Evening star., 1947-05-03
Mor ! ak in Turkey
Rife as Loon Neurs
Nerves Of People Are Prayed
BY Nine Fear Mobilization
By John r. Leacacos

imminent American aid to Turkey has
the effect OF unshackling the Turkish
press to counter Radio Moscow.
Tough and cynical though the Turks
may be, their nerves are unbelieyably
frayed after nine years OF mobilization
to defend their neutrality and to fore
stall possible attack or internal collapse
in the wake of Soviet diplomatic de-
nands aimed at their territory.
The Turks have no illusions about
the Russian game. They are offered the
choice Of giving up strategic Kars and
Ardalan in the Caucasus and allowing
joint Russo Turkish control of the Dar-
danelles or changing their present gov
ernment for a satellite one in order to
avoid q perpetual drain which not even
the riches of the United States could
eventually stand.
The choice cannot be put OF forever.
The Russian pressure is one-two
punching system. Diplomatic demands
alternate with radio propaganda to fan
the real popular discomfort in Turkey
with government fat with power
after "a years in the saddle
Immense War Profits.
The price the Russians have made
the Turks already pay for the privilege
OF sovereignty is high. The Turks made
immense profits from the war through
pre-emptiye buying by both Nazis and
Allies at high world prices. Before the
war they had a gold reserve of 25 tons.
Now it is 2o8 tons. The Turks keep
half OF it untouched for military emer-
gencies and use the rest to shore up
the economy
Between SO and go per cent of the
annual budget goes for direct or indirect
military expenditures. The cruelist
pinch is felt in manpower. The Turkish
Army was maintained at a strength
ranging from 100000 men or As diyi-
sions during the war to between 10000
and 100000 since, the latter being the
present estimate.
A further six or seven persons for each
soldier are engaged in making army
supplies. For a Nation of 10000
this means that almost one-fourth of
the country's manpower is tied up in
productive activities of preparing
for war while the economy falters along
as best it can. In the meantime, every
man from 18 to 46 has to do a tour of
service every two years and the young
men complain bitterly they can neither
get started on career nor marry.
Strained Russo Turkish relations are
nothing new in history. From 1877 to
1918 the two Nations fought IS times or
once every 18 years.
Some Turks now regret what they de-
scribe as Turkeys saving of Soviet Rus
sia at Stalingrad. Turkish intelligence,
which is topnotch, learned that the Ger
mans planned landing on Turkish
eastern shores of the Black Sea in an
attempt to outf1ank the Stalingrad
strongpoint. The Turks mobilized their
forces in that area and informed every
one they would resist any German land
ing, which consequently was called of.
Soviet Cool Since 1886.
The Soviet has been cool to Turkey
since 1885 when the Montreux Conven-
tion gave Turkey control of the straits
even through Russia, as the major Black
Sea power, was given the privilege of
sailing $4,000 tons of warships escorted
by two torpedo boats at one time through
the straits while the combined non
Black Sea powers could not have more
than $4,000 tons in transit at one time.
Russia and Turkey had been very
friendly back in 1921. Both were without
friends and both were revolutionary
regimes in those early years. BY the
Moscow pact Of 1921, Turks report,
Russia not only recognized Turkeys right
to her present clinical frontiers but also
the right to Kars and Ardahan while
the Turks showed their good faith by
giving UP Batum, the Russian Black Sea
oil port, which they then held and which
still lies only few miles from the
Turkish border. s.
Kars had been returned to Turkey by
the Bolsheviks in their treaty with the
central powers. 1t originally had been
ceded by Turkey to Russia in 1878 as an
indemnity after one of their series OF
wars.
Stopped at Teheran.
Russia also stopped Turkey from
entering this war at Teheran, the Turks
charge, by persuading Roosevelt to sup
ply Russia alone rather than also equip
Turkey for fighting.
In 1941. the Turkish tale continues,
Russia offered Turkish Thrace to Bull
garia If the latter country joined the
Axis tri-partite pact while the next year
the Russians, temporarily grateful for
Turkish neutrality, spoke of giving the
Dodecanese Islands and segment Of
Southern Bulgaria to Turkey as reward.
The current Russian campaign against
Turkey started in March. 1945, Just
before the war ended, when Russia
denounced the Russo Turkish 1925 pact
OF friendship as inadequate to present
conditions unless Turkey saw the new
light. Radio Moscow soon provided that.
First 1t was Kars and eArdahan on the
northeast Of Soviet Armenia. The Straits
question arose in June, 1915. Soviet
Georgia discovered it's historic" rights
to Turkeys Black Sea shore as far west
as Trebizond. Russia then wanted bases
in the Dodecanese. She wanted trustee
ship over Tripolitania, former Turkish
province. which the Turks took as a
slap at them
Azerbaijan followed, with repercus-
sions for an independent Kurdistan
affecting Turkeys eastern Kurdish
tribes. Russia supported syrias claim
to Turkish Hatay on the southeast.
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