Monday, January 15, 1923. Puebloans in Washington, Noble Acts, Ineffective Peacekeepers, and The Mater Familias.

A group of Puebloans visited Washington, D.C.

Puebloans are an example of a native North American culture which have been able to retain their distinctiveness to a high degree.  Insular in the first place, they have remained very much so and are generally disinclined to have too much outside contact with the larger European American culture, although they do have it by necessity.

About 90% of Puebloans are Roman Catholic, although elements of their original indigenous religions have been incorporated in terms of feast days and how they are celebrated.

The patent for manufacturing insulin was assigned by its inventors to the University of Toronto, in order to make it affordable to the general public.

French troops fired on German protestors at Bochum, killing one. The French responded with threats to occupy more of the Ruhr.

Lithuanian troops captured Memel and forced the surrender of a League of Nations Peacekeeping force.

"The Queen and Princess Elizabeth talk to paratroopers in front of a Halifax aircraft during a tour of Airborne forces, 19 May 1944."

Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon and Prince Albert, the Duke of York, a dignified couple whose progeny, or at least some of them, ought to be pondering, announced their wedding date.

Zübeyde Hanım, the mother of Turkish leader Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, died at age 66.

Ataturk on this day in 1923.

Wednesday January 10, 1923. The Klaipėda Revolt.

 Delegates to the Near East Conference in Lausanne, Switzerland, voted to accept a Turkish proposal to "exchange" the Greek and Turkish populations of the two countries.

This would result in the expulsion of 600,000 Greeks from Anatolia, where they had been since ancient times, and in which the Turks were originally an invader, for 450,000 Turks in Greece.  An exception was made for 200,000 Greeks in Constantinople, a city identified with the Greeks since ancient times, and 300,000 in Western Thrace.

Irrespective of the inequities, and even barbarism, of the Greek advances in Anatolia following World War One, the result was inhumane and effectively completed a process that the Ottoman invasion had started centuries ago.  Greek overreaching following World War One was responsible for a lot of what occurred, but it's a tragedy by any measure.

Only about 2,500 Greeks remain in Turkey today.

The French staged near Essen in preparation for intervening in the Ruhr.

Participants in the revolt.

Lithuanians rebelled in the Klaipėda Revolt in Memelland.  Lithuanian troops intervened in support of the insurrection.  The goal of the revolt was to join Memelland to Lithuania, and it met with little resistance from German troops, stationed on what had been German territory, and French occupation forces.

Both the French and the Germans had other things to worry about on this day other than Memelland.

The population of the region was about 45% German. The remaining population was Memellandish and Lithuanian.  Having said this, the ethnic composition of Memelland was complex in every fashion, with Memmelandish being a dialect of German, and the Lithuanian population of the region being predominantly Lutheran, whereas in Lithuania the vast majority of the population was Roman Catholic, a trait they shared with the Poles.  It was a mixed border region, in other words, but the border had been stable since 1441.

President Harding ordered U.S. troops withdrawn from Germany.

From Reddit's 100 Years Ago Today.

This was, of course, because it appeared that France was about to enter the Ruhr, which in fact it was.

From Reddit's 100 Years Ago Today.

Sultan Said bin Taimur of Oman was compelled to sign an agreement with the United Kingdom to provide for pre-approval by the British High Commissioner in India of any contracts between oil exploration companies and Oman.

The Sultan Said was born in 1910 and had attended Mayo College at Ajmer in Rajputana, India.  Following that it was suggested that his education be furthered in Beirut, but it was not as his father feared he'd be influenced by Christianity.  He remained in power until 1970, when he was deposed by his son.

His technical rule of the country, arranged by the British, did not happen until 1932.  He died in the United Kingdom in 1972 at the age of 62.

Sunday, November 19, 1922. The Last Ottoman Caliph

In a move that may be regarded as genuinely confusing, Abdulmejid II was elected to the office of Caliph of the Muslim people by the Turkish Grand National Assembly.

