Ottoman
Fall and Turkey 1908-1950
Troops
in Macedonia were frustrated because of arrears in pay, miserable conditions,
and an upsurge by Christian terrorists. In April 1908 about 1,500 reservists in
Ankara demanded to be sent home, and three hundred soldiers in Scutari occupied
the telegraph office in May. Sultan Abdulhamid sent agents to investigate the
unrest in Macedonia; but on June 11, 1908 Lt. Mustafa Necib shot the former
police chief Omer Nazim in Salonica before he could return with his report. On
June 21 the CUP’s gendarme force in Monastir assassinated the police
commissioner Sami Bey. On July 3 the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) cell
from Resen led by Adjutant Major Ahmed Niyazi broke into a military warehouse,
stole money, and distributed rifles to volunteers. When their ruse was
discovered, they fled to the hills to begin guerrilla resistance. The Sultan
sent Semsi, who arrived at Monastir four days later but was assassinated. On
July 10 an officer shot a regiment mufti in Salonica who had
provided information to the palace in Istanbul. One week later the Monastir
commanding General Osman Hidayet was warning troops to obey the orders of the
Sultan when an officer shot him.
Imperial
troops brought from Anatolia joined the revolution in Macedonia, and mass
meetings were held to demand a constitution. A crowd of 20,000 Albanians
gathered in Firzovik, and on July 20 their notables sent two telegrams
demanding that the Sultan restore the constitution. On the same day the
Monastir CUP branch banned the use of firearms and took over the town. The next
day the Committee sent telegrams to all branches directing them to complete
their revolutionary activities by July 23. If the Government continued to
resist, military units and volunteers would begin marching on the capital on
July 26. On the night of July 22 a force of 2,300 entered Monastir and abducted
Marshal Osman, who had been put in charge by Istanbul. The Sultan replaced the
Grand Vizier Ferid with Mehmed Said and made Kamil a minister without
portfolio. The next day the Inspector General’s office was deluged with
telegrams demanding the return of constitutional government and threatening to
replace the Sultan. A constitution was proclaimed at Monastir, followed by
other towns. On October 23 Major Enver sent a telegram to the European press
announcing a constitutional regime.
After
determining that the demand for reforms did not violate Islamic law, on July 24
Sultan Abdulhamid called for elections so that the Parliament could meet again.
All were to be brothers, and crowds in Istanbul that included Turks, Greeks,
Armenians, Bulgarians, and Jews chanted in favor of the Constitution and
against the spies. On July 26 all the political prisoners in Istanbul were
released, and the amnesty extended to about 80,000 Armenians and 60,000 Muslims
in exile.
The
CUP forced Mehmed Said and his cabinet to resign on August 4, 1908, and the
more compliant Kamil became grand vizier. Abdulhamid had violated the 1876
constitution by appointing the ministers of War and the Navy. Money and
valuables were found in the homes of arrested ministers. On August 7 Governor
Ahmed Ratib of the Hedjaz was dismissed; he had been governor since 1893 and
had acquired a fortune. Three days later the Erzurum governor Abdülvehab was
removed, and the foreign minister ordered a stop to subsidies for foreign
newspapers and embassies. Imperial decrees in early August abolished the secret
police and ordered the police to act in accordance with the Constitution. The
courts were to be independent, and no one could be imprisoned without cause.
The Armenian Revolutionary Federation published its declaration on August 6,
demanding free movement in the Armenian provinces, the return of unlawfully
occupied land, and the release of Armenian political prisoners. In October the
Armenians revised their goals to include many socialist ideas that included
local autonomy, universal suffrage, primary education for all children,
distribution of state land to peasants, collective ownership of mines and other
natural resources, and progressive income and inheritance taxes.
By
late August the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) had replaced most of the
monarchists. They took control over the three European provinces, and they held
their first secret congress on September 18. Muslims in the Arab provinces
tended to oppose the CUP, and they supported the Liberal Union Party that was
formed on September 14. The hodja Kor Ali gave a sermon
rejecting the constitutional government on October 6, and he and fifteen others
were arrested the next day. The Young Turks had little experience, and the
Sultan appointed his own administrators. The CUP announced its program on
October 6, making ministers accountable to the Chamber of Deputies. Turkish was
made the official language. Every citizen was given equal rights and
obligations regardless of ethnic origin or religion. Land reform was to be
implemented, and modern agricultural methods were encouraged. The state would
provide for schools, and all were to be taught in Turkish except for religious
schools. Inflation increased 20% in the first two months, and strikes spread
across the empire, starting with longshoremen at Salonica in August and
spreading to a general strike in transport, printing, tobacco, baking, and
tailoring. The CUP was the most organized party. The new party of Ottoman
Liberals led by Prince Sabahaddin won only one seat. Of the 288 seats the Turks
won a small majority with 147 to 60 Arabs, 27 Albanians, 26 Greeks, 14
Armenians, 10 Slavs, and 4 Jews. On December 17 Sultan Abdulhamid opened the
new Parliament. The House of Deputies elected Ahmed Riza as its president.
