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About Morning Oregonian. (Portland, Or.) 1861-1937 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 14, 1918)
TIIE 3IORXING OREGOXIAX," MONDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1918. EAST FOR CENTURIES Ottomans Prove They Are Civilization-Proof. ANNALS DRIP WITH BLOOD American, I resent, "Who Knows Past and Tells Story of Xight- jnare Xation "ov Passin; REVEALS TURKS' TURPITUDE. In this contribution to current history, dealing- -with Levantine affairs and Turkey's part in the great war, for the first time is fully revealed the continuing tur- fitude of the Turkish nation for ive centuries. With a clear understanding of Turkish character and a full knowledge of Turkey's past and present, one of the ablest of America's diplomat?, for years stationed at Constantinople, tells of the long and murderous cam paign of the Turk to make him self supreme in the Ottoman Empire. BY HEXRY MORCEXTHAr. (Forintrly American Ambassador to Turkey. i (Copyrighted.) The withdrawal of the allied fleet at the Dardanelles had consequences which the world does not yet com pletely understand. The practical ef fect of the event was to isolate the Turkish empire from all the world ex cepting Germany and Austria. Eng land, France, Russia, and Italy, which for a century had held a restraining hand over the Ottoman empire, had finally lost all power to influence or control. The Turks perceived that a series of dazzling events had changed them from cringing dependents of the European powers into free agents. For the first time in two centuries they could now live their national life ac cording to their own inclinations, and govern their peoples according to their own will. The first expression of this rejuven ated national life was an episode, so far as I know, is the most terrible in the history of the world. New Turkey, freed from European tutelage, cele brated its national rebirth by murder ing not lar Horn a million of its own subjects. Younic Turks Have Visions. I can hardly . exaggerate the effect which the repulse of the allied fleet produced upon the Turks. They be lieved they had won the really great decisive battle or the war. For sev eral centuries, they said, the British fleet had victoriously sailed the seas and had now met its first serious re verse at the hands of the Turks. In the first moments of their pride. the Young Turk leaders saw visions of the complete resurrection of their em pire. What had for two centuries been a decaying nation, had suddenly started on a new and glorious life. In their pride and arrogance the Turks began to look with disdain upon the people who had taught them what they knew of modern warfare and nothing angered tnem so much as any suggestion that they owed any part of their success to their German allies. British Fleet '"Defeated." "Why should we feel any obligation to the Germans?" Enver would say to me, "What have they done for us which compares with what we have done for them? They have lent us some money and sent us a few officers, it is true, but see what we have done! Wc have defeated the British fleet some thing which the Germans and no other nation could do. We have stationed armies on the Caucasion front, and so have kept busy large bodies of Russian troops that would have been used on the western front. Similarly we have compelled England to keep large armies in Egypt, in Mesopotamia, and in that way we have weakened the allied armies in France. No. the Ger mans could never have achieved their military successes without us: the shoe of obligation is entirely on their foot." This conviclon possessed all the lead ers of Union and Progess party and now began to have a determining ef fect upon Turkish national life and Turkish policy. Essentially the Turk is a bully and a coward; he is brave as a lion when things are going his way. but cringing, abject, and nerveless when reverses come. And now that the fortunes of war were apparently fav oring the empire, I began to see an en tirely new Turk unfolding before my eyes. The hesitating and fearful Otto man, feeling his way cautiously amid the mazes of European diplomacy, and seeking opportunities to find an. ad vantage for himself in the divided counsels of the European powers, gave place to an upstanding, almost dash ing figure, proud and assertive, de termined to live his own life, and abso lutely contemptuous of his Christian foes. Turk Reverts to Type. I was really witnessing a remarkable development in race psychology an almost classical instance of reversion to type. The ragged, unkempt Turk of the twentieth century was vanishing and in his place was appearing the Turk of the fourteenth and the fif teenth, the Turk wh had swept out of his Asiatic fastnesses, conquered all the powerful peoples in his way and founded in Asia. Africa and Europe one of the most extensive empires that his tory has known. If we are properly to appreciate this new Talaat and Enver, and the events which now took place, we must under stand the Turk who. under Osman and his successors, exercised his mighty but devastating