The former Crown Prince accordingly, at least if you agreed with the Grand  National Assembly's religious powers, became head of Islam in a fashion.  He'd last in that role for two years before the Grand National Assembly, apparently also confused as to why it, as a secular body, would do that, abolished the office.

The Ottoman claim to be able to appoint a Caliph was never uncontested, although as it was a large empire the position held weight, even after its expiration.  Islam was itself divided following Mohammed's death in 632 with the division arising over who would lead it.

Abdulmejid II went into exile in Europe following the abolishment of the office in 1924.

Friday, November 17, 1922. Don't be a J. Walker.

Well known policeman and cartoonist Dick Mansfield in safety work lecture in Washington D.C., 11/17/22

The Irish Free State, which had come into existence due to a bunch of (mostly) men carrying around weapons and assassinating figures of English authority, executed James Fisher, Peter Cassidy, Richard Tuohy and John Gaffney. for "unauthorized possession of revolvers" in violation of the Public Safety Bill.

Defence Richard Mulcahy stated in the Dail;"People have to be shot. It was necessary to shock the country into a realization of the grave thing it is to take human life. These men were found in the streets carrying loaded revolvers ready to take the lives of other men. That's the simple case we have to put before the country."

The Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, Mehmed VI left the country, with the Ottoman Empire accordingly leaving history.  It had a long run, 1299 to 1922.

Prime Minister Benito Mussolini of Italy and his fascist government won a vote of confidence, 306 to 116.

Monday, November 6, 1922. Appointment Clerks.

A group of Federal appointment clerks.

This, obviously all male, occupation was exactly what it sounded like.  Clerks who took appointments and handled the same.  Sort of the equivalent of a secretary/receptionist.

As late as the Second World War, in government service this occupation was a male one.  And, as the fine clothing in the photo demonstrates, one that paid a decent living to its occupants.

Indeed, every man here is wearing a three-piece suit of good quality.

Also of note, at least two are smoking cigars, not even taking time out from tobacco consumption to appear without one. When was the last time you were in an office and somebody was smoking a cigar?

A coal mine explosion in Spangler, Pennsylvania, killed 79 miners.

Ali Kemal, age 53, who we mentioned the other day, was lynched on his ways to the gallows by a mob.

By the way, in the long odds category, former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is a direct descendant of Ali Kemal.  I.e, not a cousin, Kamal is BoJo's Great Grandfather.

Released this day in 1922.

Saturday, November 4, 1922. Ottoman vestiges.

The Country Gentleman appeared on the stands with an election themed issue.

I don't know if women really had to give their ages. They don't know, of course, except I suppose at the time of their registration.

A young maid with kittens made up the sad cover of the Saturday Evening Post in a Rockwell illustration.

Ahmet Tevfik Pasha resigned as Grand Vizar of the Ottoman Empire, there no longer being the post following its elimination by the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, and there also no longer being an Ottoman Empire.

The position was essentially that of Prime Minster by power of attorney through the Sultan, who also no longer existed.

On the same day Ali Kemal, former Turkish Interior Minister, was kidnapped from a barbershop in Istambul under orders of the military governor of Izmir.  He'd be murdered two days later.

Colorado was hit by severe weather:

The Colorado killer tornadoes of November 4, 1922

British archeologist discovered the Tomb of King Tutankhamen.

This story has never fascinated me the way it does other people.  This is not to say that it isn't significant, it certainly is, but many people are fascinated with it, which I'm afraid I am not.

Wednesday, November 1, 1922. Endings

The Turkish Grand National Assembly declared the Ottoman Empire abolished.  It also ended Constantinople's status as the capital city.

Mehmed VI going into exile.

This ended Mehmed VI's status as Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, but did not his status as caliph, among other things the head of the imperial family.  He'd hold that position until November 19 when his cousin Abdulmejid Efendi was elected caliph, which he'd hold for two years, upon which time the Assembly would abolish the Caliphate.