On
October 5, 1908 Bulgaria proclaimed its independence under Prince Ferdinand,
and the next day Austria-Hungary annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina. Also on that
day Crete, which the powers had evacuated in late July, revolted and announced
it was joining the Greek union, which the Chamber ratified on October 12. The
Porte began a boycott against Austrian, Bulgarian, and Greek goods that was
successful, and they took measures to prevent uprisings against minorities. The
Ottoman empire made an agreement with Austria in February 1909, and Russians
mediated an agreement with Bulgaria in April that cancelled 40 of the last 74
payments of the Ottoman war indemnity. The 6.5 million Greeks demanded one
quarter of the seats in the legislature, and the Armenian Dashnaks made similar
demands.
Hafiz
Dervish Vahdeti had begun publishing Volkan (Volcano) on
November 10, 1908, and they organized the Society of Islamic Unity that
resisted liberal reforms. They appealed to soldiers in the First Army and were
supported by the Liberal party in opposition to the CUP. The Committee of young
officers refused to give up control over the armed forces and voted to replace
the new Grand Vizier Kamil with Hüseyin Hilmi in February 1909. The opposition
was vocal, and Hasan Fehmi, the editor of an anti-unionist paper, was murdered
on April 6. One week later the First Army Corps mutinied in Istanbul, marched
to the Chamber of Deputies, and demanded the replacement of Unionist officers
so that Islamic law could be restored. Hüseyin Hilmi and his entire cabinet
agreed to resign. Yet the high-rankingulema in the Society of
Islamic Scholars declined to support the revolt, and they denounced it on April
16. About twenty Unionists were killed, and their headquarters and newspaper
offices were sacked. CUP leaders fled from the capital. The rebels shouted,
“Down with the Constitution!” On April 14 the Armenians in Adana rose up, but
they were crushed by a pogrom that killed about 20,000. Abdulhamid pardoned the
attacks on Armenians again. The Islamic deputies met and elected Ismail Kemal
president with support from the Liberal Union.
The
CUP was still strong in the provinces, especially in Macedonia. The Committee
in Salonika sent the Action Army led by General Mahmud Shevket and his chief of
staff Mustafa Kemal. They traveled by train and surrounded the capital. Both
chambers sat together as a National Assembly and approved the army’s entrance
into the city. The Action Army occupied Istanbul on the morning of April 24,
1909 without resistance. Mahmud Shevket declared martial law to discipline the
mutineers and the Istanbul garrison, and counter-revolutionaries were quickly
tried and executed. On April 25 the army of liberation used cannons to regain
the Yildiz Palace. The National Assembly met with Said as chairman and, after
obtaining an approving fatwa from the Shaykh al-Islam,
unanimously voted to depose Sultan Abdulhamid on April 27. He was interned in
the house of a Jew, and his younger brother Mehmet Resit became Sultan Mehmet
V. Both the Liberal Union party and the Islamic Union were closed down, and on
May 5 Hüseyin Hilmi was reappointed grand vizier.
The
Parliament banned trade unions in the public sector and required arbitration
that made strikes difficult. In May 1909 the Workers’ Federation of Salonica
organized 6,000 people to march in protest against the legislation. Newly
trained officers took over and reorganized the army. Students who did not pass
their exams were conscripted into the army that now required non-Muslims to
serve. Mahmud Shevket appointed himself inspector general of the three armies
in Istanbul, Salonica, and Edirne and then minister of War. His military had
control and came into conflict with the CUP, some of whom formed the People’s
Party in February 1910. The Law of Associations passed on August 23 prohibited
political associations based on ethnic or national groups, closing down Greek,
Bulgarian, and other clubs in Rumelia. On September 27 the Law for the
Prevention of Brigandage and Sedition formed army battalions to disarm and
repress armed bands. Hüseyin Hilmi, the editor of Participation,
founded the Ottoman Socialist party in September 1910, but it was banned the
same year. The CUP split again in January 1911 as Col. Sadik and Abdulaziz
Mecdi formed the New Party. They published their demands in April that aimed to
protect historic Ottoman traditions.
The
opposition groups combined to organize the Liberal Union Party in November
1911, and they elected a candidate in a by-election on December 11 by one vote;
but in January 1912 the CUP parties used intimidation and bribery to win all
but six of the 275 seats in the “big-stick elections.” The ministers and grand
vizier were no longer responsible to the Sultan but to the Parliament, and the
deputies could over-rule the Sultan’s veto with a two-thirds vote. Societies
could be formed, but secret societies that threatened public order were banned.
The collection of taxes was made more efficient, and the budgets of the army,
navy, and police had increased substantially from 1901 to 1910. Terrorism in
Macedonia and Anatolia was controlled by prohibiting the carrying of weapons.
Mahmud
Shevket severely suppressed an Albanian revolt in 1910, but this provoked
support from Montenegro. In August 1911 the Government granted the Albanians
their own parliament, and the Albanians revolted again in June 1912, demanding
complete independence. Albanian rebel leaders in the north demanded autonomy
and reforms on August 9, and the Ottoman government granted them on September
4. During the Balkan War the European powers accepted the independence of
Albania on December 12, and Serbia and Montenegro in the Treaty of London
agreed to withdraw from the territory they had invaded.
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