influence in .the world. We must realize that the basic fact un derlying the Turkish mentality is its utter contempt for all other races. A fairly insane pride is the element that largely explains this strange human species. The common term applied by the Turk to the Christian is "dog," and in his estimation this is no mere rhetor ical figure: he actually looks upon his European neighbors as far less worthy of consideration than his own domestic animals. All Turk's Graces Borrowed. Such graces of civilization as the Turk has acquired in five centuries have practically all been taken from the subject people whom he so greatly despises. The Turks have learned lit tle of European art or science, they have established very few educational institution and illiteracy is the pre vailing rule. The result is that pov erty has attained a degree of sordid ness and misery in the Ottoman Empire which is almost unparalleled elsewhere. The Turkish peasant lives in a mud hut; he slesps on its dirt floor: he has no chairs, no tables, no eating utensils, and no clothes except the few scant garments which cover his back and which he usually wears for many years. In the course of time these Turks might learn certain things from their European and Arabic neighbors, but there was one Idea which they could never even faintly grasp. They could not understand that a conquered peo ple were anything except slaves. When they took possession of a land, they found it occupied by a certain number of camels, horses. buffaloes. dogs, swine and human beings. Of all these living things the object that physically most resembled themselves- they re garded as the least important. It be came a common saying with them that horse or a camel was far more valuable than a man; these - animals cost money, whereas "infidel Chris tians" were plentiful in the Ottoman country and could easily be forced to labor. Christian Held In clean. It is true that the carls Sultans gave the subject peoples and the Europeans in the Empire certain rights, but these in themselves really reflected the con tempt in which all non-Moslems were held. The Sultans erected the several peoples, such as the Greeks and the Armenians, into separate "millets." or nations, not 'because" they desired to promote their independence and wel fare, but because they regarded them vermin, and, therefore, disqualified for membership in the Ottoman state. The attitude of the government toward Christian subjects was illus trated by certain regulations which limited their freedom of action. The buildings in which Christians lived should not be -conspicuous and their churches should have no belfry. Chris tians could not ride a horse in the city, for that was the exclusive right of the noble Moslem. The Turk had the right to test the sharpness of his sword upon the neck of any Christian. Imagine a great government, year in and year out, maintaining this at titude toward many millions 'of its own subjects! And for centuries the Turks imply lived like parasites upon thesa over-burdened and industrious people They taxed them to economic extinc tion, stole their most beautiful daugh ters and forced them into their harems. topk Christian male infants by the hundreds of thousands and brought them up as Moslem soldiers. Time Brings Some Change. Such were the mental characteristics of the Turk in his days of military greatness. In recent times his attitude toward foreigners and his subject peo ples had superficially changed. His own military decline, and the ease with which the infidel nations de feated his finest armies, had appar ently given the haughty descendants of Osman a respect at least for their prowess. Many Turks also now re ceived their education in European universities; they studied in their pro fessional schools, and they became physicians, surgeons, lawyers, engi neers, and chemists of the modern kind. However much the more pro gressive Moslems might despise their Christian associates, they could not ignore the fact that the finest things in this temporal world were the prod ucts of European and American civili zation. And now that one development of modern history which seemed to- be least understandable to the Turk be gan to force itself upon the conscious ness of the more intelligent and pro gressive. Certain leaders arose who began to speak surreptitiously of such things as "Constitutionalism." "Lib erty," "Self-Government." These daring spirits began to dream of overturning the autocratic ultan and of substi tuting a parliamentary system for- his irresponsible rule. The point which I am emphasizing here is that this move ment presupposed a complete transfor mation of Turkish mentality, especially in its attitude toward subject peoples. No longer, under the reformed Turk ish state, were Greeks, Syrians. Ar menians. and Jews to be regarded as "filthy Giaours." Turkey for the Turks. But all these aspirations vanished like a dream. Eong before the Euro pean War began the Turkish democracy had disappeared. The power of the new Sultan had gone, and the hopes of re generating Turkey on modern lines had gone also, leaving' only