Mehmed protested the removal of his position as caliph, effectively a claim to lead the Islamic world, which he declared he had not intended to resign.  The destruction of the Ottoman Empire during the war had effectively eliminated Turkey's claim to occupy that position as a political entity.

He'd spend his exile in Malta and then later in Italy.

Mexican General Francisco R. Murguia, age 49, was executed for attempting a rebellion against President Alvaro Obregon.  Mexican forces had captured him the day prior.

A village in Mexico is now named after him.

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.

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.

April 24, 2021: Statement by President Joe Biden on Armenian Remembrance Day

 

Each year on this day, we remember the lives of all those who died in the Ottoman-era Armenian genocide and recommit ourselves to preventing such an atrocity from ever again occurring. Beginning on April 24, 1915, with the arrest of Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople by Ottoman authorities, one and a half million Armenians were deported, massacred, or marched to their deaths in a campaign of extermination. We honor the victims of the Meds Yeghern so that the horrors of what happened are never lost to history. And we remember so that we remain ever-vigilant against the corrosive influence of hate in all its forms.

Of those who survived, most were forced to find new homes and new lives around the world, including in the United States. With strength and resilience, the Armenian people survived and rebuilt their community. Over the decades Armenian immigrants have enriched the United States in countless ways, but they have never forgotten the tragic history that brought so many of their ancestors to our shores. We honor their story. We see that pain. We affirm the history. We do this not to cast blame but to ensure that what happened is never repeated. 

Today, as we mourn what was lost, let us also turn our eyes to the future—toward the world that we wish to build for our children. A world unstained by the daily evils of bigotry and intolerance, where human rights are respected, and where all people are able to pursue their lives in dignity and security. Let us renew our shared resolve to prevent future atrocities from occurring anywhere in the world. And let us pursue healing and reconciliation for all the people of the world.  

The American people honor all those Armenians who perished in the genocide that began 106 years ago today.

September 24, 1920. The Turkish-Armenian War

Armenian coat of arms.

This day in 1920 is regarded as the start of the Turkish Armenian War, but in reality it would be better regarded as the recognition of a conflict that had commenced several days earlier.

The root of the war was a Turkish decision to take back lands allotted to Armenia in the Treaty of Sevres which the Allies had negotiated with the Ottoman Empire but which the Turkish rebels, who had displaced the Ottoman government, did not recognize.  They correctly gambled that the Allies would not intervene on Armenia's behalf and commenced an invasion of Armenia on September 13, which should be regarded as the real beginning of the war.  On this date Armenia declared war on Turkey and commenced offensive actions, which worked at first.

The war soon went badly and the Armenians were forced to accept an armistice on November 18, 1920.  The Soviets then invaded on November 29, 1920, effectively putting an end to the country.  A peace treaty by the new government, essentially a treaty between the USSR and the Turkish rebels, was concluded on December 2, 1920.

The early 20th Century was one disaster after another for the Armenian people.  The Ottoman government killed over 1,000,000 Armenians during World War One and the Turkish rebels committed further atrocities upon Armenian civilians as it entered the country.  The country regained its independence on September 21, 1991.

August 10, 1920. Turkey and the Blues

Panoramic view of Lake Fairlee from Quinibeck Lookout,  August 10, 1920.

On this day in 1920 Mamie Smith recorded Crazy Blues, which would go on to be the first blues recording in American musical history to cross over the racial divide and be a general musical hit.

Mamie Smith

Smith would go on to have a short but successful blues career, but after her retirement from music things did not go as well.  She died penniless in 1946 at age 55 and was buried in an unmarked grave in New York City.  A gravestone was finally erected after a campaign to have one installed in 2012.

The Ottoman government signed the Treaty of Sevres in which they agreed to dismantle the Ottoman Empire, recognize Greek and Italian claims to Anatolian domains, and grant Armenia independence.

