Tuesday, November 21, 1922. The Conference of Lausanne opens, Harding discusses the Merchant Marine.

The Conference of Lausanne opened in Switzerland on the topic of a formal peace between Turkey and Greece, and the respective borders it would result in.  On this day at the conference, Mussolini angered the other Western Ally delegates by stating that Italy would support Turkish demands that Russia participate in the conference, an irony given that in twenty years Italy would be participating in the Axis invasion of the Soviet Union.

The New York Times featured a headline stating: "New Popular Idol Rises In Bavaria", regarding one Adolf Hitler

Military sports were in evidence on the Potomac.

Polo on mules on Camp A. A. Humphreys.  The installation later became Ft. Humphreys and then Ft. Belvoir in 1935.  A current Camp Humphreys is a major U.S. installation in the Republic of Korea.

President Harding addressed the House of Representatives.  His topic was the Merchant Marine.  He stated:

Members of the Congress:

Late last February I reported to you relative to the American merchant marine, and recommended legislation which the executive branch of the Government deemed essential to promote our merchant marine and with it our national welfare. Other problems were pressing and other questions pending, and for one reason or another, which need not be recited, the suggested legislation has not progressed beyond a favorable recommendation by the House committee.

The committee has given the question a full and painstaking inquiry and study, and I hope that its favorable report speedily will be given the force of law.

It will be helpful in clearing the atmosphere if we start with the frank recognition of divided opinion and determined opposition. It is no new experience. Like proposals have divided the Congress on various previous occasions. Perhaps a more resolute hostility never was manifest before, and I am very sure the need for decisive action—decisive, favorable action—never was so urgent before.

We are not now dealing with a policy founded on theory, we have a problem which is one of grim actuality. We are facing insistent conditions, out of which will come either additional and staggering Government losses and. national impotence on the seas, or else the unfurling of the flag on a great American merchant marine commensurate with our commercial importance, to serve as carrier of out cargoes in peace and meet the necessities of our defense in war. There is no thought here and now to magnify the relation of a merchant marine to our national defense. It is enough to recall that we entered the World War almost wholly dependent on our allies for transportation by sea. We expended approximately three billions; feverishly; extravagantly, wastefully, and unpractically. Out of our eagerness to make up for the omissions of peace and to meet the war emergency we builded and otherwise acquired the vast merchant fleet which the Government owns to-day.

In the simplest way I can say it, our immediate problem is not to build and support a merchant shipping, which I hold to be one of the highest and most worthy aspirations of any great people; our problem is to deal with what we now possess. Our problem is to relieve the Public Treasury of the drain it is already meeting. Let us omit particulars about the frenzied war-time building. Possibly we did full as well as could have been done in the anxious circumstances. Let us pass for the moment the vital relationship between a merchant marine and a commercially aspiring nation. Aye, let us suppose for a moment the absurdity that with one $3,000,000,000 experience, and with the incalculable costs in lives and treasure which may be chargeable to our inability promptly to apply our potency— which God forefend happening again—let us momentarily ignore all of these and turn to note the mere business problem, the practical question of dollars and cents with which we are confronted.

The war construction and the later completion of war contracts, where completion was believed to be the greater economy to the Public Treasury, left us approximately 13,200,000 gross tonnage in ships. The figures arc nearer 12,500,000 tons now, owing to the scrapping of the wooden fleet. More than half this tonnage is Government-owned, and approximately 2,250,000 tons are under Government operation in one form or another. The net loss to the United States Treasury—sums actually taken therefrom in this Government operation—averaged approximately $16,000,000 per month during the year prior to the assumption of responsibility by the present administration. A constant warfare on this loss of public funds, and the draft to service of capable business management and experienced operating directors, have resulted in applied efficiency and enforced economies. It is very gratifying to report the diminution of the losses to $4,000,000 per month, or a total of $50,000,000 a year; but it is intolerable that the Government should continue a policy from which so enormous a Treasury loss is the inevitable outcome. This loss, however, attends operation of less than a third of the Government-owned fleet.

It is not, therefore, a question of adding new Treasury burdens to maintain our shipping; we are paying these burdens now. It is not a question of contracting an outlay to support our merchant shipping, because we are paying already. I am not asking your authorization of a new and added draft on the Public Treasury; I am appealing for a program to diminish the burden we are already bearing.

When your executive Government knows of public expenditures aggregating fifty millions annually, which it believes could be reduced by half through a change of policy, your Government would be unworthy of public trust if such a change were not commended, nay, if it were not insistently urged.

And the pity of it is that our present expenditure in losses is not constructive. It looks to no future attainments. It is utterly ineffective in the establishment of a dependable merchant marine, whereas the encouragement of private ownership and the application of individual initiative would make for a permanent creation, ready and answerable at all times to the needs of the nation.

But I have not properly portrayed all the current losses to the Public Treasury. We are wearing out our ships without any provision for replacement. We are having these losses through deterioration now, and are charging nothing against our capital account. But the losses are there, and regrettably larger under Government operation than under private control. Only a few years of continued losses on capital account will make these losses through depreciation alone to exceed the fifty millions a year now drawn to cover losses in operation.

