F I r s t d r a f t
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Around that time, Turkey was adopting European institutions in both political and social spheres. For the ruling elite, to become part of a wider European project was a goal to be achieved. A member of the Turkish Parliament wrote that the European project would not be taken seriously, nor would it be successful, if it was based on the definition of its people as eastern, occidental or Balkanic. Instead, people should be distinguished from each other by their civilization, mentality and life-style.335 Again political leadership in Ankara was confused concerning Turkish reaction to the Briand project. Prime Minister, İsmet İnönü, admitted there was confusion resulting from Briand’s proposal. In a sense, the Turkish leaders of the early 1930s were caught off guard as they were preoccupied with gaining recognition as a legitimate member of the international community through League membership. The Turkish leaders believed that Turkey should be part of any international initiative. By excluding Turkey, the Briand proposal, in a way, set the bar for Turkey’s admission to world councils on equal footing with others at a higher level. Consequently, Turkish Foreign Minister Tevfik Rüştü Aras criticized the European Union project as being planned only for the continent. In his opinion, a harmonious international order could be established only if it included all nations which already had connections with each other in this small world.336 Tevfik Rüştü Aras later wrote that the reactions of European countries to the Briand project were diverse in the sense that they did not all welcome it. Meanwhile, Ankara lobbied in several European countries, namely, Italy, Germany, Greece, Hungary and Bulgaria, to push for the extension of an invitation to Turkey to be a participant in the deliberations on European Union.337 Turkish diplomatic lobbying paid off, as each of these European capitals mentioned, in one form or another, the desirability of Turkey’s inclusion in their replies to Briand’s memorandum on the Organization System of European Federal Union.338 While Italy and Germany recommended the participation of both Turkey and the Soviet Union in the European Union project in their responses to Briand,339 Greece also supported Turkey’s participation.340 Mussolini’s Italy objected to Briand’s project, arguing that France wanted to emphasize the disparity between the victorious and the defeated powers in the war. In other words, France intended to ratify only the existing European system and its inequalities.341 The fascist leader’s professed aim was to put an end to this inequality. In fact, similar arguments were made in the Turkish press of the time. For instance, a columnist in the Turkish daily newspaper, Cumhuriyet, wrote that France aimed to establish a European Union based on the division between the victorious and defeated powers of Europe.342 Leaders of Turkish opinion could not help but sympathize with Italian criticism of Briand who excluded Turkey from the European project. At the same time, Turkish political leadership knew well the real motives behind the Italian opposition to Briand’s project. A major stumbling block in the way to a European Union was the rivalry between Italy and France. Turkish leaders and the press were not convinced that these two countries were ready to give up this rivalry for the sake of a European Union.343 According to Zeki Mesut Alsan, the minds of European leaders were not even clear on what Europe was. For instance, he believed that, for France, Europe meant Western Europe, while Germany and Austria focused on Central Europe and t Italy was interested in creating an Italian-led bloc in Europe. 344 In fact, the Italians perceived the Briand proposal as an opportunity to capitalize on the increased sense of isolation in Turkey. As an alternative to the exclusivist union idea of France, Mussolini intended to press on with a plan for an Italian-Soviet-Turkish alliance.345 He thought that the three countries could collaborate in the Black Sea against “French intrigues”.346 Mussolini was also pushing for triangular collaboration against France in the Mediterranean. The fascist leader was working for a Turkish-Greek reconciliation that would lead to a triple alliance with Italy in order to compete with France in that region. At the same time, Mussolini started using the motto “the Balkan pact in the same spirit as Locarno”.347 This spirit was supposed to bring together countries like Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary and Turkey around Italian leadership in a way that would compel Yugoslavia to bow to Italian pressures, and therefore, to neutralize the Entente. Like the Italians, Turkish political leaders thought that the root of uneasiness in Europe was French hegemony. Ankara particularly resented French foot-dragging in ratifying the French-Turkish Treaty of Friendship, Reconciliation and Arbitration of February 1930.348 However, Turkey’s suspicions of France did not necessarily prompt Ankara to rush into any alliance system, particularly an Italian-led one. The reserved Turkish attitude towards alliances of unequal strength found its expression in an interview in the Italian daily newspaper, Popolo d’Italia, with Turkish Foreign Minister Aras who stated that, as three separate treaties of friendship already bound Turkey, Greece, and Italy, there was no need for an additional tripartite pact.349 In fact, to be a part of a bloc would not help Turkey to become a member of the League of Nations. Since Turkey wanted to be recognized as a legitimate actor, it could not alienate either Italy or France. For that