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The case of Turkey illustrates how much Holbraad’s conception of middle power status is contingent on the regional context. Although he offers a convincing argument for excluding Turkey from the league of middle powers of the Cold War period, he overlooks Turkey’s middle power status and behaviour in the European context in the interwar era. Indeed, it is the major assertion of our work that modern Turkey displayed the characteristics of a middle power (at least an emerging one) in the interwar period in terms of its activist diplomacy and, though to a lesser extent, of its naval policy.69 Unfortunately, there is no accurate statistical data based on traditional indicators of size and strength to provide a convincing argument regarding Turkey’s middle power status in the period under study. There is only a single compilation that attempts to bring together such indicators for the interwar period. The Yearbook of International Disarmament which was published regularly by the League of Nations from 1926 to 1938, covering 60 states, remains to this date the only data series in hand to gauge conventionally the relative positions of states in the international power hierarchy. These Yearbooks had been published as part of the League’s promotion of international disarmament efforts in the 1920s and 1930s. Notwithstanding their obvious shortcomings and major inaccuracies, the data compiled by the League at least offer a perception of the relative strengths of these states.70 Accordingly, the available data may be used to provide a very crude presentation of Turkey’s size, population, and military strength in comparison to that of the others.71 Based on data presented in the Yearbooks of International Disarmament, Turkey’s relative position in the international system can be compared to four other countries in Europe: Spain, Hungary, Yugoslavia and Poland. These countries were selected for comparison in line with a proposal made by General Smuts regarding the composition of the League of Nations Council back in December 1918. In a pamphlet titled, The League of Nations – A Practical Suggestion, General Smuts proposed a distinction between the two types of lesser powers: intermediate powers and minor powers.
This proposal is considered unusual in two respects. First, it boldly disregarded the distinction between winners and losers of the War. Secondly, it did not consider the perceived contribution of these to the victory or their responsibility for the First World War.73 As Smuts originally cited Spain, Hungary, Turkey, Central Russia, Poland and Greater Serbia among the “intermediate powers,” his categorization (with the exception of Central Russia) is taken here as a basis for comparing the relative strengths of European middle powers. A simple survey (or reading) of data on area, population, size of the army, number of aircraft and total tonnage of units presented in the Yearbooks for these five countries yields a rather interesting result.74 A further distinction may be made as to the lower-echelon and higher-echelon middle powers among them. While Poland and Spain stand out as two higher-echelon middle powers due to the magnitude of resources they commanded at that time, the interwar Hungary and Yugoslavia can be regarded as lower-echelon middle powers. Having fared worse than the two higher-echelon middle powers but better than the two lower-echelon middle powers in most data categories, Turkey indeed presents the ultimate middle power in the context of interwar Europe from the conventional perspective. Only in terms of geographical area, Turkey stood a cut above the rest. On the other side of the coin, size of population was the category in which Turkey seriously lagged behind the two higher-echelon middle powers – Poland and Spain. Indeed, many foreign observers regarded population as a serious vulnerability for the new Turkey. For instance, writing in the early 1930s, an Austrian diplomat in Ankara identified two problems with Turkey’s population. First, given the size of the country (almost as large as Germany and Italy combined), Turkey was under-populated for national defence purposes. The mismatch between its population and territory posed a defence problem, particularly in and around the coastal regions.75 Second, an under-populated Turkey could be seen as potential outlet for settling immigrants from European countries, such as Germany and Italy, whose resources had been strained by population pressure.76 This final observation is indeed a confirmation of a typical middle power dilemma, resulting from the mismatch between its relatively large size and strategic importance and the limited means at its disposal to defend itself. This dilemma provides a strong motivation for multilateralism among the middle powers. Their interest in collective security is also linked to this mismatch. Hence, they make reliable partners in international organizations.77 Turning to less tangible manifestations of middle power activism in international relations, the case of Turkey in the 1930s was very much reminiscent of Australian and Canadian relocation in the international system in reaction to lack of economic leadership in the 1980s. Half a century earlier, in the absence of leadership from traditional powers, Turkey took various initiatives and actively promoted cooperation in the Balkans. One major difference, however, is that, as Turkey evolved from a regional (great) power to a middle power, its diplomacy could count on fewer and less developed international and regional organizations than their Australian and Canadian counterparts several decades later. The quality of a viable diplomacy