166 Ë The Caucasus Group and Japan
Fig. 6.6.Haidar Bammat, his wife, Shigeki Usui, and two unidenti ed individuals, Lausanne,
Switzerland, July 1938, just before Usui’s departure to Tokyo.
der. They were said to be reserve forces for “Turkish intelligence” and foreign spies.
Moscow approved the request.¹⁶⁰
Turkey appeared to overlook Japanese-supported operations from its territory. In
the spring of 1938,Kafdağı, a new version in Turkish of the closed journalKavkaz,
began publication in Turkey.¹⁶¹Ultimately, however, in view of its relations with the
Soviet Union, Turkey considered it politically expedient to expel Alikhan Kantemir’s
group operating with Bammat from Turkey. This move was prompted by a meeting,
held in Turkey between 6 and 10 August 1938, of Japanese military attachés from
the Soviet Union, Turkey, Egypt, Romania, Syria, and Afghanistan, as well as other
Japanese diplomats from the region. Bammat was invited to attend this conference.
Under the cover of an economic conference, the meeting was convened to launch
intelligence and subversion in the Caucasus and Central Asia, evidently to divert So-
viet eorts from the Far East. Soviet intelligence knew in advance about the meeting
and its true purposes, however, and lodged complaints with the Turkish government,
160 L.S. Gatagova, comp.,Sovetskaia etnopolitika, 1930–1940-e gody. Sbornik dokumentov(Moscow:
Institut rossiiskoi istorii, 2012), 207–208.
161 Mamoulia,Les combats indépendandistes des Caucasiens, 219.