reason, Prime Minister İsmet İnönü told the Italian ambassador in Turkey that the Turkish government would consider Briand’s proposal and the Italian response to it together.350 In other words, İsmet İnönü was concerned not only about the Briand initiative but also about the countries’ reactions to it. The Turkish press of the time mirrored İnönü’s mindset to a certain extent, as most Turkish newspapers devoted more attention to the Italian reply to Briand’s proposal than to the proposal itself. Obviously, in its conception of Europe, Mussolini’s Italy did strike a responsive chord in Ankara.351 The issue of extending invitations to the Soviet Union and Turkey came up during the first meeting of the second session of the Commission of Enquiry for European Union on 16 January 1931. German and Italian Foreign Ministers figured prominently in the consequent debate, advocating both Soviet and Turkish participation.352 Despite Briand’s reservations, the question of Turkish and Soviet incorporation into the Commission led to agreement among the member states acting on different yet compatible interests and motives. For instance, Romanian Foreign Minister Titulescu said his country would welcome the participation of these two countries the moment it appeared expedient.353 For Italian Foreign Minister Grandi, the admission of Turkey and the Soviet Union was meant to move Britain and Germany away from France.354 At the end of deliberations on 20 January, 1931, the first resolution the Commission drafted was about inviting Iceland, Turkey and the Soviet Union to join the Union. This resolution was eventually adopted with Norway, Belgium, Yugoslavia, Spain, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Switzerland maintaining their reservations regarding the issue.355 Adoption of this resolution cleared the way for Turkey’s official involvement in the work of the Commission of Enquiry beginning with its third session in May. On 20 January, 1931, Briand in Geneva wrote to Paris that the French government hoped to see a positive response to this invitation from the Turkish government.356 This invitation can hardly be seen as a manifestation of a French change of heart towards Turkey less than a year from Briand’s League of Nations address. At best, it can be regarded as a pragmatic move to prevent Turkey from drifting into the Italian orbit. There were indications that the French were concerned about Italian manipulation of Turkey, even within the framework of the Commission of Enquiry for European Union. Again, in January, French diplomats in Rome warned Paris about this possibility. They quoted an Italian daily, Giornale d’Itallia, which stated: “Turkey will accept the invitation of the powers to participate in the work of the conference [on the European Union] and will not forget the friendly attitude of Rome.”357 The Italian officials, for their part, did not try to hide their expectations either. After his return to Rome from Geneva, Italian Foreign Minister Grandi informed the Italian delegation that the presence of these two countries in the debates on the Briand project was in the Italian interests. Later, Grandi hinted to the ambassadors of Turkey and the Soviet Union that Italy would support their participation if they declared their preliminary acceptance of the invitation.358 The Italian sponsorship for Turkish membership in various schemes for European initiatives was not devoid of ulterior motives. In 1931, various proposals and counter-proposals were made to eliminate tariffs and other barriers among the countries in Eastern Europe in response to the 1929 World Economic Crisis. Both Italy and France tried to modify the proposed schemes to suit their political interests in the region. When Paris came up with modifications to turn the whole scheme into an anti-German political coalition, Italy sought a way out in order not to lose its leverage over Berlin. One tactic Rome resorted to was to “attempt to enlarge the technical difficulties by pleading for the inclusion of Bulgaria, Albania, Greece, Poland and Turkey, who could be counted on to make negotiations more complicated and lengthy and, if they none the less succeeded, to counterbalance the influence of the Little Entente.”359 Nevertheless, in the subsequent sessions of the Commission of Enquiry for European Union, Turkey strengthened its position through its involvement in various committees, including the one that was tasked with studying the Soviet proposal for an economic non-aggression pact.360 However, after the death of Aristide Briand in March, 1932, the work of the Commission of Enquiry Union lost much of its momentum. During its sixth session on 30 September, 1932 that opened with a tribute to the memory of Aristide Briand, Turkey was already a full-fledged participant owing to its membership in the League of Nations as from 18 July, 1932.361 Although Briand’s proposal could not be realized, his half-hearted inclusion of Turkey into the Commission of Enquiry for European Union secured Turkey’s admission to the League as a European rather than an Asian country. League membership, in a way, set the seal on Turkey’s identity as a European country for France as well. Two weeks after Turkey’s admission to the League, the French Parliament hailed Turkey’s entry as “a moral and political event of extraordinary significance … to Europe’s interest.”362