is considered a middle power asset. The new Turkey inherited not only the core geography of the Ottoman Empire but, to a great extent, its diplomatic traditions and institutions.78 This heritage facilitated gradual enhancement of the new Turkey’s voice in international fora. Building on their experience with the Ottoman capitulations and debts, Turkish diplomacy also took on an economic dimension after the World Economic Crisis of 1929.79 The failure of various international initiatives led Turkey to turn its attention to regional arrangements such as promoting cooperation in the Balkans where there had been a marked absence of leadership from traditional sources. Under circumstances that accorded primacy to economics, the traditional Turkish diplomatic apparatus was supplemented (or complemented) by other bureaucratic institutions. The Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Economics both began to develop international postures. An observer sees this diversification of actors involved in Turkey’s international relations as a natural outcome of a policy of statism (étatism) which was impossible to serve by means of traditional diplomacy only. To manage Turkey’s international economic relations, Türkofis was set up as a separate agency under the Ministry of Economics. It grew into a large network with offices in the countries of Turkey’s major foreign trade partners. The Ministry of Finance’s rising profile in Turkey’s foreign relations during the same period stemmed principally from the need to handle the Ottoman debt. Interestingly Turkey’s major arms procurement programs through foreign loans provided another impetus for the Finance Ministry’s involvement in the economic diplomacy of Turkey in the 1930s.80 In evaluating Turkey’s middle power activism in international economic affairs, it has to be borne in mind that Ankara operated within a far less connected and interdependent international economy than Canada or Australia would decades later. In fact, the Turkish economic diplomacy was largely confined to bilateral economic and trade relations and proved unable to offer sufficient incentives for multilateral regional arrangements. The failed Balkan economic union proposal is a case in point. Turning to security issues, as a middle power Turkey was faced with similar dilemmas and exhibited foreign policy behaviour typically attributed to middle powers. The Italian attack on Abyssinia and piracy in the Mediterranean during the Spanish Civil War were two cases in point. Apprehensive of its own security, Ankara regarded the Italian attack on Abyssinia as a clear breach of an independent country’s territorial integrity. It went along with the international community in imposing and implementing sanctions on Italy. Also during the Spanish Civil War, it politically supported the international action regarding submarine activity in the Mediterranean, though it stopped short of supplying naval units to international patrols in the Mediterranean. That became a divisive issue, creating a rift between the proponents and opponents of the internationalist line in Turkish foreign policy at the time. Regional great power is another concept used to identify Turkey’s position in the world. Osterud identifies the new Turkish Republic as a regional great power, though only in the Middle East context. “The break-up of empires meant new political realities in regional affairs, with nationalist Turkey as a new ‘regional great power, in the Middle East...”81 However, it should be noted that middle power and regional great power are two categories that are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Wight argues that the latter refers to states “with general interests relative to a limited region and capacity to act alone.” Hence, “great power” status of such states is strictly confined to a sub-system in the regional context. Although middle powers and regional powers are portrayed as two distinct categories, the latter is occasionally an interim step to becoming a middle power. In other words, “such regional great powers will probably be candidates, in the states-system at large, for the rank of middle power.”82 The issue here is whether or to what extent such an evolutionary trajectory is applicable to the case of Turkey between the two World Wars. Another question is how regional great powers evolve into middle powers or attempt to do so. What has to be firmly established is whether Turkey displayed the attributes of a regional great power to a sufficiently sustainable degree between the two World Wars to be called a middle power or whether the status it inherited from the Ottoman Empire can be taken as an indication of such previous status. With its mixed record, Turkey definitely tried to act like a middle power. It may be claimed that its transition to middle power status could not materialize due to the outbreak of the Second World War. On the other hand, Poland, which fits both middle and regional great power categories in the interwar context and the choices it made, offers a contrast in behaviour as a comparably situated international actor. Poland preferred to act as (or pretend to be) a “Great Power.” In other words, Turkey and Poland presented two opposite diplomatic and military/naval choices and styles both regionally and internationally in the interwar period. To begin with, while Poland signed a treaty of alliance with France in pursuit of protection from Russian and German powers, Turkey took the opposite way and tried to preserve its diplomatic independence. These two different types of middle power behaviour may be related to the varying degree of intensity of great power rivalry each was exposed to. Poland