226 • 14 MODERNIZING RULERS IN THE INDEPENDENT STATESthe Bolsheviks renounced claims made on Istanbul and the Straits by previ¬
ous Russian governments, Britain and France now occupied these areas on
the pretext of aiding the White Russians against the communists. The win¬
ter of 1918-1919 was a nightmare for Istanbul's Turks. Influenza was rife,
coal and wood were scarce, youth gangs roamed the darkened streets and
robbed shopkeepers and passersby, food prices skyrocketed, and the Greek
inhabitants flew their national flag openly. They even gave the French com¬
mander a white horse, on which he triumphantly entered the city, just as
Mehmet the Conqueror had done in 1453.
By the time the Allies opened their postwar conference in Paris, they
were prepared to divide Thrace and Anatolia—as well as the Arab lands
discussed in Chapter 13—into spheres of influence. Some proposed a US
mandate over Anatolia as well as Armenia. The Turks, tired from wars that
had taken their young men and drained their treasury since the Libyan War
of 1911, might have accepted foreign tutelage and military occupation, but
for an unforeseen challenge. Eleutherios Venizelos, the Greek prime minis¬
ter, argued before the Paris Peace Conference that the west Anatolian city of
Smyrna (now Izmir) should be awarded to Greece. Greek nationalists in
Athens spoke of a reconstituted Byzantine Empire that would include
Istanbul, Thrace, and western Anatolia, areas in which many Greek Chris¬
tians still lived under Ottoman rule. Egged on by the Allies, especially Lloyd
George, Venizelos acted to realize these ambitions. On 15 May 1919 some
25,000 Greek troops landed at Smyrna, welcomed by its mainly Greek and
foreign inhabitants. No resistance came from the Ottoman government,
which was trying to pacify a country that was close to anarchy. Yet this
landing of the Greeks, long the most rebellious subjects of the Ottoman
Empire, was the spark that ignited Turkish nationalism in Anatolia. Four
days later another landing, equally fateful for Turkish history, occurred at
the Black Sea port of Samsun.
MUSTAFA KEMAL ATATURK,
Commanding the force that landed at Samsun was Mustafa Kemal, a gen¬
eral who had been sent by the sultan's government to disarm the people
and restore order to eastern Anatolia's turbulent provinces. Mustafa Kemal,
later surnamed Ataturk, had already won fame for his military exploits in
World War I. He had commanded the Turks' successful Dardanelles defense
against the Western Allies in 1915. The following year his troops drove back
the Russians in the east. He also directed the Turks' orderly retreat from
Syria in 1918, gaining the respect of his British adversaries. His frank hos-