The operating environment in the Balkans made coalition building among these countries relatively easy. First, they were geographically contagious. This factor alone facilitated collaboration of like-minded states. Turkey, Greece, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Albania and Romania all had a frontier (continental or coastal) with at least one of the others. Secondly, in the Balkans, with the exception of Albania, power was more or less evenly distributed among geographically and economically minor states of comparable strength. Turkey was the only Balkan country with a sizeable territory. Thirdly, no specific great power exerted decisive influence in the region in the first half of the 1930s. In fact, immediately after the First World War a power vacuum occurred in the peninsula, which was only deepened by the World Economic Crisis of 1929.364 Compared to other Balkan states, Turkey had the greatest potential to act as a middle power in the region, not merely because of the size of its territory but mainly as a result of its diplomatic capacity in the Balkans. Turkey could tap its middle power capacity mostly in diplomatic terms. At the time, Turkey already had in place a highly developed diplomatic tradition and establishment. The Turkish ruling class in the interwar period inherited the administrative experience of the Ottoman Empire. They used the knowledge, the skill and the know-how that they had gained from the Ottoman experience to promote their diplomatic goals. In functional terms, the Ottoman heritage added an element of creativity to the new Republic’s diplomacy.365 Moreover, Ankara began to acquire muscle to back its diplomacy in the form of a growing military power, including its rejuvenated navy. The naval programs had come to fruition by the late 1920s and the early 1930s. The two submarines ordered in the Netherlands had been delivered in 1928. Their arrival marked the beginning of the growth trajectory for the the Turkish Navy. The battlecruiser Yavuz was finally ready for re-commissioning in 1930. The contractor, Penhoët, completed the work satisfactorily but incurred a substantial financial loss.366 To be considered of combat value, the Yavuz needed destroyers to protect her. In 1931 the Turkish navy was anxiously awaiting the delivery of these destroyers and other units built in Italy under the 1929 order. The three submarine chasers were first to arrive although they had been delayed because of speed problems.367 Italian government exerted pressure on Ankara to accept the three submarine chasers despite their failure to reach the contract speed.368 These three boats were officially received by the Turkish Navy in September 1931 in İstanbul.369 The first two destroyers, Kocatepe and Adatepe, were originally due for delivery in the spring of 1931. They were marred by serious stability problems370 and it was attempted to rectify these problems that delayed their delivery until October 1931. The two submarines, Sakarya and Dumlupınar, were delivered a month later, in November 1931.371 The last Italian-built units were the two additional destroyers, Zafer and Tınaztepe. They were supposed to be delivered within 12 months after the order but when they finally arrived in İstanbul in June 1932, the delivery term had been exceeded by more than a year.372 The arrival of these units, however, strengthened naval power and provided Ankara with another functional leverage in addition to its diplomacy. Its new navy and the quality of its diplomacy (as an Ottoman heritage) could both have functioned either as a burden or an asset in Turkish efforts to promote regional cooperation in the 1930s. To start with, reorganization of its navy under German instruction and the acquisition of modern naval units could have been regarded as indications of Turkey’s aggressive intentions or revisionist foreign policy. However, from 1928 onwards, Turkey had been participating in international disarmament conferences. Ankara shared and, to a certain extent, subscribed to Soviet views on disarmament. For instance, in March 1928, at the fifth session of the Preparatory Commission, the Soviets submitted a proposal that called for total disarmament. The proposal drew severe criticism from all but two delegates. Only the Germans and the Turks supported the Soviet proposal. On his return to Moscow, Litvinov, the Soviet delegate at the Geneva talks, singled out these two countries’ delegates in his oral report to the Soviet Central Executive Committee. While he assigned a “special place” to the German delegation, the Turkish delegation was commended for the “considerable support” they lent to the Soviet proposal.373 The Soviet proposal for total disarmament was finally included on the agenda of the Preparatory Commission on 15 April 1929. Revised and amended in the meantime, the proposal in broad terms called for a) reduction, rather than limitation, of armaments; b) proportional reduction of all categories of armaments; and c) abolition of offensive armaments, i.e. primarily aircraft, tanks and long-range artillery. When a vote was about to be taken to kill the Soviet proposal, the Turkish representative tabled a resolution that added a new lease of life to it.374 It has been argued that “The Turkish delegate apparently thought these principles were basically sound, but he was prepared to acquiesce in shelving the Soviet plan if the Turkish proposal [calling for equalizing armaments for all countries] was discussed”.375 Also in 1929, Turkey took advantage of another Soviet initiative to normalize its international status. In view of the delays in the Kellogg-Briand Pact’s ratification by various signatories, Litvinov proposed a protocol to bring the pact into immediate operation. Such a special protocol was signed on 9 February 1929 by Estonia, Latvia, Poland, Romania and the Soviet Union. It was open to other countries’ accession too, and so Turkey, Persia and Danzig subsequently acquiesced to the Protocol and thus to the