania in November 1809, he noted that ‘I have been some time in Turkey: this place [Prevesa] is on the coast, but I have traversed the interior of the province of Albania on a visit to the Pasha.’ It was common for Europeans to speak of Preface the Balkan provinces of the Ottoman Empire as ‘Turkey-in- Europe’ and of Asia Minor and the Arab provinces as ‘Turkey-in- Asia’, when they described the geography of the empire. The idea of nationalism made inroads into the Ottoman Empire after the French Revolution, first among the non-Muslim commu- nities of the empire, and then among a minority of Muslim intellec- tuals who became conscious of their ‘Turkishness’, their language The Ottomans were a rare imperial people who had no homeland and their roots. But nationalism remained a concern of the to retreat to as their empire waned in the nineteenth and twentieth minority, for the majority was still determined to maintain a multi- centuries. Other imperial peoples had returned to various home- ethnic, multi-religious empire, right until the final defeat in 1918 lands: the British to their island base when they were forced to during the First World War. decolonize; the French to France, the Spanish to Spain, and so on. Only after total defeat and the realization that the victors were By the twentieth century, the Ottomans had no homeland for they going to partition the empire and promote self-determination did had originated as tribal peoples who, for a variety of reasons, had the Ottomans realize that they too had to determine their identity been forced to migrate from the steppes of Central and Inner Asia on the basis of nationalism and ‘nationhood’. and went in different directions. Some of these tribal confedera- When the nationalists created their republic in 1923, they were tions, including the ones who came to be known as Ottoman careful to call it the Republic of Turkey, a territorial and therefore (Osmanli) adopting the name of their leader, Osman (d.1324), a patriotic description, and not the Turkish Republic, which would migrated into the Islamic world and adopted Islam. have defined the republic ethnically. Nevertheless ‘Türkiye These peoples came to be described as ‘Turks’ by the people they Cumhuriyeti’ is often rendered incorrectly as the ‘Turkish intermingled with. But they themselves were called by the name of Republic’ and not the ‘Republic of Turkey’, and the assembly in the head of their tribal confederation: thus the Seljuks, the Ankara as the Turkish Grand National Assembly and not the Danismend, the Mentese and the Osmanli or Ottomans. The Grand National Assembly of Turkey. The nationalists were aware Ottomans reserved the name ‘Turk’ for the nomadic tribesmen and of the difference in meaning and chose their words with care.