was caught between Germany and Russia and allied with France, which in turn was preoccupied with Germany, whereas Turkey at this time did not stand in such close proximity to any great power rivalry. Italian-British rivalry in the Mediterranean came much later to influence Turkish foreign policy behaviour.83 Similarly, Neumann argues: “For an aspiring regional great power, there is a difference between being constrained by geographically distant powers with an abstract interest in regional balance, or by immediately neighboring great powers with specific hegemonic interests and aspirations. Poland was exposed to the latter experience, and could actually count two great powers among its regional challengers.”84 Turkey and Poland stand at two different ends of the spectrum of middle powers and/or regional great powers in evolutionary terms as well. While Turkey represents more or less a power that stepped down from the rank of a great power, Poland is a power that graduated up to the same rank from years of non-existence. Neumann offers a vivid description of the typical middle power dilemma for Poland in the interwar period: “With a population of around 30 million and a standing army of over 250.000 men, Poland did not lag hopelessly behind a great power like France... Because of its weak economy, however, Poland could ill-afford to keep an army of this size. In the 1930s, defence costs reached as much as 27.5 percent of government expenditure.”85 The simultaneous, yet temporary decline of both Germany and Russia facilitated Poland’s graduation to a higher rank in the European power hierarchy. However, this sudden change of status in turn prompted “an inflated view of its own role in the European system... especially after the conclusion of the Russo-Polish War in 1921.”86 The Locarno Treaties represented a shock both to Polish security and to its great power aspirations (or pretensions). It was a watershed for Polish dreams of equality with great powers. However, even this watershed did not end Polish self-perception of great power status.87
Hence, the Poles viewed various schemes of regional security, from the Little Entente to the suggested “Eastern Pact,” as impediments to its regional leadership aspirations. In contrast to Turkey’s success in restoring its relations with its smaller neighbours, Polish diplomacy failed to achieve similar results by peaceful means in the interwar period. Moreover, it took advantage of its neighbours' troubles with great powers to advance its own interests. There are two cases in point. After the Anchlus in 1938, Poland delivered an ultimatum to Kaunas (Lithuania) to establish diplomatic relations.. Also, following German intervention in the Sudetenland, it took Teschen by force from Czechoslovakia.89 Poland’s problems with its smaller neighbours can be linked to the fact that Lithuania and Czechoslovakia had just gained their independent nation status from multi-ethnic empires and their governments and people were intent on guarding jealously their new states’ independence. A neighborhood of newly independent states indeed points to the existence for Polish diplomacy of an operating environment similar to one that was in place in the Balkans for Turkish diplomacy. Understandably, Poland’s neighbours were reluctant to forego this by the “forging of a union of states under Polish leadership...” To the new elites in Kaunas and Prague, to play a subordinate role once again in a union of states was not a tempting option.90 By 1936, Polish imperial ambitions were stated more bluntly. The authoritarian government began to demand colonies as a solution to both its overpopulation and “the Jewish problem.” In a similar frame of mind, Poland embarked on naval rearmament to become a naval power overseas. Shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War, “General Sosnkowski announced in 1939 Poland’s youth were to play the role due to Poland”. Such moves completed Poland’s isolation.91 The ultimate manifestations of Polish and Turkish diplomatic behaviours can be found in their reactions to Mussolini’s Four-Power Pact proposal. Both resented and rejected Mussolini’s proposal, however, for diametrically opposed reasons. Mussolini basically proposed a European order to be dictated and managed by four great powers: Italy, France, Britain and Germany. The proposal deepened the Turkish suspicion regarding Great Power behaviours. Ankara was convinced that despite intensity of rivalries among themselves, the Great Powers would cooperate at the expense of smaller states in the Balkans and the Mediterranean, if their interests warranted so. Consequently, Turkey intensified its diplomatic efforts for Balkan cooperation and, therefore, chose an ‘activist’ path after March 1933. Polish reaction, although featured a strong element of deep resentment, differed from Turkey’s in its causes. The Poles were resentful not over the scheme itself but over their exclusion from the circle of Great Powers. Polish Prime Minister even hinted at pulling his country out of the League of Nations. In so doing, he indicated that his country would choose isolation to “constant interference by the big-four.”92 Re-discovery of Turkey’s and Poland’s middle power credentials had to wait until the end of the Cold War. The Cold War international order did not leave either country much latitude for diplomatic activism as middle powers. For instance, Spero’s recent work is a typical example dealing with Poland’s restoration to middle power status. Based on the Polish case after the Cold War, Spero defines middle power in behavioural terms and indeed associates typical middle power behaviour with a function called “bridging.” He defines