Kellogg-Briand Pact.376 Although Turkey had not yet been a party to any general disarmament or naval limitation treaty, in 1930 it signed naval protocols with its two neighbours, Greece and the Soviet Union, which ushered in a naval holiday in the Aegean and the Black Sea. In other words, Turkey committed itself not to seek further expansion of its naval power without notifying others well in advance. The naval protocol with Greece was particularly important, as it confirmed lack of aggressive or expansionist motives against each other on the part of both governments. In sum, it was a clear manifestation of both countries’ adherence to the status quo.377 Similarly, the new Turkey managed to turn a potential burden or hindrance into a functional and activist advantage through the diplomatic tradition it had inherited from the Ottoman Empire. This Ottoman heritage, which now provided a functional advantage for Turkey to assume a high profile diplomatic role, could have hindered its efforts. To put it in different terms, Turkey had inherited in the Balkans the negative public image of the Ottoman Empire that had resulted from nearly four centuries of Ottoman rule. Turkey’s relations with its Balkan neighbours, hence, remained burdened with this negative image. The Greeks felt particularly strongly about the Ottoman past. The resolution of Turkish-Greek problems that had defied solution since the Treaty of Lausanne generated an equally strong impact, this time in a positive direction in the early 1930s. Ankara’s mending fences with Athens helped Turkey drastically change its international image to that of a status quo power that rejected cross-border expansionism or irredentism so that the new Turkey began to be perceived as a potential partner rather than a source of threat in the Peninsula. Turkey’s rapprochement with Greece was also rewarded by unqualified support from Athens of Ankara’s pursuit of endorsement of its European credentials. From the onset, Turkey had sought international recognition as a European rather than an Asian country. For instance, in the 1920s, Turkish Foreign Minister Tevfik Rüştü Aras defined his country’s new orientation and identity as being a western power to whom “the death of a peasant in the Balkans is of more importance than the death of a king in Afghanistan.”378 During the interwar period, Turkish decision-makers and intellectuals were adamant in asserting the new republic’s European credentials. This was a reflection of the Turkish desire for acceptance in the European states system.379 This aspiration met with mixed success initially. Turkey’s European credentials were not a foregone conclusion for many, even after Turkey was admitted on equal footing into various pan-European schemes.380 In the 1930s, the new Turkish state was gradually brought into the European fold through participation in two significant European Union projects of the time. It should be noted that Greece, or the Venizelist government in Greece to be precise, played a profoundly important role in the process by sponsoring Turkey’s inclusion. When the Commission of Inquiry for European Union discussed the prospects for the participation of Turkey and the Soviet Union in the works of the Commission on 16 January 1931, Greece stood out as Turkey’s principal sponsor.381 Greek Foreign Minister Michalakopoulus expressed in no uncertain terms where Turkey stood from the Greek perspective: “it is the opinion of the Greek government that, from an economic and even from the geographical point of view, Turkey belongs to Europe rather than Asia.”382 Similarly, Athens’ support seems to have been instrumental in the fundamental change of mind on the part of a prominent European intellectual regarding Turkey’s place in his European Union proposal. In his first major work, Paneropa, Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi regarded the new Turkey as a source of risk rather than a full-fledged participant in his interwar conception of the European Union. His proposed union was devised, among other things, to permanently insure the existence of the Eastern European states which would be relieved of the crushing burden of arming themselves. The Petite Entente would be secured against the Hapsburg danger; the prospect of Scandinavian countries uniting against the Russian; the Balkan countries against the Turkish.383 Coudenhove-Kalergi’s view of Turkey reversed itself completely during the period from 1923 to 1934. Interestingly, Coudenhove-Kalergi used Turkey’s admission to Aristide Briand’s project as justification for the change in Turkey’s status into a European country in his own project.384 Moreover, in the first half of the 1930s, Turkey was among the countries Coudenhove-Kalergi visited in order to enlist allies for his struggle against Nazism. In 1934, Coudenhove-Kalergi published his second book, Europa Erwacht! (Europe Awake!), which rejected racist theories of the Nazis.385 Coudenhove-Kalergi ‘s visit to Turkey obviously helped him change his mind about this country’s place in Pan-Europe, because in his book published in 1934, he included Turkey, along with the other Balkan countries, within a political Europe. However, Coudenhove-Kalergi’s inclusion of Turkey in his Pan-Europe was not devoid of geopolitical considerations or his usual anti-Soviet motives. Although, at the time, Turkey had been denied full sovereignty over the Straits, he claimed that European enlargement into southeastern Europe was significant as the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles were now in the hands of a European power, namely Turkey.386 Yüklə 0,71 Mb. Dostları ilə paylaş:
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