The gloomy picture of losses does not end even there. Notwithstanding the known war cost of three billions of dollars for the present tonnage, I will not venture to appraise its cash value to-day. It may as well be confessed now as at some later time that in the mad rush to build, in establishing shipyards wherever men would organize to expend Government money, when we made shipbuilders overnight quite without) regard to previous occupations or pursuits, we builded poorly, often very poorly. Moreover, we constructed without any formulated program for a merchant marine. The war emergency impelled, and the cry was for ships, any kind of ships. The error is recalled in regret rather than criticism. The point is that our fleet, costing approximately three billions, is worth only a fraction of that cost, to-day. Whatever that fraction may be, the truth remains that we have no market in which to sell the ships under our present policy, and a program of surrender and sacrifice and the liquidation which is inevitable unless the pending legislation is sanctioned, wilt cost scores of millions more.

When the question is asked, Why the insistence for the merchant marine act now? the answer is apparent. Waiving every inspiration Which lies in a constructive plan for maintaining our flag on the commercial highways of the seas, waiving the prudence in safeguarding against another $3,000,000,000 madness if war ever again impels, we have the unavoidable task of wiping out a $50,000,000 annual loss in operation, and losses aggregating many hundreds of millions in worn- out, sacrificed, or scrapped shipping. Then the supreme humiliation, the admission that the United States—our America, once eminent among the maritime nations of the world—is incapable of asserting itself in the peace triumphs on the seas of the world. It would seem to me doubly humiliating when we own the ships and fail in the genius and capacity to turn their prows toward the marts of the world.

This problem can not longer be ignored, its attempted solution can not longer be postponed. The failure of Congress to act decisively will be no less disastrous than adverse action.

Three courses of action are possible, and the choice among them is no longer to be avoided.

The first is constructive—enact the pending bill, under which, I firmly believe, an American merchant marine, privately owned and privately operated, but serving all the people and always available to the Government in any emergency, may be established and maintained.

The second is obstructive—continue Government operations and attending Government losses and discourage private enterprise by Government competition, under which losses are met by the Public Treasury, and witness the continued losses and deterioration until the colossal failure ends in sheer exhaustion.

The third is destructive—involving the sacrifice of our ships abroad or the scrapping of them at home, the surrender of our aspirations, and the confession of our impotence to the world in general, and our humiliation before the competing world in particular.

A choice among the three is inevitable. It is unbelievable that the American people or the Congress which expresses their power will consent to surrender and destruction. It is equally unbelievable that our people and the Congress which translates their wishes into action will longer sustain a program of obstruction and attending losses to the Treasury.

I have come to urge the constructive alternative, to reassert an American "We Will." I have come to ask you to relieve the responsible administrative branch of the Government from a program upon which failure and hopelessness and staggering losses are written for every page, and let us turn to a program of assured shipping to serve us in war and to give guaranty to our commercial independence in peace.

I know full well the hostility in the popular mind to the word "subsidy." It is stressed by the opposition and associated with "special privilege" by those who are unfailing advocates of Government aid whenever vast numbers are directly concerned. "Government aid" would be a fairer term than "subsidy" in defining what we are seeking to do for our merchant marine, and the interests are those of all the people, even though the aid goes to the few who serve.

If "Government Aid" is a fair term—and I think it is—to apply to authorizations aggregating $75,000,000 to promote good roads for market highways, it is equally fit to be applied to the establishment and maintenance of American market highways on the salted seas.

If Government aid is the proper designation for fifteen to forty millions annually expended to improve and maintain inland waterways in aid of commerce, it is a proper designation for a needed assistance to establish and maintain ocean highways where there is actual commerce to be carried.

But call it "subsidy," since there are those who prefer to appeal to mistaken prejudice rather than make frank and logical argument. We might so call the annual loss of fifty millions, which we are paying now without protest by those who most abhor, we might as well call that a "subsidy." If so, I am proposing to cut it in half, approximately, and to the saving thus effected there would be added millions upon millions of further savings through ending losses on capital account—Government capital, out of the Public Treasury, always remember—and there would be at least the promise and the prospect of the permanent establishment of the needed merchant marine.

I challenge every insinuation of favored interests and the enrichment of the special few at the expense of the Public Treasury. I am, first of all, appealing to save the Treasury. Perhaps the unlimited bestowal of Government aid might justify the apprehension of special favoring, but the pending bill, the first ever proposed which carries such a provision, automatically guards against enrichment or perpetuated bestowal. It provides that shipping lines receiving Government aid must have their actual investment and their operating expensed audited by the Government, that Government aid will only be paid until the shipping enterprise earns 10 per cent on actual capital employed, and immediately that when more than 10 per cent earning is reached, half of the excess earnings used must be applied to the repayment of the Government aid which has been previously advanced. Thus the possible earnings are limited to a- very reasonable amount if capital is to be risked and management is to be attracted. If success attends, as we hope it will, the Government outlay is returned, the inspiration of opportunity to earn remains, and American transportation by sea is established.

