Bey Sugar-Coats Post Revolt Tensions

While it developed without displaying excesses of any kind, the Turkish Revolution has been marked by the fraternization of Muslims and Christians, and of Christians among themselves.

Continuing The Turkish Revolution of 1908,
with a selection from Ministerial Address by A. Rustem Bey. This selection is presented in 2 installments, each one 5-minutes long. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Previously in The Turkish Revolution of 1908.

Time: 1908
Place: Istanbul

Another very remarkable circumstance accompanying the Turkish Revolution, and which justifies the pretty name given to it by Hilmi Pasha, une révolution sans tache, is that it has given rise to no excesses on the part of the soldiery or the civilian population. The movement has been, so far, kept well in hand by the Young Turkey leaders, who have used their new-found power with a tact and moderation equal to the consummate skill and dogged perseverance which have led to the triumph of their program. Only two cases of violence against the representatives of the former régime, of which the horrors were sufficient to justify the most terrible reprisals on the part of the population, have been recorded up to date. Fehim Pasha, perhaps the greatest villain of the infamous gang which served as an instrument for the execution of the now defunct policy of Yildiz, was lynched at Broussa by the mob, and another myrmidon of the palace, a notorious spy, was badly beaten at Salonika. For the rest, arrest and imprisonment have been the only forms of punishment to which recourse has been had. As for pillaging or even trafficking, there has been no instance of them. This constitutes the highest testimonial not only in favor of the leaders of the movement, but of the Mussulman population at large, and more especially the predominant Turkish element, which was credited in so many quarters with every instinct of brutality but has given the world, not excluding the West, which indulges in such complacent self-laudation, a lesson in self-restraint and generosity which should receive ample recognition from the detractors of the race, its English detractors especially, who have been loudest in their denunciations of the “unspeakable Turk.” It is only fair to add that it is in England also that Turkey has found her staunchest friends, and that they have always formed the majority of the population.

While it developed without displaying excesses of any kind, the Turkish Revolution has been marked by the fraternization of Muslims and Christians, and of Christians among themselves, and, still more astonishing phenomenon, by the surrendering to the Turkish authorities of the “Comitadji” bands of Macedonia. But this fraternization, so far as the majority of the Christians is concerned, is attributable to no permanent feeling. Overjoyed at the suppression of the tyranny which weighed so heavily on them, the Christians, thinking for the moment of nothing else but of manifesting their wild delight, fell on the necks of their Muslim compatriots, who had already moved to meet them more than halfway. The latter are certainly inspired by a sincere desire for permanent reconciliation. But it is just as certain that the former, or at least certain nationalities among them, will sooner or later, rather sooner than later, freeze into indifference and from indifference pass back to hostility. As for the “Comitadjis,” the latest news to hand is to the effect that they are already reverting to their former occupation. This brings me to the second point of my article, namely, the prospects of good working and durability of the new order of things in Turkey.

The Turks proper, the founders of the Ottoman Empire, of which they have always been and will continue to remain the axis, and which is composed of nearly as many nationalities as the mosaic of peoples governed by the Hapsburgs, are giving conclusive proofs of their sincere desire to weld the variegated and, so far, antagonistic populations of Turkey into one whole, inspired by a feeling of common citizenship. This is natural. Chastened by a bitter experience, the Turks have become fully aware that they can only keep together what through the contentment of the races they have conquered. It is for this reason that the first care of the Young Turkey party in its hour of triumph has been to proclaim and emphasize what, du reste, constitutes one of the fundamental principles of the resuscitated Constitution of Midhat Pasha, namely, the equality before the law, under the common name of Ottomans, of all the elements of the heterogeneous multitude which inhabits the Empire. The Turkish population (I am still speaking of the Turks proper) has cordially adhered to this notion of its leaders. Few incidents in history are more touching than the visit paid by a large assemblage of Turks to the Armenian cemetery in Constantinople in order to deposit floral tributes on the graves of the victims of the massacre of 1894 and to have prayers recited, by a priest of their own persuasion, over the butchered dead. Truly, the Turks have shown to extraordinary advantage during the present crisis. Not only have they displayed marked steadiness of demeanor in a situation which would have produced disorderly intoxication in most nations, but they have also acted like men of feeling and refinement, confirming the verdict of those who knew them best that they are “the gentlemen of the East.” And they have been well served by their instincts. For, if anything was calculated to placate the Armenians and throw them into the arms of the race from whose midst sprang their arch tormentor, and which, though it did not lend itself to the execution of the sanguinary anti-Armenian policy of the Yildiz it is the Kurds who are guilty of this revolting complacency — yet has much with which to reproach itself in regard to them, it is this charmingly simple act of contrition and redemption.

The Turks having offered moral reparation, in this and other gracefully inspired forms, to the Armenians for past ill treatment, and the latter having accepted it in the same spirit, while, on the other hand, the reestablishment of the Constitution of 1876 has been already accompanied by pre liminary measures of reform and other circumstances which make it imperative on every fair-minded person to give the ruling element in Turkey credit for the earnest desire and the ability to introduce competent government into the Empire.

It will be seen from what precedes that the Armenians are destined to work in durable unison with the Turks in the remodeled Ottoman Empire. Their financial, commercial, and administrative aptitudes, which are of the highest order, will constitute a felicitous complement to the political and martial virtues which predominate in the Turks. The cooperation of the two peoples will act as a conservative factor of great importance in the new situation.

Edwin Pears begins here. A. Rustem Bey begins here. Arminius Vambery begins here.

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