Mustafa Kemal Atatürk Essay ⋆ History Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was one of the greatest reformers of the 20th century, and his legacy is present-day Turkey. He built a modern state from the ruins of the Ottoman Empire through massive and progressive domestic reforms. Viewed with godlike status by Turks, he is considered the savior of a country that under his guidance resisted occupation and colonization and embraced democracy and modernization.

He was born in 1881 in Salonika (present-day Thessalonica, Greece). His father, Ali Reza, was a low-ranking Ottoman government employee who died when Mustafa was young. His mother, Zubeyde, raised him and his sister, Makbule. Zubeyde was a religious woman and hoped that her son would attend the local religious schools. However, with the help of his uncle he instead attended military school. The military schools, reflecting the Ottoman system, allowed students to rise not according to class status but by ability. Mustafa excelled in his studies. He took the name Kemal, which means perfection. He completed his studies at the War College in Harbiye, Istanbul, in 1905.

In Istanbul and elsewhere throughout his postings, Mustafa Kemal was deeply disturbed by the corruption in the Ottoman bureaucracy. He joined several underground organizations that had contacts with exiled Turks in Geneva and Paris. To keep him away from Istanbul, his superior officers, suspicious of Mustafa Kemal, posted him in faraway places such as Damascus and Tripoli, but he was able to remain active in the secret societies, although events unfolding in the Balkans pushed other figures to the forefront.

The underground organizations united and formed the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) and in 1908 started the Young Turk revolution. The subsequent leaders of this movement, Enver Pasha, Talat Pasha, and Cemal Pasha, ruled as a triumvirate and were also suspicious of Mustafa Kemal and preferred to keep him away from the seat of government. Mustafa Kemal was critical of the CUP’s lack of ideology and program. The CUP’s only objective in the revolution was to reinstate the 1876 constitution, which had been abolished by the sultan. Mustafa Kemal was also wary of the expansionist and pan-Turkic postrevolution ideology the CUP embraced. Germany cleverly took advantage of the situation and entered into an alliance with the CUP. Mustafa Kemal, although he did not agree with the alliance, gladly learned modern military technology from German military officers who had been sent to train the Ottoman armies.

Allied Defeat At Gallipoli

The CUP-led Ottoman Empire fared badly in both the Balkan Wars and World War I. The only major victory was at Gallipoli, where Mustafa Kemal soundly defeated the British invasion. In 1915 the British army and navy valiantly fought to open the Dardanelles in a plan created by Winston Churchill. It was essential for the Allies to take Istanbul in order to reopen the Bosphorus Strait. The Allied defeat in Gallipoli compromised that situation and possibly lengthened the war.

Mustafa Kemal was heralded as a hero among the Turks during a war that saw few victories and many defeats for the Ottomans. At the conclusion of the war, the remaining Ottoman territories were divided amongst the Allied powers. France was given control of southern Turkey (near the Syrian border), Italy was given the Mediterranean region, and Greece was given Thrace and the Aegean coast of Turkey. Istanbul was to be an internationally controlled city (mainly French and British). The Kurds and Armenians were also granted territory under the Treaty of Sèvres. The Turks would have only a small, mountainous territory in central Turkey.

Mustafa Kemal was outraged, as were most Turks. Of all the occupying armies, he viewed the Greek army as the most dangerous threat. Greek nationalism was at an all-time high, and many wanted to reclaim all of ancestral Greece (which extended well into Asia Minor). This fear was confirmed by the Greek invasion of Smyrna (present day Izmir) in 1919.

In May 1919 Mustafa Kemal secretly traveled to Samsun (on the Black Sea coast) and journeyed to Amasya, where he issued the first resistance proclamation. He then formed a national assembly, where he was elected chairman. Next he organized a resistance army to overthrow foreign occupation and conquest. Under his leadership the Turkish resistance easily drove out the British, French, and Italian troops, who were weary of fighting and did not want another war. The real conflict was with the Greek troops and culminated in horrible atrocities committed by both sides. In September 1922 the Turkish army drove the Greek army into the sea at Izmir as the international community silently observed.

In 1923 the Treaty of Lausanne was signed and replaced the Treaty of Sèvres. This treaty set the borders of modern-day Turkey. On October 29, 1923, the Republic of Turkey was proclaimed, with Mustafa Kemal as president and Ismet Inönü as prime minister. Even though the government appeared democratic, Mustafa Kemal had almost absolute power. However, he differed from several rising dictators of the time in several respects. He had no plans or ideology pertaining to expansionism. His primary focus was the modernization and domestic reform of his country. He wanted to make Turkey self-sufficient and independent.

He believed that the only way to save his country was to modernize it, and by force if necessary. He moved the capital from Istanbul to Ankara, a centrally located city. He then abolished both the sultanate and the caliphate, and his fight against religion became one of his most contested reforms. He believed that Islam’s role in government would prevent the country from modernizing. He was not antireligion but against religious interference in governmental affairs. He closed the religious schools and courts and put religion under state control. He wanted to lessen the religious and ethnic divisions that had been encouraged under the Ottoman system. He wanted the people of Turkey to identify themselves as Turks first. He established political parties and a national assembly based on the parliamentary system. He also implemented the Swiss legal code that allowed freedom of religion and civil divorce and banned polygamy.

Atatürk banned the fez for men and the veil for women and encouraged Western-style dress. He replaced the Muslim calendar with the European calendar and changed the working week to Monday through Friday, leaving Saturday and Sunday as the weekend. He hired expert linguists to transform the Turkish alphabet from Arabic to Latin script based on phonetic sounds and introduced the metric system. As surnames did not exist until this time, Mustafa Kemal insisted that each person and family select a surname. He chose Atatürk, which means “father of the Turks.”

Some of his most profound reforms, however, were in regard to women. Atatürk argued that no society could be successful while half of the population was hidden away. He encouraged women to wear European clothing and to leave the harems. Turkey was one of the first countries to give women the right to vote and hold office in 1930. He also adopted several daughters. One of them, Sabiha Gokcen, became the first woman combat pilot in Turkey.

These reforms did not come easily and in many cases garnered little support. Many religious and ethnic groups such as the Sufi dervishes and Kurds staged rebellions and were ruthlessly put down. Other minority groups suffered or were exiled as a result of the new government.

A heavy drinker, Atatürk died of cirrhosis of the liver in November 1938. As he had no children he left no heirs and instead bequeathed to his country the democracy that he created, which would survive him to the present day. Although Atatürk forbade many basic concepts of democracy such as free press, trade unions, and freedom of speech, he paved the way for the future addition and implementation of these ideals.

Bibliography:

Lord Kinross (Patrick Balfour). Atatürk: The Rebirth of a Nation. London and New York: William Morrow Company, 1965;
Mango, Andrew. Atatürk: The Biography of the Founder of Modern Turkey. New York: The Overlook Press, 1999.

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