bridging as “alignment by middle powers with all neighbours to lessen historic security dilemmas rather than playing countries off against one another, or hiding behind neutrality or nonalignment.”93 In other words, bridging represents a type of alignment different than ‘balancing against’ or ‘bandwagoning’ with specific states, or aggressive alignments for territorial aggrandizement or regional domination. Accordingly, he argues that Poland as a middle power sought security by bridging with other middle or great powers in the post-Cold War era. This represents a strategy based not on “self-help” but “other-help” view of the world. The choice of such an alternative strategy stems from Poland’s own historical experiences because self-help strategies had previously failed to guarantee Polish security and sovereignty.94 The historical experience and fear of losing sovereignty and independence are two explanations for the Polish change of heart.95 In this respect, it is very reminiscent of a path Turkish diplomacy had attempted to follow in the interwar period. The Ottoman diplomatic experience suggested to the new rulers of Turkey that self-help strategies had worked only to a certain (or limited) extent to keep the Empire from unraveling. Like Poland’s, Ottoman independence was, however, very much compromised by the Great Powers. So the new Turkish strategy which was devised and implemented between the two world wars was indeed a strategy aimed at bridging first the Balkan and then the Mediterranean divides in light of the lessons learned from the Ottoman experience. This was regarded as best option to secure Turkey’s survival without loss of sovereignty and independence. 2. BUILDING A VIABLE COUNTRY: POLITICS AND FORCE The domestic context within which the new Turkish government tried to revive Turkish naval power in the 1920s was not very favourable.. At home, regime consolidation problems and the Sheik Said rebellion militated against a swift recovery of Turkish naval power. A naval program in the proper sense of the word could only be embarked upon after the country had stabilized internally and externally towards the end of the 1920s. The external and internal threats that had to be tackled almost concomitantly stretched the modest diplomatic and military resources of the new country to the limit. In the mid-1920s, Turkey looked like a country with very slim prospects for survival. It was more or less an international outcast left out of the collective security system of the League of Nations. A number of issues that had defied settlement at Lausanne hindered the normalization of relations with its neighbours, some of which were prominent great powers such as Britain, France and Italy. Political Rivalry In 1923, the new rulers of Turkey embarked on the ambitious task of creating a modern republic. This task inevitably required transforming the society and institutions inherited from the Ottoman Empire into a society and institutions loyal to the Republic. However, the march towards reform met with opposition. The proclamation of the Republic on 29 October, 1923 sharpened the rivalry between the proponents and opponents of reforms which eventually resolved into the establishment of two political parties in the Parliament (TBMM). The Cumhuriyet Halk Fırkası (The Republican People's Party) led by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder and first president of the Republic, was formed by the ruling group, whereas the opposition was organized into the Terrakiperver Cumhuriyet Fırkası (Progressive Republican Party). Former comrades during the War of Independence began to part company and engage in a political struggle over the future shape and direction of the new Turkey. Rauf Orbay gradually emerged as the key figure opposing Mustafa Kemal and his intended reforms. Orbay's comments in the Istanbul press about the Republic, and his visit to the Caliph were seen as open challenges to the new regime.96 To expand their support bases, both individuals tried to recruit political allies. Orbay was joined by two prominent military leaders of the War of Independence, Generals Kazım [Karabekir] and Ali Fuat [Cebesoy]. President Mustafa Kemal enlisted Chief of Staff Field Marshal Fevzi [Çakmak] and Prime Minister İsmet [İnönü] on his side. The latter group decided to press on with the reforms, including the abolition of the Caliphate in March 1924, to consolidate the regime. During this power struggle, the loyalty of the Turkish navy became a significant issue. Initially, the navy was seen by a new Turkish ruling elite as an institution with questionable pro-republican credentials. The whole process of transformation thus involved as well conversion of the navy into a republican institution. The Ministry of Marine was created in December 1924to serve this end. This office was the first (and shortly to become the last) of its kind in modern Turkey. Although it had been standard practice for the governments in the late Ottoman era to have a Ministry of Marine, particularly after 1867, the new regime of Turkey did not immediately adopt the Ottoman model.97 The Turkish War of Independence of 1919-1922 was overwhelmingly a land war in which naval operations had peripheral influence at best. The amount of space devoted to naval operations in the official military history of the War of Independence is illustrative of the extent of the naval contribution to the nationalist effort during the War of Independence. Air and naval operations combined account for only a single volume in the 20-volume series published by the General Staff History service.98 Yüklə 0,71 Mb. Dostları ilə paylaş:
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