Though differing in detail, it. is not more in proportion to their population and capacity than other great nations have done in aiding the establishment of their merchant marines, and it is timely to recall that we gave them our commerce to aid in their upbuilding; while the American task now is to upbuild and establish in the face of their most active competition. Indeed, the American development will have to overcome every obstacle which may be put in our path, except as international comity forbids. Concern about our policy is not limited to our own domain, though the interest abroad is of very different character. I hope it is seemly to say it, because it must be said, the maritime nations of the world are in complete accord with the opposition here to the pending measure. They have a perfect right to such an attitude. When we look from their view-points we can understand. But I wish to stress the American viewpoint. Ours should be the viewpoint from which one sees American carriers at sea, the dependence of American commerce, and American vessels for American reliance in the event of war. Some of the costly lessons of war must be learned again and again, but our shipping lesson in the World War was much too costly to be effaced from the memory of this or future generations.

Not so many months ago the head of a company operating a fleet of ships under our flag called at the Executive Offices to discuss a permit to transfer his fleet of cargo vessels to a foreign flag, though he meant to continue them in a distinctly American service. He based his request for transfer on the allegation that by such a transfer he could reduce his labor costs alone sufficiently to provide a profit on capital invested. I do not vouch for the accuracy of the statement nor mean to discuss it. The allusion is made to recall that in good conscience Congress has created by law conditions surrounding labor on American ships which shipping men the world over declare result in higher costs of operation under our flag. I frankly rejoice if higher standards for labor on American ships have been established.

Merest justice suggests that when Congress fixes these standards, it is fair to extend Government aid in maintaining them until world competition is brought to the same high level, or until our shipping lines are so firmly established that they can face world competition alone.

Having discussed in detail the policy and provisions of the pending bill when previously addressing you, I forbear a repetition now. In individual exchanges of opinion not a few in House or Senate have expressed personal sympathy with the purposes of the bill, and then uttered a discouraging doubt about the sentiment of their constituencies. It would be most discouraging if a measure of such transcending national importance must have its fate depend on geographical, occupational, professional, or partisan objections. Frankly I think it loftier statesmanship to support and commend a policy designed to effect the larger good of the nation than merely to record the too hasty impressions of a constituency. Out of the harmonized aspirations, the fully informed convictions, and the united efforts of all the people will come the greater Republic. Commercial eminence on the seas, ample agencies for the promotion and carrying of our foreign commerce, are of no less importance to the people of Mississippi and the Missouri Valley, the great Northwest, and the Rocky Mountain states, than to the seaboard states and industrial communities building inland a thousand miles or more. It is a common cause, with its benefits commonly shared. When people fail in the national viewpoint, and live in the confines of community selfishness or narrowness, the sun of this republic will have passed its meridian, and our larger aspirations will shrivel in the approaching twilight.

But let us momentarily put aside the aspiring and inspiring viewpoint. The blunt, indisputable fact of the loss of fifty millions a year under Government operations remains; likewise the fast diminishing capital account, the enormous war expenditure, to which we were forced because we had not fittingly encouraged and builded as our commerce expanded in peace. Here are facts to deal with, not fancies wrought out of our political and economic disputes. The abolition of the annual loss and the best salvage of the capital account are of concern to all the people.

It is my firm belief that the combined savings of operating losses and the protection of the capital account through more advantageous sales of our war-built or war-seized ships, because of the favoring policy which the pending bill will establish, will more than pay every dollar expended in Government aid for twenty-five years to come.

It should be kept in mind that the approximate sum of five millions annually paid for the transport of ocean mails is no new expenditure. It should be kept in mind that the loan fund to encourage building is not new; it is the law already, enacted by the essentially unanimous vote of Congress. It is only included in the pending bill in order to amend so as to assure the exaction of a minimum interest rate by the Government, whereas the existing law leaves the grant of building loans subject to any whim of favoritism.

It should be kept in mind, also, that there are assured limitations of the Government aid proposed. The direct aid, with ocean carrying maintained at our present participation, will not reach twenty millions a year, and the maximum direct aid, if our shipping is so promoted that we carry one-half of our deep-seas commerce, will not exceed thirty millions annually. At the very maximum of outlay we should be saving twenty millions of our present annual operating loss. If the maximum is ever reached, the establishment of our merchant marine will have been definitely recorded and the Government-owned fleet fortunately liquidated.

From this point of view it is the simple, incontestable wisdom of businesslike dealing to save all that is possible of the annual loss and avoid the millions sure to be lost to the Government's capital account in sacrificing our fleet. But there is a bigger, broader, more inspiring viewpoint, aye, a patriotic viewpoint. I refer to the constructive action of to-day, which offers the only dependable promise of making our war-time inheritance of ships the .foundation of a great agency of commerce in peace and an added guaranty of service when it is necessary to our national defense.

Thus far I have been urging Government aid to American shipping, having in mind every interest of our producing population, whether of mine, factory, or farm, because expanding commerce is the foremost thought of every nation in the world to-day.

