New-York tribune., 1919-06-27
Allies Reject
Turks Plea to
Retain Empire
Continued from page /

tians, condemned to death by every
means 100000 Moslems
Thousands Driven from Homes
Several hundreds of thousands of
these unfortunate beings, hunted from
their homes, are still wandering about
to-day in the middle of Asia Minor
without shelter and without any re-
lief for their very existence. And even
IT they returned to their provinces
they would find themselves just as
destitute, for a large number of towns
and villages, both Moslem and Chris
tian, have been completely destroyed.
Asia Minor is to-day nothing but a
vast heap of ruins.
"The new government, notwithstand-
ing its vigilant care, has been as yet
unable to mitigate the disastrous ef-
fects of the cataclysm. 1t will always
be easily possible to confirm my as
sertions by an inquiry undertaken on
the spot.
1T is necessary, however, to dismiss
any theory of racial conflict or any
explosion of religious fanaticism.
Moreover, the Turkish people, at time
when violence could strive successfully
against right, showed itself able to
respect the lives, the honor and the
sacred feelings of the Christian ma
tions subject to its laws. 1t would
w Aeii o1 " JuuSe tne ottoman ma
tlon by its long history as a whole
rather than by a single period which
shows it in the most Instantaneous
light.
Pleads for World Sympathy
"Whatever be the names by which
they are called, the principles and the
methods of both Russian and Turkish
revolutions are the same--namely, to
Intx o~l.
ruins by putting its members out of
the way and taking possession of their
property. Europe and America are en-
deavoring, at the cost of immense sac
rltices, to deliver the Slav people, whose
ostensible attitude toward the Entente
is scarcely different at the present time
from that of the Turks, for both have
been reduced to silence and both are
parayzed by an unheard of tyranny.
The Turks, who thus find them
selves, under the domination of the
that of the Russians under the Terror
lists, deserve the same sympathy and
the same humanitarian and kindly as
slstance at the hands of the rulers Of
the great nations which hold the des-
TIMES of the world in their hands.
"Latterly, the truth has begun to
filter through into European public
opinion. The great trial of the Union
lists at Constantinople has proven the
responsibility of the leaders of the
committee, all of whom occupy high
positions in the state, for the war and
the other tragic events. That is the
rehabilitation of the Ottoman nation
Thus rehabiitated in the ewes of
the civilized world, our mission will
henceforth be that of devoting our
selves to an intensive economic and
intellectual culture, IN order thus to
become a useful factor in the LEAGUE
of nations.
"The Ottoman people hopes that the
chaos in the East, fostered as it is bv
this abnormal state of affairs, which
is neither war nor peace, may at last
be replaced by order, and it likewise
desires to see the end of the continued
occupation OF its territories, in spite
OF the armistice. This occupation in
tact has resulted at Smyrna in the
most deplorable excesses, which have
been committed to the hurt of the de-
fenceless Moslem population.
1T desires with equal earnestness
the maintenance, on the basis of the
status quo ante ebellum, of the integrity
OF the Ottoman empire, which during
the last forty years has been reduced
to the least possible limits.
~, ldStly, W1SneS TO be granted IN
Thrace, to the north and west OF
Adrinople, where the Mahometan pop.
ulation is in an overwhel lining major
lty, frontier line which will render
possible the defence of Adrianople and
Constantinople.
What we ask for thus is, moreover,
completely in conformity with Presi-
dent Wilson's principles, which we in
voked when we requested an armistice,
being convinced that they would be
eventually applied in the interests of
hand, fresh parcelling out of the
Ottoman Empire would entirely upset
the balance in the East"
Allied Reply to Turkey
The reply of the Allied and associated
powers WAS dated June 25 and follows:
"The council of the principal Allied
and associated powers have read with
the most careful attention the memo
randum presented to them by YOUR
excellency on June II, and, in accord
ance with the promise then made, de-
sire now to offer the following obser-
vations upon it:
'ln your recital of the political in
trigues which accompanied Turkeys
entry into the war and of the tragedies
which followed it, your excellency
makes no attempt to excuse or qualify
the crimes of which the Turkish gov
ernment was then guilty. 1t is ad-
mitted directly or by implication. tn It
Turkey had no cause of quarrel with
the Entente powers, that she acted as
the subservient tool of Germany, that
the war, begun without excuse and
conducted without mercy, was accom-
panied by massacres whose calculated
atrocity equals or exceeds anything in
recorded history.
"But it is argued that these crimes
were committed by a Turkish govern
ment for whose misdeeds the Turkish
people were not responsible that there
was in them no element of religious
fanaticism, that Moslems suffered from