Issues

One Informant Report (1920) on the Situation in Turkey. Publication of the archival document; foreword and comments by Aleksei V. Sarabiev

Alexey Sarabyev

Religiia i obshchestvo na Vostoke, Issue IV (2020), p. 255-283.

 
DOI: 10.31696/2542–1530–2020–4–255–283

As the core of this paper is presented the publication of one small secret intelligence report from Istanbul (September 1920). The document contains a meeting description accompanied by the transmission of the conversation between the US military representative and the head of the Ottoman government (Grand Visir) in Istanbul during the difficult period for Asia Minor—with both duarchy and large-scale foreign intervention. The structure of the paper includes a detailed commentary on the published archival document with a brief author’s introduction. The commentary gives an outline and some details of the historical background of the events of that time, in which Russia, also torn apart by the civil war and intervention, was indirectly involved. The growing influence of the United States in military-political conflicts in the regions of the Black and Mediterranean Seas is emphasized. The main focus of the comments is done on the religious argument in proving the military activity and political competition of the world powers in Asia Minor. The religious and confessional aspect of social instability is also highlighted as significant, although it was subordinated mainly to the phenomena that act as the leading factors of civil confrontation in the Asia Minor territories of the former Ottoman Empire—the national-political, economic (struggle for concessions), as well as the Ottoman wars with so-called Christian powers and the ensuing direct military intervention.

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Keywords: interventions, religious factor, interfaith clashes, Entente, Ottoman Empire, Turkish Republic, USA, Russia, Crimea, Treaty of Sevres, Pyotr N. Wrangel, Damad Ferid Pasha

Volume: 255-283

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