I believe in Government aid becomingly bestowed. We have aided industry through our tariffs; we have aided railway transportation in land grants and loans. We have aided the construction of market roads and the improvement of inland waterways. We have aided reclamation and irrigation and the development of water power; we have loaned for seed grains in anticipation of harvests. We expend millions in investigation and experimentation to promote a common benefit, though a limited few are the direct beneficiaries. We have loaned hundreds of millions to promote the marketing of American goods. It has all been commendable and highly worth while.

At the present moment the American farmer is the chief sufferer from the cruel readjustments which follow war's inflations, and befitting Government aid to our farmers is highly essential to our national welfare. No people may safely boast a good fortune which the farmer does not share.

Already this Congress and the administrative branch of the Government have given willing ear to the agricultural plea for postwar relief, and much has been done which has proven helpful. Admittedly, it is not enough. Our credit systems, under Government provision and control, must be promptly and safely broadened to relieve our agricultural distress.

To this problem and such others of pressing importance as reasonably may be dealt with in the short session I shall invite your attention at an early day.

I have chosen to confine myself to the specific problem of dealing with our merchant marine because I have asked you to assemble two weeks in advance of the regularly appointed time to expedite its consideration. The executive branch of the Government would feel itself remiss to contemplate our yearly loss and attending failure to accomplish if the conditions were not pressed for your decision. More, I would feel myself lacking in concern for America's future if I failed to stress the beckoning opportunity to equip the United States to assume a befitting place among the nations of the world whose commerce is inseparable from the good fortunes to which rightfully all peoples aspire.

What's wrong with Russia? It was never part of Rome.

By Ssolbergj - Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2992630

SPQR Senātus Populus que Rōmānus.Translated, the Senate and People of Rome.  The motto of the Roman Empire, whose legions marched under that banner in service of its Emperors.

"I will burn other people's villages with a cheerful smile."

"It ain’t a war crime if you had fun."

"Behind us, there is a house on fire. Well, let it burn. One more, one less."

Russian wall scribbling in liberated Ukrainian territory.

What's wrong with Russia?

People have been asking that question for years, maybe centuries.

Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. 

Winston Churchill

No, it's really not.

What it is, is something it isn't.  It was never part of the Roman Empire.

The Roman Empire was the most extensive expression of the Greco-Roman world and their culture.  The Greeks had commenced the work that Rome would end up finishing, or rather the Catholic Church would end up finishing, well prior to Rome's rise, however.  The great Greek philosophers came into being prior to even the expansion of the Greek Empire under Alexander the Great, infusing its culture with the outlook of the Western world.  Under Alexander the Greeks spread throughout the Mediterranean region, but the Romans picked it up, and the Greek world view, and massively expanded it.

Indeed, the influence of the Greeks and the Romans was so extensive that a student of early Christianity can't help but be impressed by the extent to which Christ and his disciples lived in a Judea that had been heavily impacted by the Greeks. The version of the Old Testament that is quoted in the New Testament pretty clear is the Septuagint, the Greek version.  Most, maybe all, of the New Testament was originally written in Greek.  Thoughts expressed in the New Testament are such that there have been those who have speculated that they could not have been expressed in Hebrew, had Hebrew remained the language of the Israelites, and that therefore Divine Providence was at work.  Early Christian Church fathers applied Greek philosophy to their understanding of Theology.¹ 

The Romans built on what they obtained from the Greeks, and they built the concept of a multicultural empire.  Rome started off a city state monarchy but in the end, it was a multicultural empire in which anyone within it could become a Roman citizen under certain circumstances.  Its unifying features was a uniform legal code and two languages, Latin and Greek.  You could be a cultural German, but if you could learn Latin and adhere to Rome's legal code, you had a chance to be as Roman as an Italian born in Rome.

The Church, and there was only one, came in and added the concept that there was only one moral code for everyone in the world, and your status and culture didn't trump that.  It also came in with a strong ethos of support for the plight of the poor and the equality of everyone before God.  Real women's rights came in with the Church, and the end of slavery was made inevitable by it as well.  The supremacy in religious matters of the Roman pontiff pointed out that even the government was subject to the Natural Law, and that it didn't create it.

We are all Romans.

The influence of Rome spread well beyond the Empire, even during the Roman age, and that was through Christianity.  Rome made it all the way up to the Teutoburg, but not beyond that.  Christianity did, however.  It may have taken the Northern Crusades to bring the Poles in, but brave missionaries to bring in the Scandinavians, but they did.

In the East, the Baltic was part of the Greek world, and hence the Roman world.  St. Andrew the apostle travelled into what is the southern Ukraine, via the Black Sea, and preached at least in Scythia.  Some maintain that he saild the Dneiper and preached in Kyiv.

Ukraine was the subject of missionary work in the 800s.  St. Cyril and Methodius, brothers, passed through Ukraine during their missionary work.  Western Ukraine, which is where the Ukrainian Catholic Church has its presence today, was Christianized first.

St. Cyril and Methodius.

Under St. Vladimir The Great, a Kyivan king claimed by both the Ukrainians and the Russians, the Kyivan Rus were firmly brought into the Church.   But of note, Vladimir had been born a pagan and converted to the Church (again, there was only one) in 988 after traveling to the West and studying the non-pagan religions. He died in 1015 at age 57.