Signed outside of Paris, the Ottoman government was already fighting a revolt from Ataturk and therefor the treaty would never really come into full effect in the way envisioned.  Those parts of that would more or less be carried out were in those areas where the Allied already controlled Ottoman domains outside of Anatolia.

Regarded as an example of outrageous overreach by the Allies today, the treat wasn't completely without its merits.  The release of non Ottoman territories in Arabia, if only into mandates that were effectively European colonies, did recognize that those areas should eventually be independant, even though they definitely were not at the time.  Achieving a free Kurdistan and Armenia would have been a real achievement, the former of which has never occured and which continues to plague the region today.  Greek claims to the Anatolian mainland grossly overreached, however, and doomed any chance of acceptance of the treaty, which in turn doomed Armenian and Kurdish independence.

Photographed on this day in 1920, with "US" service lapel pins, campaign ribbons, Nurses service pin, and overseas stripes.  Still really don't know what more is here, but something is as it was a news photograph.

April 14, 1920. Gathering Storms.

Salvador Diego Fernandez, the then new Charge d'Affaires of the Mexican Embassy, called at the State Department on this day in 1920.  Dressed in a dapper fashion but wearing a serious expression, the news coming out of Mexico was no doubt the topic of his conversations inside the building.

The news coming out of Mexico on this day suggested that a civil war in Mexico was about to commence right on the U.S. border.

Carranza was rushing to meet the challenge presented by Sonora in revolt.  And that entailed moving troops right along the troublesome border with the U.S.

Indeed, the Secretary of War was asking for additional troops to guard that border.

Another border also featured in Washington on this day, that being one that Armenian veterans of World War One, who staged a parade in D.C., hoped would be recognized for Armenia.  They received a Marine Corps escort and there was good reason, at the time, to think that their wishes would come true in light of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the ongoing attempted occupation of Turkey by France, Greece, Italy and the United Kingdom.

Armenian veterans presenting a petition after their parade.

In Washington D.C., President Wilson  met his cabinet for the first time since his stroke.

Josephus Daniels and John Payne, April 14, 1920.

Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby and Secretary. of Agriculture E.T. Meredith arriving at the White House for the Cabinet Meeting. Both men were new to their positions.

March 15, 1920. The Ides of March sees Germany in near revolt, the Allies in Constantinople, Congress Acting on the Versailles Treaty, and a Blizzard in North Dakota.

The headline was quite correct, a new civil war loomed in Germany, but at the same time the Reichswehr was pulling back from the putschists, proving once again that the army's instinct for self preservation remained paramount.

And perhaps it also reflected the fact that the rank and file of the Germany army differed little from the average man in the street to some degree.  This was no doubt not the case for the Freikorps, but German soldiers had played a role in the revolution of 1918, something that their leaders couldn't afford to forget.

Not forgotten in the U.S. was the Treaty of Versailles. The Senate ratified it, but not as written, substituting a compromise alternative Article X.

On the same day, but only hinted at here, British forces, acting under the Treaty of Sevres, occupied Constantinople.  The Allies in Turkey were acting as if the surrender of the Ottoman regime meant that the end of Turkey as a state capable of waging war against those on their own soil was over, which was far from true, and which would ultimately lead to disaster.

Allied troops marching in Constantinople, Greek flag flying from a building.

The occupation of the Ottoman capital city did not go well.  It commenced the night prior and was expansive on this day.  British Indian troops engaged in gunfire at a Turkish military school, killing ten students and British authorities arrested Turkish nationalist, including some members of the Ottoman parliament.  The overall human toll on the occupation isn't known.

The occupation of the parliament effectively eliminated the Turkish government which in turn put only the Sultan in a position of supporting the peace treaty with the Allies.  This would discredit the peace and a putative government anticipated by the treaty, which in fact had not yet been signed by the Turks.  The entire affair would strengthen Turkish nationalist who were already fighting the Allies in Anatolia.  