a group of in dividuals, headed by Talaat and Enver, actually in possession of the state. Having lost their democratic aspira tions, these men now supplanted it with new national conception. In place of democratic, constitutional state they resurrectea me iaea or ran-iurKism; in place of equal treatment of all Otto mans, they decided to establish a coun try exclusively for Turks. . I have called this a new conception yet it was-iew only to the individu who then controlled the destiny of the empire, for, in reality, it was merely an attempt to revive the most barbaric ideas of their ancestors. It represented merely an atavistic reversion. After 500 years close contact with European civilization, the Turk remained precise ly the same individual as the one who had emerged from the steppes of Asia in the Middle Ages. W e now discov ered that a paper constitution and even tearful visits to Christian churches and cemeteries could not uproot the inborn preconception, of this nomadic people that there are only two kinds of people in the world the conquering and the conquered. Extermination Now Proposed. 1 These leaders not only reverted to the barbaric conceptions of their ances tors, but they went to extremes that had never entered the minds of the parly Sultans. Their fifteenth and six teenth century predecessors treated the subject peoples as dirt under their feet, yet they believed that they had a cer tain usefulness and did not disdain to make them their serfs. But this com mittee of union and progress, led by Talaat and Enver, now decided to do away with them altogether. The old conquering Turks had made the Chris tians their servants, but their parvenu descendants bettered their instruction, for they determined to exterminate them wholesale and Turkify the empire by massacring the non-Moslem ele ments. Originallythis was not the states manlike conception of Talaat. and En ver; the man who first devised it was one of the greatest monsters known to history, the "Red Sultan," Abdul Hamid. This man came to the throne in 1876, at a critical period in Turkish history. In the first two years of his reign he lost Bulgaria, as well as important provinces in the Caucasus, his last re maining vestiges of sovereignty In Montenegro, Serbia, and Rumania, and all his real powers in Russia and Her zegovina. Greece had long since be come an independent nation, and the processes that were to wrench Egypt from the Ottoman Empire had already begun. Sultan Sees Hanger Ahead. As the Sultan took stock of his in heritance, he could easily foresee the day when all the rest of his domain would passinto the hand of the in fidel. What had caused this disinte gration of this extensive Turkish em pire? The real cause, of course, lay deep in, the character of the Turk, but Abdul Hamid saw only the more ob vious fact that the intervention of the great European powers had brought re lief to these imprisoned nations. And what had happened several times be fore might happen again. - There still remained one compact race in the Ottoman empire that had na tional aspirations and national poten tialities. In the northern part of Asia Minor, bordering on Russia, there were six provinces in which the Armenians formed the largest element in the popu lation. From the time of Herodotus this portion' of Asia has borne the name of Armenia. The Armenians of the present day are the direct descendants of the people who inhabited the coun try 3000 years ago. Their origin Is so ancient that it. is lost in fable and mystery. .... What is definitely known about the Armenians, however, is that for ages they have constituted the most civilised and most industrious race in the eastern section of the Ottoman empire. Every where they are known for their in dustry, their intelligence and their de cent and orderly lives. 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The Peerless P acific C ompany Wholesalers of Heating: and Plumbing Supplies Phones, Marshall 1901; A7799 68-70-72 Front St., Portland, Or. These people became Christians in the fourth century and established the Ar menian church as their state religion. This is said to be the oldest Christian church in existence. Armenians Are Christians. In the face of persecutions -which have had no parallel elsewhere, these people have clung to their early Chris tian faith with the utmost tenacity. For 1500 years they have lived there in Armenia, a little island of Chris tians surrounded by backward peoples of hostile religion and hostile race. Their long; existence has been one un ending; martyrdom. The territory which they Inhabit forms the connecting; link between Europe and Asia, and all the Asiatic invasions Saracens,. Tartars. Mongols, Kurds and Turks have passed over their peaceful country. For centuries they have thus been the Bel gium of the east. (Through all this period the Armenians have regarded themselves not as Asiatics, but as Ku ropeans. They speak an Indo-European language, their racial origin Is L believed by scholars to be Aryan, and the fact that their religion is the re ligion of Europe has always made them turn