Now, 1015 is a very late date.  St. Andrew had been in the region in 55AD.  St. Cyril and Methodius in the late 800s.  But as late as 988 paganism still existed in the lands of the Rus.

And in 1054, the Great Schism commenced.

Now, the Rus did take to Christianity, of that there can be no doubt. But the Great Schism put their Church outside the Latin world to some degree.  Islam was already on the rise, and the Byzantine Empire would fall in 1453.  In 1448 the Russian Church obtained de facto independence, although in 1439 history nearly took a different course with Russian Orthodox representatives recognized Rome as the head of the Church at the Council of Florence. Sadly, their union was prevented from taking effect.

So basically, the Russians were on the edge of the world. The Great Schism, the collapse of the Roman Empire, and then the collapse of the Byzantine kept them there.  Ukraine had been part of the Greco-Roman world, and to some degree, it remains so, especially the further west in Ukraine you go.

And this matters.

Outside of the Moscow elite and a very small urban elite, Russia is one great big blue-collar country.

Fiona Hill

Russia definitely has a cultured development and the Russians are a great people. But they're a people where western concepts have never taken root, including the concept that power devolves from the people, and not the other way around. Even those who have attempted, and there have been many, to change that, have uniformly failed.

It's a culture that has developed great works of art and literature, while remaining insular and focused on itself.  Outside of Russia, everyone is some sort of odd stranger, and the Russians have, from time to time, imagined themselves as the archetype of Slavs.  The culture has a hard time not accepting that to some degree.

And it's a rough place to live in part because of this.  People die young, often due to conditions and alcoholism.  Male deaths outstrip women's by quite some margin.² Brutality and acceptance of horrible conditions exists where it has departed elsewhere.  Russia's military retains an ethos of cruelty that stems back to ancient times and manifests itself in horrific ancient behaviors. 

And hence, there's really no mystery.  

Russia wasn't part of the Greco-Roman world.

Ukraine, however, was.

Footnotes.

1. There's a common myth that Islam preserved the works of the Greek philosophers, and Christians got them from them.

In reality, Islam got the texts of the Greek philosophers from Chaldean Christians, who had preserved them.  Latin Christians did get them from Islamic Arabs, but it is important to note that Islamic Arabs got them from Chaldean Christians.  

As it happened, Hellenized Islamist theologians were later dismissed and regarded as heretical in Islam.

2.  As an odd expression of this, it's often frequently noted that younger Russian women are disproportionately beautiful, before age and conditions change this at a rate not experienced in the West.   It's been seriously suggested that this is due to natural selection, as the population of women always exceeds that of men, thereby giving physically attractive women a heightened competitive genetic advantage.

Tuesday, October 31, 1922. Mussolini takes office.

Mussolini officially took office as the Prime Minister of Italy on this day in 1922.

Parades commemorating the event by current fascists took place in Italy yesterday.  As earlier noted here, the current Prime Minister is a member of a political party with fascist roots, although she maintains that she is not a fascist herself.

The Trial of Six commenced in Greece, in which the trial of the defeated heads of the late war effort against Turkey would be held, leading to their execution.  It was effectively a political trial for the crime of losing the war.

It was, of course, Halloween.

Wednesday, October 25, 1922. Winners and Losers.

A "flying circus" was staged at Boling Field which even included a hot lunch being dropped in from the air.

The Dáil Éireann approved the Irish Free State Constitution Act of 1922.  It would become effective on December 6, 1922, when King George V proclaimed it, which created the Irish Free State as an independent and coequal member of the British Commonwealth.

On the same day, the Irish Republican Army declared the formation of a rival republican government with Eamon de Valera as "President of Ireland", a cabinet of ministers and a twelve member Council of State. By this point, however, the IRA did not holding any Irish territory of consequence.

Mussolini delivered an ultimatum to the Italian government, demanding that it surrender power to the Fascists.

Prince Andrew of Greece, a Greek army officer, was arrested on Corfu and charged with contributing the disastrous Greek defeat in the Greco-Turkish War.  The Prince, the father of the late Prince Consort Philip (Philippos) of the United Kingdom, would be allowed to leave the country.  Other Greek officers were executed or sentenced to long prison sentences.

The Red Army took Vladivostok.  As it did so, Imperial Russian General Mikhail Diterikhs was evacuated with such troops as could be evacuated by the Japanese.

Diterkhs was descended from German Lutherans from the Sudentenland and was a deeply religious Orthodox Christian.  He moved to China, as many Russian Whites from the far eastern part of Siberia did, where he died at age 63 in 1937.

Monday, October 16, 1922. The Greek tragedy in Anatolia, Racism in Children's Books and Toys.

Former Greek Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos proposed a mandatory population exchanged between Greece and Turkey to the League of Nations.  The proposal was for Orthodox Christians in side of what was to become or had become Turkish territory would come to Greece, and Muslim populations inside of Greece would go to Turkey.   The proposal would be adopted and carried out that following year, with 1,221,489 Greek and other Orthodox Christians going to Greece and about 400,000 Muslims going to Turkey.  The relocation was compulsory.

