Turkey or Ottoman Empire as it was known as then, was an ancient empire settled by Ottoman Turks in the end of 13th century. It was a huge transcontinental empire ranging from Caspian Sea in the east to the boundaries of Mediterranean sea in the west. Out of all the invaders who tried to defeat the Roman empire, no one was able to win over the capital of Constantinople; except the fierce Turk warriors, who put the final nail in the coffin of the weak Roman Empire. Whole of the Europe trembled before the disciplined army of the Turks. The empire was at its height in 16th and 17th Century under Suleiman the Magnificent. The location of this empire between Europe and Asia gave Turks the power to control the trade between both.
Like everything, a nation also has a life cycle. First there is the birth of a nation. People are energetic and motivated as everyone is in the beginning of an event. People work hard, nation is administrated properly and as a result, the nations moves to a high growth trajectory. But as the nation grows, it also starts to become rich. Similar to a projectile launched into air, it reaches to a peak; after which due to this growth and money, arrogance appears. And after this the decline begins. The Ottoman empire started declining from the end of 17th century. There were a lot of internal and external factors responsible for this. First of all the Turks were not business minded; they were from a military background and did not encouraged much growth in trade. As the world became further industrialized, ocean routes opened and the popularity of land routes declined significantly. This caused a major drop in Ottoman Empire's economy. While in contrast to this, the new surge in oceanic trade with Asia filled the coffers of European nations with gold. This new rise of Europe lead to inflation in the Ottoman Empire, which in combination of other factors led to serious decline in economy.
Another factor for decline was the incompetency of the sultans; the sultans after Suleiman were not motivated or energetic towards the growth of the empire. Rather than being an able administrator, they were being seen as the military head of the nation, whose main role was to lead the armies into the war. As a result, Turks were stopped at the gates of Vienna and the few conquests were made after 1565. From ages, Turks had used the war to gain new revenues. This economic decline made their fighting abilities stagnant; while the European armies were growing under the economic boom. This further reduced their political and economic clout.
As the Ottoman Empire began to rot internally, many parts of it started breaking. Greece declared its independence in 1829. In 1875, the Balkan states also declared their independence.It was imminent now that the empire would break apart. All the countries of Europe were witnessing these events carefully. Every country wanted the result in such a way that they are benefited the most. Turkey was called 'Sick Man of Europe' and there was a hoard between England, Russia, Germany and France to get the biggest pieces of it. The burden of wars like Crimean War and the Russo - Turkish War caused irreversible damage to the economy. After a series of wars, the Ottoman empire had been driven out of nearly all of Europe and North Africa and its territory remained as the present day Turkey, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and few parts of Iraq.
When the World War I started, Ottoman empire fought with the Central Powers of Austria-Hungary and Germany. The main reasons to join war were bitter rivalry with Russians, German pressure, early German gains in the war and to save the disintegration of Empire. After four years of war, the Central Powers lost to the Allies and it was imminent that Ottoman Empire would be divided among Britain and France. The British Prime Minister had promised Greece, that if they join with Allies in the World War, they will be given territories in Ottoman Empire after the war. After the war was over, Greece demanded those territories and under the supervision of England launched a massive attack on Ottoman Empire. France took the areas of Syria and Lebanon, while England took Mesopotamia and Palestine. The Arab lands were also partitioned to create a separate state. Moreover, the Allies were pushing for Treaty of Sevres which was planning severe punishments for Ottoman Empire and would have partitioned it in small pieces.
The Britishers formed a puppet government in Ottoman Empire with a new Sultan at the top following British orders. The people of empire were not happy with this and considered him as a traitor. The cruelties done by Greeks further raised the anger in people. When the news came of the Treaty of Sevres, which would partition the Ottoman Empire into various countries and regions controlled by Allies, people's anger turned to frenzy. Mustafa Kemal Pasha was an army officer who was sent to inner regions to control people and reorganize the remaining troops. But, Mustafa took advantage of the situation and started forming an army to fight the Allies. He also formed an association to gain complete independence of the nation. In the next Parliament elections, the candidates of this party got majority. The Britishers sensing danger to their plans dissolved this parliament. Later GNA(Grand National Assembly) was formed with Kemal Pasha as the speaker.
Kemal disapproved the Treaty of Sevres and persuaded the parliament to gather an army and fight with the invaders to get complete independence. The GNA Army fight with the Caliphate army and had the main task to fight with the Greek and Armenian forces. After lot of bloody battles, the GNA Army defeated the Greeks and Armenians in many key battles. Allies led by Britishers sensing the success of this expedition, put forwarded an updated version of the Treaty of Sevres with few milder terms. But Pasha, refused it immediately on the grounds that they wanted complete independence; they wanted to form a separate republic of Turkey. GNA refused any proposal that will sacrifice the sovereignty of Turkey, such as the control of Turkey's finances, straits and other international affairs. On 24 July 1923, the Treaty of Lausanne was signed between Allies and GNA; Allies recognized the GNA as the government of Turkey. On October 29 The Republic of Turkey was incorporated.