Constantinople would be occupied until 1923 when it was evacuated under the terms of a treat with the new Turkish government, the result of which would in part be the expulsion of most of Turkey's Greek minority population.

Closer to home, the deadly Spring Blizzard of 1920 hit North Dakota.

And U.S. passports suddenly became invalid due to Robert Lansing departing the office of Secretary of State with no replacement in place.  The crisis would continue for a week until Bainbridge Colby was confirmed for the office.

The Secondary Waves of the Great War.

World War Two, for obvious reasons, looms large in our imagination as the biggest event of the 20th Century.  The biggest, and the most significant.

But are we wrong?  

It seems lately that the echos of World War One are resounding pretty loudly.

World War One smashed the old order and demolished the borders of centuries.  The interbellum tried to reconstruct them, but did so in a metastasized and imperfect form, giving rise to new malignant orders that sought to fill the voids left by the death of the old imperial ones.  World War Two pitted three forces against each other, fascism, communism, and democracy, with democracy and communism ultimately siding with each other against fascism. After the war, the results of the Second World War gave rise to a contest between the two victors, communism and democracy, against each other until the vitality of free societies and free markets drove the rigidness of communism to and beyond the breaking point.

And now that communism is dead and gone, buried alongside its evil cousin fascism, the old unsolved questions of the Great War are back.  The rights of small nations, including those with out countries, against the possessions of older larger ones.  The demise of great empires giving rise to smaller ones.  Nationalism of all stripes against everything else.

It's 1919 all over again.

Turkey didn't sign the Treaty of Sevres.

Indeed, rather than do that, it fought it out.

It can't be blamed.  The Greeks had a quasi legitimate claim to Smyrna, but only quasi. A lot of ethnic Greeks lived there, which is no surprise as Anatolia had been Greek. The Ottoman's were invaders to the region, finally taking it in the 1450s.  But it had a large Ottoman population that they were bloodily brutal towards and they engaged in conquest, with the help of their Western allies, in Anatolia proper, seeking in a way to reverse what was lost centuries prior.

The Italian claim, moreover, to islands off of Turkey was absurd.

But the Armenian claims to their lands weren't.

The region sought of Armenia marked for a plebiscite is Kurdistan.  The Syria that ran to the sea and down to Palestine was an Ottoman province carved away from the Empire.  So was the Mesopotamia, i.e., Iraq, that appears on the map.

In 1990, the United States intervened in the Middle East to force Iraq, the British post World War One creation, out of Kuwait, a desert province that the British had protected during their stay in the Middle East, launching operations, with the assistance of others, from that region of Arabia named for the Sauds, that Arabian family that spent the Great War and the immediate interbellum consolidating power at the ultimate expense of the Hashemites, that Arabian noble family who had made war on the Turks.  The British dolled out kingdoms to that family as consolation prizes, with the Hashemites taking Iraq and the Transjordan.  The French got to administer Syria, a region that it claimed an historical affinity to, with the British taking administration of Palestine and Egypt, both of the latter having been Ottoman provinces although Egypt was long administered by the British in an arrangement that nobody can possibly grasp.

And so now, the old fights, and the interbellum struggles, reappear.  The peoples not accorded nations would like to have them. The old empires would like to keep their domains.  Borders drawn by European nations, with the help of Woodrow Wilson, are treated as real, when perhaps they were never correct.

Why an understanding of history is important.

They (the Kurds) didn't help us in the Second World War; they didn't help us with Normandy.

Donald Trump on the Kurds.

Of course they didn't. 

In 1944-45 the Kurds were where they are now, which means that they were unwilling citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran and Turkey.  Iraq, Syria, Iran and Turkey also didn't help us in the Second World War.

Indeed, the Turks were courted by the Germans throughout much of the war but wisely stayed out, having learned their lesson by siding with the Germans during World War One.  Turkey was a neutral power, lead by the aggressively secular military man Ataturk,. 