The net result would be the loss of a large Christian and Greek presence in Anatolia for the first time since the Apostolic Age, which of course Anatolia was principally Greek.  The Greek population of Istanbul was exempt from the exchange, but the Istanbul Pogrom of 1955 would cause many of them to leave.  The population today is growing, but still remains at only about 110,000.  Further repression of the Greek minority in the country would follow in 1964.

By Alexikoua - Own work, data taken from:*Kamouzis Dimitrios, The Constantinopolitan Greeks in an era of secular nationalism, mid-19th century to 1930, 2010, University of London. King's College. Department of Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, p. 32.*Darja Reuschke,Monika Salzbrunn,Korinna Schönhärl, The Economies of Urban Diversity: Ruhr Area and Istanbul, Palgrave Macmillan, 2013, ISBN 9781137338815, p. 117-122.*Σάββας Τσιλένης. Η μειονότητα των Ορθόδοξων Χριστιανών στις επίσημες στατιστικές της σύγχρονης Τουρκίας και στον αστικό χώρο.*Dundar Fuat, Turkiye Nufus Sayimlarinda Azinlikar. Doz, 1999, ISBN 9756876123. 9789756876121, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33989120

It's almost impossible to imagine a nation suggesting that members of co-ethnic communities in another country be forcibly expelled into itself now, but the Greek government feared, with good reason, that Greeks in Anatolia would be exterminated there.  The forced relocation removed a Greek presence in Anatolia that went back to antiquity, as well as operating to help complete the end of an Armenian one that was, if anything, even older.

It should be noted that Turkish oppression of the Armenians in modern times went back to the closing days of the Ottoman Empire, but it had really ramped up in regard to the Greeks due to the Greco Turkish War during which the Greeks had committed atrocities of their own, and had grossly overplayed their hand in trying to seize Turkish territory. The Ottoman parliament had been willing to accept that, but the Young Turks had not.  Had the Greeks not so overreached, the following tragedy may very well not have occured.

The U.S. Bureau of Prohibition seized the Canadian schooner Emerald 8 miles off the coast of New Jersey, resulting in a British protest.

Florence Kate Upton died on this day following surgery.  The British children's book author was 49.

She was also the inventor of the "Golliwog" dolls, which are truly beyond comprehension today.

The Adventures of Two Dutch Dolls and a "Golliwogg", 1895.

The dolls were popular at the time, but are shocking today, and for good reason.  Indeed, we hesitated to post this at all, but given as this blog is supposed to be exploring an earlier time (which we're actually somewhat beyond in these 1922 posts), I've put them up.  An example of deeply ingrained racists views from the time.

October 14, 1922. Jiggs, East Thrace, and Liberty Kansas.

The Saturday Evening Post went to press with a Leyendecker illustration that was, well, sad.

Continuing on the canine theme, the Marine Corps first mascot, English bulldog Jiggs, entered the Corps.

Greece agreed to the terms of the Armistice of Mudanya and ceded its territories east of the Maritsa River to Turkey.

The Ku Klux Klan kidnapped the mayor of Liberty, Kansas and beat him for having denounced the Klan. This led to the Governor of Kansas denouncing the Klan as well and ordering an investigation.

Wednesday, October 11, 1922. Armistice of Mudanya.

Paragon adjustable and reversible aircraft propeller created by Spencer Heath and tested on October 11, 1922, Bolling Field, Washington, D.C.

The Armistice of Mudanya between Turkey and the Allied powers ended the Greco Turkish War.  A mass exodus commenced in Thrace as Greeks and Armenians fled the oncoming Turkish rule.

Tuesday, October 3, 1922. Aftermaths

 Somewhere on the East Coast, a "conduit" was being built.

Construction at the time still involved a lot of horse power in the literal sense, something that was rapidly changing.

And with that change would come to an end one more daily association of men with animals, making us the poorer for it.

The Convention of Madanya began with representatives of the Allied Powers meeting with Turkish representatives in order to negotiate an end to the Chanak Crisis.  The Allied Powers were frankly impaired, as the British government was not willing to fight over the issues the crisis presented without the support of the Dominions, and they didn't have it. The French were not willing to fight either, and the Greek government had collapsed.

On the same day, Metropolitan Gregory of Kydonies, age 58, together with other priests, were executed by the Turks.

The Irish Free State offered an amnesty to its armed opponents who voluntarily surrendered their arms before October 15.

Following that date, the Irish Free State, something that had come about due to civilian use of arms, unless a person buys the claim that those civilians were under arms from a legitimate, if unrecognized, government, would arrest in large numbers Irish Republicans caught with "illegal" arms.  Ever since that time, the Irish government has been hostile to civilian's owning arms, something which is truly ironic in context.

Italian Fascists took over the city of Bolzana and deposed the Mayor, who had been in power since 1895, at which time the city had been in Austria.

Saturday, September 30, 1922. Camp Bragg becomes a Fort.

Greek Orthodox priests in the city of Kydoniae (Ayvalik) were taken into custody by the Turks while waiting, following the recommendation of their bishop, for evacuation The Turks would murder then three days later.