After the Republic of Turkey was formed; Kemal Pasha became the first President of the new republic. From the beginning Pasha was oriented to form this new republic on the lines of modern states like France, Switzerland, Sweden etc. Pasha formed a treaty with Greece for transfer of Turks living in Greece and same happened for Turkey. This made the nation more homogeneous. With clever usage of events and time, Pasha started to rule like a dictator and abolished Caliphate system. Pasha wanted the nation to run on modern values, science and arts rather than on religion. Pasha passed a number of reforms in this direction to take the country away from the religion. The people's dress was changed to western outfits. The 'fez' was also banned and hats like Fedora were encouraged. Pasha brought reforms in the educational sector and persuaded people to educate their girls. The law was changed. The language was changed. The language usage was shifted to Turkish rather than Arabic. Women were given much more independence.
After, these changes Turkey never looked back. An age of prosperity began; even though there was not much changes in the economic life of people. Turkey rose from the ashes of the destroyed Phoenix( Ottoman Empire) and is modernizing rapidly. The ideas of people changed and they started thinking in areas never dreamt before. Pasha's reforms brought Turkey much closer to the western world; even though the economy was growing moderately. So, it can be said that The Turkey of today, a strong regional power was modernized from the beginnings and the name of Mustafa Kemal Pasha will always remain written in golden words in the history of Turkey.
The Britishers formed a puppet government in Ottoman Empire with a new Sultan at the top following British orders. The people of empire were not happy with this and considered him as a traitor. The cruelties done by Greeks further raised the anger in people. When the news came of the Treaty of Sevres, which would partition the Ottoman Empire into various countries and regions controlled by Allies, people's anger turned to frenzy. Mustafa Kemal Pasha was an army officer who was sent to inner regions to control people and reorganize the remaining troops. But, Mustafa took advantage of the situation and started forming an army to fight the Allies. He also formed an association to gain complete independence of the nation. In the next Parliament elections, the candidates of this party got majority. The Britishers sensing danger to their plans dissolved this parliament. Later GNA(Grand National Assembly) was formed with Kemal Pasha as the speaker.
Kemal disapproved the Treaty of Sevres and persuaded the parliament to gather an army and fight with the invaders to get complete independence. The GNA Army fight with the Caliphate army and had the main task to fight with the Greek and Armenian forces. After lot of bloody battles, the GNA Army defeated the Greeks and Armenians in many key battles. Allies led by Britishers sensing the success of this expedition, put forwarded an updated version of the Treaty of Sevres with few milder terms. But Pasha, refused it immediately on the grounds that they wanted complete independence; they wanted to form a separate republic of Turkey. GNA refused any proposal that will sacrifice the sovereignty of Turkey, such as the control of Turkey's finances, straits and other international affairs. On 24 July 1923, the Treaty of Lausanne was signed between Allies and GNA; Allies recognized the GNA as the government of Turkey. On October 29 The Republic of Turkey was incorporated.
After the Republic of Turkey was formed; Kemal Pasha became the first President of the new republic. From the beginning Pasha was oriented to form this new republic on the lines of modern states like France, Switzerland, Sweden etc. Pasha formed a treaty with Greece for transfer of Turks living in Greece and same happened for Turkey. This made the nation more homogeneous. With clever usage of events and time, Pasha started to rule like a dictator and abolished Caliphate system. Pasha wanted the nation to run on modern values, science and arts rather than on religion. Pasha passed a number of reforms in this direction to take the country away from the religion. The people's dress was changed to western outfits. The 'fez' was also banned and hats like Fedora were encouraged. Pasha brought reforms in the educational sector and persuaded people to educate their girls. The law was changed. The language was changed. The language usage was shifted to Turkish rather than Arabic. Women were given much more independence.
After, these changes Turkey never looked back. An age of prosperity began; even though there was not much changes in the economic life of people. Turkey rose from the ashes of the destroyed Phoenix( Ottoman Empire) and is modernizing rapidly. The ideas of people changed and they started thinking in areas never dreamt before. Pasha's reforms brought Turkey much closer to the western world; even though the economy was growing moderately. So, it can be said that The Turkey of today, a strong regional power was modernized from the beginnings and the name of Mustafa Kemal Pasha will always remain written in golden words in the history of Turkey.
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