Syria was a French possession going into World War Two, a League of Nations mandate from World War One.  It became independent in 1946 basically as the British forced a weakened France to depart.  Iraq became independent in 1932 but following a pro fascist coup at the start of World War Two, the British defeated it in a short war in 1941.  Iran was a neutral during the war, but a neutral that leaned heavily towards the Allies and which allowed transportation of supplies from the Western allies to the Soviet Union across its territory.

So what does one make of all of this?

Well not much. 

World War Two was the single most significant event of the modern era, but it's now 75 some years ago.  All of the nations that were our allies, or perhaps more accurately that we became allied to, are still our allies. But the two major nations we fought in World War Two, Germany and Japan, are also our allies.  One of the nations that was a major ally of ours during World War Two, the Soviet Union, would be our major opponent for decades thereafter.  Russia, its predecessor and successor, can hardly be called our friend.

And bizarrely, perhaps World War One now has more to do with what's gong on in that region than World War Two, at least in some ways.  World War Two, followed by the Cold War, put the issues that the Great War's peace shoved into prominence back on the back burner.  The major wars were too big and the ideologies too deep for the rights of small peoples to take the place that seemed so prominent in 1918.

Now those issues are back.

Yes, the Kurds didn't fight at Normandy.  How could they?  But the Western Allies didn't save the Armenians from the Ottomans.  How could they?  The Allies didn't save the Turks from the Greeks nor did they save the Greeks from the Turks.  They probably could have done something about that.

In 1918 the European powers that carved up the Ottoman Empire, as well they should have, imagined a much smaller Turkey.  That Turkey would have suffered injustices. Greek claims to the interior of Turkey were unjust.  Italian claims to some of Turkey were absurd.  But the imagined Kurdish and Armenian states that some saw were not. And Armenia did manage to emerge. Kurdistan did not. We didn't do anything about that.

Maybe we couldn't have. But we could have kept this from breaking out.

Turkey's grievances against the United States (according to the Wall Street Journal)

Turkey is about to invade northern Syria in order to take on the Kurds, our allies, there. (I started this before the in fact did do just that)  They have a green light in this from President Trump.

Most people who have looked at this have been horrified.  The Kurds have put up an admirable successful fight against long odds, aided in party by their long martial history obtained while trying to secure a state of their own.

A few pundits, however hold the opposite view and feel that Trump is correct. Very few, and most of them put their opinions in much different terms than Trump has.  But, giving them their due, what could be the basis for pulling out and handing over an ally to their enemies.  Well, no less of journal than the Wall Street journal has declare has declared that the Turks have a point in being upset with the Untied States.

But do any of them justify stepping aside and allowing Turkey to invade northern Syria in order to put down the Kurds.  Only one, and only if you agree with the logic of taking sides.

The Journal notes that the Turks cooperated with the U.S. effort in Syria in spite of having misgivings, but that the U.S. didn't rally to its defense when it shot down a Russian combat aircraft. That action, which occurred during the Obama Administration, is very shoddy treatment of an ally, but it doesn't justify an invasion of Kurdish Syria.  The Journal also notes that the United States has been harboring an odd religious figure who is in opposition to the Turkish government and whom some believe is associated with a recent coup attempt.  That also is plenty reason for the Turkish administration to distrust the US but it's also no reason to invade Kurdish Syria.

The real reason to take that position, and the only one that makes sense as an argument, it that the US, in order to combat ISIL in Syria, armed one of the Kurdish militias which we've formerly branded as a terrorist organization and which has caused lots of deaths in Turkey in the past.  That would be a shocking proposition for Turkey and hard for it to accept. And defeating that militia, which is aligned against it, is something that the Turks would wish for.

But here's the rub.

There's no justifying terrorism in any sense. But there's also no good justification for occupying the lands of another people. The Turks are occupying part of Kurdistan and some Kurds are reacting with violence, and have been for a long time.  Neither position is acceptable.