On the same day, Sotiros Krokidas became the interim Greek Prime Minister.

The Yankees took the American League Pennant, defeating the Boston Red Sox.

Camp Bragg, North Carolina, was redesignated as Fort Bragg, thereby indicating its permanent status.

Sunday, September 24, 1922: The September 11, 1922 Revolution (Επανάσταση της 11ης Σεπτεμβρίου 1922)

The Greek Army rebelled in the 11 September 1922 Revolution (Επανάσταση της 11ης Σεπτεμβρίου 1922) so named as Greece remained on the Julian calendar at the time.

This confusing event followed in the wake of public upset at the loss of the Greek effort in Anatolia, proving if nothing else that defeated armies are dangerous to their own governments, if to nobody else.

The rebellion led to the abdication of the king, who was on his second reign, having suffered from military discontent during World War One as well.  He'd opposed entering the war.  The Greek monarchy would be restored a few days later and King George II would take over, who would also have two reigns, one ending in 1924, and a second running from 1935 to 1947.

Berryman cartoon for this day in 1922.

Saturday, September 16, 1922. Strife.

British troops landed with heavy artillery in Turkey in order to prevent the Turks from taking control of the Dardanelles following the Greek defeat.  Meanwhile, Anastasios Charalambis became Prime Minister of Greece in the midst of a military revolt, replacing Nikolaos Tirantafyllakos, who had stepped down.  His service would last but a single day before King Constantine called upon him to abdicate and Sotirios Krokidas was appointed by the military as the new premier.

Things were not going well in Greece.

The League of Nations approved the Trans Jordan Memorandum setting the boundaries of the Kingdom of Jordan and Palestine.  Those boundaries formed the later frame for the boundaries of the state of Israel.

Lev Kamenev was named to a position which was the functional titular equivalent of Prime Minister of the Soviet Union.  Kamenev assumed the position as Lenin was becoming increasingly ill.

He was, of course, executed during Stalin's regime, during which the swimming pool of blood rose higher.

Henry Ford enacted a lock out of his plants, idling 100,100 workers, rather than pay what he regarded as profiteers in the coal and steel industries.

Work was progressing on the James Scott Water Fountain in Detroit.

And the USGS was out on the Colorado River again.

Tuesday, September 5, 1922. East Thrace, Missoula, San Diego. Big Pictures, the result of the Greek Defeat, Air Records, Motorcyle Races.

Missoula from Penwell block, September 5, 1922.

Turkey stated a demand for East Thrace, which had been ceded to Greece in 1920.

East Thrace.

This meant that Turkey was declaring that it wanted to reclaim recently lost territory, lost to Greece, across the Bosporus.  This would of course give it completely control of the straits, and hence entry into the Black Sea.

Greeks had comprised about 38% of the population there before the Greco Turkish War, and Bulgarians about 4.3%.  Bulgarians had been subject to a pre-war set of expulsions and violence due to the Balkan Wars that foreshadowed World War One which, at the same time, increased the Muslim population as Muslims fled into the area for refuge due to Ottoman lands being lost elsewhere.  Greeks would now be subject to the coming population exchange between Turkey and Greece, which also impacted the remaining Bulgarians.  In 1934 the Jewish population was expelled in the Thrace Pogroms.

Today, 15% of the Turkish population lives in the region.

Aviator Jimmy Doolittle set a transcontinental flight record.

Dealing with speed of a different type, motorcycle racer Billy Denham was photographed at a motorcycle race.

Denham is wearing elements of the wool U.S. Army uniform of the period, to at least the extent that he's wearing a wool service shirt.  Note also that he's wearing a tie, something you wouldn't see a motorcycle racer wear now, and for good reason.

 

Wednesday, August 30, 1922. The End of Greek Anatolia.

Young women photographed on this day in 1922.

A press photographer photographed a group of young women on this day in 1922.  None of them appeared as flappers.

The Turks won the Battle of Dumiupinar, bringing the Greco Turkish War effectively to a close.  As a result, this day is celebrated as Victory Day in Turkey.

This brought about the millennia long presence of a significant Greek population in Anatolia, one which had persisted even in spite of the Ottoman Conquest.  In no small part, it came about due to Greek greed which had sought to expand Greek control beyond what was initially logical, during the immediate post World War One period during which such efforts were effectively supported by nearly all of the Allied powers, and during which France, the UK, and Italy contributed troops to the effort.  Indeed, Italy seized islands for its own from Turkey.

Had the Greeks not overreached, they likely would have been supported longer by the Allies, which grew tired of the war and ultimately pulled its combat troops out of it.  Greece proved insufficiently strong to hold what it had taken against the revolutionary Turkish forces which had overthrown their own government, which had entered into a putative peace, and which fought the war well against long odds.

The war would result in a tragic mass population transfer of Greeks from Turkish lands, many of whom would relocate far from their homes in other lands, such as the United States and Australia.

In Ireland, the results of a recent peace continued to operate oddly.

Due to the odd nature of the treaty between the UK and the Irish Free State, a Second Irish Provisional Government was set up due to the assassination of Michael Collins, even though power was being transferred to the Dail.

