The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-03-08
New Turkish Party

From Zero Hour in the Near East" by Jackson Fleming, in Asia" Maga- zine.
 stantinople and other parts of Turkey the Turks were soon convinced that Great Britain and France. as well as Greece and Italy. were even more ag- gressive than Russia and Germany had ever been. Many of the progressive leaders, as stated in the beginning, W ere soon scattered from Constanti- nople-imprisoned, in exile or in hid- ing. Enver Pasha, I was told, was | probably somewhere in the Cau- casus''; Talaat was "in Germany; Djemal sin Switzerland" Many were less fortunate. The fear of losing his Caliphate was put into the heart of the weak sultan. reactionary cab | met was formed subservient to the al- I lies bidding. Military demonstrations and propaganda were the order of the 1 day.
 But the spirit of the Turk was not crushed. Patriots were everywhere, and although reconciled for the most part to the dissolution of the empire, | still they were resolved to preserve Turkey. the nation. Under the leader ship of Mustapha Pasha, who was a- l the time in command of the Turkish l afHly III eastern Analolld, ln6 HdLlOn- alists began to organize and to assume real significance as party. It was in
 July G919) that the first congress | of nationalists was called by Mustapha
 Kemal to meet at Erzerum.
 1 By this time the allies at Constanti- nople and the bolstered-up govern ment" were watching nationalism with | uneasy interest. They ordered MuSta- pha Renal to come to Constantinople J CT consider himself shorn of his com mand in the army. He didn't come, 1 but his army chose to remain under
 him. It seemed that nationaKsm was rising like tidal wave. The allies
 undertook to smother this "deplorable', ] patriotism with the censorship, propa- ganda, etc., so that Constantinople has become perhaps the most trying place l in all the world for truth to find day. l light.
 1 Turning toward the Paris conference and the west generally. the propa- 1 ganda characterized the nationalists after this wise: These Turkish na- tionalists are the same old unspealS- able Union and Progress elements, | with their former murderous leaders | directing the movement from their
 hiding places. They are the same pro- German, Pan-Islamic butchers of Ar
 menians and Greeks who proved them selves utterly incompetent to govern
  1 the point of slaughtering the rest of | the Armenians."
 Turning eastward the propaganda | turned color also: "These nationalists | are the same maddened Union and Progress clements who ruined the Turkish empire. Threatened to under I mine the faith of Islam. and who would
 now lead the Turkish people to sui cide."' -.
 The nationalists, I should say in- clude practically all the progressive clements among the Turkish people. They are supported by a vast major ity of the population. If this means the "Union and Progress" element, then it is that element turned inside out and expurgated It includes that element, perhaps. not in it's first ire sponsible flush of freedom. but deeply humbled by experience and by the war. and now under new leadership. It is
 the progressive spirit in Turkey dis illusioned of it's abnormal aspirations, with principles which are now normal lv progressive principles. But first
 and foremost, the nationalists are con-
 ducting a desperate defense of Tur-
 keys territorial integrity.