But quite often we excuse one or the other.  People will glorify Michael Collins, the Irish terrorist leader, and refuse to accept he was a terrorist who was seeking Irish Independence by illegitimate, if successful, means.  Irish desires for independence were legitimate and the British occupation became illegitimate. But one doesn't excuse the other in either direction.  Likewise some have glorified any other number of terrorist organizations along similar lines or those opposing them.

So Turkey has a legitimate beef about the U.S. again under President Obama, arming the Kurds. But then the Kurds have a legitimate beef with Turkey for occupying their territory when they are not wanted there, particularly in light of the fact that its a historical accident that Kurdistan is not a state while Syria is, even though both were Ottoman territories until 1918.  If Turkey has been our ally since more or less 1945 (it really wasn't in any sense before that), it still doesn't excuse this oddity any more than the United Kingdom being our ally meant that we should have opposed Irish independence.

And on the status of Turkey being an ally of the United States, it is, in a formal sense.  It's a member of NATO.  But it's an ally because it was an opponent of the Soviet Union, the dangerous Communist state that was once on its border.  Being a democratic state was not a requirement for being a member of NATO.  Turkey often was, but it sometimes wasn't, a status it ironically shared with Greece, which fought a war with Turkey, while both were members of NATO, over Cyprus.  It was a minor war, but a war none the less.

NATO membership is still important, to be sure, but the dynamics that lead Turkey into the western alliance have changed.  The United States was allied to more than one less than democratic nation during the Cold War.  Since the end of the Cold War the necessity for such alliances had diminished, and with it the necessity that an allied power meet certain standards should have risen.

The problems begin when those standards start to be applied here.  Turkey is our long time ally, as noted above, and is using some American armor in its invasion.  The Kurds are largely left wing socialist in orientation. But the Kurds are fighting for what we said we were for in 1917-18 and claim to have been for every since, the right to national self determination.  Turkey is a state that retains remnants of its Ottoman past principally in the form of having a large Kurdish territory within its borders.  

In the end, the Turkish fight with the Kurds is over that.  They'd like out, the Turks would like to keep them in, whether they like it or not.  They're not a small group that can be ignored like some other ethnicities that are too small to form a viable state.  And a Kurdish state right now would likely be among the most western and most secular in the region.  The fact that there isn't such a state is itself a remnant of 1918, when the European powers carved up the region based upon their own ideas, and apparently none of those ideas reflected an independent Kurdistan.

Anyway its looked at, if we'd stayed in, the Turks likely would have stayed out.  If that would have weakened our relationship to the current Turkish government, that frankly likely wouldn't have mattered much.  It likely also would not have lead to a Kurdish state. But it might have kept the bloodshed we see now from occurring.

May 15, 1919 The Winnipeg General Strike, the Greco Turkish War commences.

A more localized strike in Winnepeg, Manitoba  that commenced a few days prior spread to being a complete working class strike on this day in 1919.  It would become one of the largest sustained labor strikes in Canadian history.

The world was slipping into an economic depression, one now largely forgotten, and surprisingly brief, but in the immediate politically tense post war situation, a serious event indeed.

Also serious, Greece landed troops in the Smyrna, on the Turkish coast.

Greek troops landing on Smyrna.

An intent to land had been declared the day prior and the action was supported by the Allies.

The city had a large Greek population as did many areas of Turkey at the time.  Like many of the European states prior to the end of World War Two, Turkey contained significant ethnic enclaves including Greek ones, reflecting that Turkey itself had once been a Greek speaking and culturally Greek domain.  It's primarily Greek status had ended with the fall of Constantinople to the invading Ottomans in 1453 but large Greek populations remained.

The Ottoman Empire itself had come to a near end with the Central Power defeat in World War One. The Allies were sympathetic to national claims in Turkey and the Ottoman Empire was being dismantled.  As part of that, Greek claims in Turkey were received sympathetically.