their eyes westward. And out of that western country, they have always hoped, would some day come the de liverance that would rescue them from their murderous masters. And now as Abdul Hamid. in 1876. surveyed his shattered domain, he saw that its most dangerous spot was Ar menia. - He believed, rightly or wrong ly, that thesa Armenians, like the Ru manians, the Bulgarians, the Greeks, and the Serbians, aspired to restore their independent, mediaeval nation, and he knew that Europe and America sympathized with this ambition. -Wholesale Murder Ordered. How could the Sultan free himself permanently from this danger? An en lightened administration, which would have transformed the Armenians into free men and made them safe in their lives and property and civil and reli gious rights, would probably have made them peaceful and loyal subjects. But the Sultan could nof rise to sucn a conception of statesmanship as this. Instead. Abdul Hamid apparently thought that there was only one way of ridding Turkey of the Armenian problem and that was to rid her of the Armenians. The physical destruc tion of 2,000.000 men, women, and chil dren by massacres, organised and di rected by the state, seemed to be the one sure way of forestalling the fur ther disruption of the Turkish Empire. And now for nearly 30 years Turkey gave the world an Illustration of gov ernment by massacre. We in Europe and America heard of these events when they reached especially mon strous proportions, as they did in 189S 86. when nearly 200.000 Armenians were most atrociously done to death. But through all these years the existence of the Armenians was one continuous nightmare. Their property was stolen, their men were murdered, their women were ravished, their young girls were kidnapped and forced to live in Turkish harems. Yet Abdul Hamid was not able to ac complish his full purpose. He attempted to exterminate the Armenians in 1895 and 1896, but found certain insuperable obstructions to his scheme. Chief of these were England, France and Rus sia. It became apparent that unless the Sultan desisted. England. France, and Russia would intervene, and the Sultan well knew, that, in case this interven tion took place, such remnants of Tur key as had survived earlier partitions would disappear. Satanle Enterprise Falls. Thus Abdul Hamid had to abandon his satanlc enterprise of destroying a whole race by murder, yet Armenia continued to suffer the slow agony of pitiless persecution. The Young Turk regime, despite Its promises of uni versal brotherhood, brougrht no respite to the Armenians. A few months after the love feasting already described, one of the worn! massacres took place at Adana. in which 35,000 people were de stroyed. And now the Tounf Turks, who had adopted so many of Abdul Hamid s Ideas, also made his Armenian policy their own. Their passion for Turkify lng the nation seemed to demand log ically the extermination of all Chris tiansGreeks. Syrians, and Armenians. Much as they admired the Mohammedan conquerors of the fifteenth and six teenth centuries, they stupidly believed that these great warriors had made one fatal mistake, for they had had It in their power completely to obliterate the Christian populations and had neg lected to do so. They felt that the mistake had been a terrible one, but that something might be paved from the ruin. They would destroy all Greeks. Syrians, Armenians and other ChrlMtlans. move Moslem families into their homes and upon their farms, and so make sure that these territories would not simi larly be taken away from Turkey. In order to accomplish this great reform. It would not be necessary to murder every living Christian. The most beautiful and healthy Armenian girls could be taken, converted forcibly to Moham medanism and made the wives or con cubines of devout followers of the Prophet, v . Great Day Flaally Comes. Unlike - Abdul Hamid. the Young Turks found themselves In a position where they could carry out this "holy enterprise. Great Britain. France and Russia had stood in the way of their predecessor. But now these obstacles had been removed. The Young Turks, as I have said, believed that they had defeated them and that they could, therefore, no longer Interfere with their internal affairs. Only one power could successfully raise objections and that was Germany. In 1898. while all the rest of Europe w'as ringing with Gladstone's denun ciations and demanding intervention. Kaiser Wllhelm the Second had gone to Constantinople, visited Abdul Hamid, pinned his finest decorations on that bloody tyrant's breast and kissed him on both cheeks. The same Kaiser wno naa aone this In 1898 was still sitting on the throne in 1915, and was now Turkey s ally. Thua. for the fti-st time In two centuries, the Turks, in 1915. had their Christian populations utterly at their mercy. The time had finally come to make Turkev exclu sively the country of the Turks. (Continued tomorrow.) Sir Thomas White. Canadian Minis ter of Finance, arranged with the Brit ish authorities to purchase the 1918 Mlmnn pack in Britinh Columbia. "JSfnRe"T STEP- -1 pj-.r. . aAt r . DEAL