Wisconsin Governor John J. Blain urged President Harding to ask Congress to take over the coal mines in order to abate the problems the long-running coal mine strike was causing and threatened to cause.

In Pennsylvania, a monument to George Washington was dedicated.

 Taft College was founded in California.

Lex Anteinternet: The Punitive Expedition: The Battle of Parral. Cpl. Tannous

Lex Anteinternet: The Punitive Expedition: The Battle of Parral. A...:       

The Punitive Expedition: The Battle of Parral. April 12, 1916

 Corporal Richard Tannous, 13th Cavalry, wounded at Parral.

More on Tannous:  Tannous.

An etymological note on Russian and Ukrainian, sort of. The lingering Greek influcence in the Black Sea.

Both languages are, of course, Slavic Indo-European languages.  I don't speak them, of course.  But I'm often struck by how bits and pieces of them appear to be similar to Greek.

I don't know the reason for this, but of course the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantine) did stretch up into the Ukrainian region and influenced.  Russia remained beyond it, but it was Eastern Christianity that Christianized the entire region, rather than Western for the most part (although the further west you go, the less true this is).

I was thinking of this in regard to the besieged city of Mariupol.

What's that mean?

Well, "pol", means city.  Pretty Greek.  As in "póli" (πόλη).  As in, more specifically, for example, Thermopoli.

For those here in Wyoming, that reminds us of "polis".  Polis ( πόλις) is a Greek word too, but it means a city state.

Does "pol" mean city in Russian and Ukrainian.

Nope.

What that tells us is that this lingering use goes way back.  But the naming of the city does not.  It goes back to 1779, and was originally named Marianopol, being named for the Russian Empress Maria Feodorovna, sort of, but also after the Greek city of Mariampol, which was a suburb of Bakhcisarai in Crimea.  That Greek village was named for the Virgin Mary.  The Russians forcibly removed a lot of Greek Orthodox Christians from Crimea to there, in fact.

"Mary's City".

Mariupol actually had a small remaining Greek population, part of a complicated story which has to do with what was once a fairly large Greek presence in the greater region, stretching from the Black Sea, through Anatolia, and into Palestine.  That widely spread population has greatly decreased in modern times, dating back to a retreat in presence that's now a century old as populations began to concentrate following World War One, often due to force and war.  Prior to the Russian invasion this year, about 90,000 ethnic Greeks remained in the city, but many more Ukrainians have Greek ancestors due to intermarriage.

At noon Eastern Time, Pope Francis will  engage in an Act of Consecration of Ukraine and Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, this is the Feast of the Annunciation.  He's invited Bishops round the world to join him in the same.

Mural of the Sacred Heart of Mary in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Thursday October 23, 1941. Dumbo released

On this day in 1941 the Walt Disney animated film Dumbo was released.  I've never seen it.

Free French leader Charles De Gaulle asked the French Resistance to halt assassinating Nazi figures in order to end German reprisals.

Both of these are noted here:

Today in World War II History—October 23, 1941

The German government banned the emigration of Jews from territory held by Germany, now that its mass murder campaign was in full swing.

The Germans killed all the males age 16 to 69 in Mesouvouno Greece.

Congress voted to add $5.96B to the Lend Lease bill,

Thursday, October 20, 1921. End of the Franco-Turkish War.

France and the Grand National Assembly of Turkey signed the Treaty of Ankara, bringing to an end the Franco Turkish War.  The treat fixed the bordered between Turkey and the French ruled Syrian mandate, which had not been accepted by the National Assembly.

The treaty signaled that France, which had better relations with the National Assembly than other Allied countries, was essentially recognizing the National Assembly as the legitimate government.  It also demonstrated that the Alliance coming out of World War One, which had seen France, the United Kingdom, Greece and Italy all intervene in Turkey, had effectively come apart during the long-running Greco Turkish War.

Tuesday, August 23, 1921. The pieces of the Ottoman Empire.

President Harding signed the New York Harbor bill into law.

I have utterly no idea what the statute did, but the photograph is of fairly high quality.

Faisal I bin Hussein bin al-Hashemi was crowned King of Iraq.  The kingdom was sort of a consolation prize for not getting Syria, and not a particularly good one.  In later years, he'd note that "this country is ungovernable."

In another part of the former Ottoman Empire, the Battle of Sakarya commenced in Turkey.  It would prove to be a long, and pivotal, battle in the Greco Turkish War, with the Turks ultimately prevailing three weeks later.

And a photographer took the following photo contrasting new and old two wheeled means of transportation.

Θαλασσάκι/Thalassaki - Anastasia & Iliana Fergadioti

Saturday, June 11, 1921. The story continues

The Country Gentleman ran a second Rockwell illustration that completed the story started by last week's illustration.

On the same day, King Victor Emmanuel II of Italy opened an Italian parliament that included new territories that were annexed following the 1920 settlement of Italian claims.  He welcomed the new members.

His counterpart in Greece, King Constantine I departed for Turkey to personally take command of the failing Greek effort against the resurgent Turks.