With in a few days, the Greek beachhead in Turkey would expand to the entire province that the city was in, a significant expansion of the operation.  

The landing is the practical starting date for the Greco Turkish War, a war that initially had strong Allied support and which supported extensive Greek claims in Turkey.  Indeed, the war effort was aided by the fact that other Allied powers, including Italy and the United Kingdom, occupied parts of Anatolia and Turkish islands off of the Turkish coast. The initial goals were to partition Anatolia leaving the domain of the Turks much smaller than is presently the case, and which would have not only left a very large portion of it under Greek control, but which would have also left substantial coastal island areas under Italian control, but also some areas under Armenian control and possibly even the creation of a Kurdish state.

In its greatly weakened state Turkey did poorly in the war at first and this vision of a diminished Turkey appeared likely to come into existence.  A treaty to that effect was drafted between the warring powers but neither Greece nor the Ottoman Empire ratified it.  The war would spark support of the young Turkish nationalist who displaced the Ottoman Empire, which fell prior to the war concluding.  The year after the war's full conclusion the Turkish parliament would abolish the caliphate, and the political regime that had come into existence in 1299 would end.

By that time, the Turks were on the advance in the war, which Turks regard as the Turkish War of Independence.  Rather than the treaty that had been negotiated but not ratified, the end result was much more favorable to Turkey which achieved its present borders.  As part of that treat, a massive population exchange was entered into in which Greece and Turkey exchanged their respective ethnic populations and approximately 1,000,000 Greeks whose homes had been in Anatolia left it.  The practical result was, therefore, that a Greek population that dated back to the Byzantine Empire was effectively nearly completely removed, although small Greek populations remain in Turkey to the present day.

In Philadelphia, a Military Police unit paraded, including its mounted officers.

Roads to the Great War: Silent Landscape at Gallipoli Reviewed

Roads to the Great War: Silent Landscape at Gallipoli Reviewed by Mike Han...: Silent Landscape at Gallipoli: The Battlefields of the Dardanelles, One Hundred Years On by Simon Doughty (Author), James Kerr ...

Countdown on the Great War, November 7, 1918: The False Armistace, the Bavarian monarchy falls, the French and British explain the war against the Ottomans.

1. The False Armistice resulted in celebrations throughout the Allied nations as a false report that Germany had entered into an Armistice circulated and was widely reported.

A couple of Wyoming's newspapers, including the Casper Daily Tribune, did note the reports, but were hesitant about reporting them as fully accurate.  They would turn out not to be.

2.  The German Revolution spread to Hanover, Brunswick, Frankfurt, and Munich.  King Ludwig III of Bavaria was forced to flee with his family for what he thought would be a temporary departure, but which would not see him return as king.

The Bavarian Royal Family.

There was some irony to his being the first German monarch to fall.  He was already in his upper years at the time he had become king, in 1913, and therefore was not a long reigning German monarch.  He was additionally a staunch supporter of the direct right to vote, thereby putting him in sympathy with democratic aims.  Indeed, he'd run, unsuccessfully, as a candidate for the Reichstag and there was some belief that if the German Emperor were an elected position, he would likely have been the Emperor.

He was not in the direct line of succession for the Bavarian crown and also came to it by way of a change in the Bavarian constitution which allowed for the regent to declare himself king upon the incompetency of the rightful occupant, which he then did, thereby ending his regency for the severely mentally ill King Otto.

Ludwig was a direct descendant of both the French King Louis XIV and the Norman Duke and English King William of Normandy.

3.  The UK and France issued (maybe. . .it might have been November 9) the Anglo French Declaration retroactively declaring their war aims in the fight against the Ottoman Empire to have been the "complete and final" liberation of nations that had been part of the Ottoman Empire.

4.  The U.S. Third Army was established at Chaumont, France.  It would not see a mission until after the Armistice.

5. The English fishing smack Conster hit a mine and sank.