{"id":29146,"date":"2022-09-23T07:11:00","date_gmt":"2022-09-23T04:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eliamep.lncdoo.com\/mia-amfilegomeni-alosi-to-1453-stin-tourkiki-politiki-ritoriki-nicholas-danforth\/"},"modified":"2024-08-28T11:06:51","modified_gmt":"2024-08-28T08:06:51","slug":"mia-amfilegomeni-alosi-to-1453-stin-tourkiki-politiki-ritoriki-nicholas-danforth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/mia-amfilegomeni-alosi-to-1453-stin-tourkiki-politiki-ritoriki-nicholas-danforth\/","title":{"rendered":"A Contested Conquest: The Many Meanings of 1453 in Turkish Political Rhetoric &#8211; Nicholas Danforth"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"the-content\"><p><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Turkish politicians have invoked Ottoman history to justify everything from interfaith tolerance to aggressive irredentism.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>In the early years of the Cold War, shortly after Turkey and Greece joined NATO, Ankara sought to downplay anti-Greek elements in its 1453 conquest celebrations.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Now, by recasting the reconversion of Hagia Sophia and Turkey\u2019s Exclusive Economic Zone claims as matters of national sovereignty, Erdo\u011fan has succeeded in winning support from his political opponents.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Read <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/Policy-paper-109-Danforth-final.pdf\">here<\/a> in pdf the Policy Paper by <strong>Nicholas Danforth<\/strong>, Non-Resident Senior Research Fellow, Turkey Programme.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h2>Introduction<\/h2>\n<p>On May 29<sup>th<\/sup>, 2022, the Turkish Defense Ministry tweeted: \u201c569 years earlier, Istanbul was conquered. To look at it and dream of rebuilding Rome or Byzantium is a delusion. Those who long for 1,000 years ago make it clear who is the irredentist and who is the obstacle to peace.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn1\" name=\"_ftnref1\">[1]<\/a><\/p>\n<p>It was certainly an ironic comment from a government that indulges in imperial nostalgia as readily as Turkey\u2019s. But it was also a revealing one. Turkish leaders have long celebrated the conquest of Constantinople as a glorious event in their country\u2019s \u2013 indeed the world\u2019s \u2013 history. And yet the tone and target of these celebrations have varied. At some times, and among some political circles, the anti-Greek element has been front and center. Religious conservatives, in particular, were often eager to emphasize that converting Hagia Sophia into a mosque was necessary to defeat Greek designs on Istanbul itself. Yet at other times, Turkish leaders have worked to downplay this aggressive interpretation of the conquest, presenting it instead as a victory for liberal values.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>President Erdo\u011fan\u2019s own version of Ottoman nostalgia \u2013 religious, anti-Western and often veering on irredentist \u2013 has come to infuse all official history in Turkey today. Indeed, it has become so omnipresent that it is easy to forget an alternate version was possible.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Turkish leaders, like their counterparts everywhere, read history according to their own worldview and the political needs of the moment. President Erdo\u011fan\u2019s own version of Ottoman nostalgia \u2013 religious, anti-Western and often veering on irredentist \u2013 has come to infuse all official history in Turkey today. Indeed, it has become so omnipresent that it is easy to forget an alternate version was possible. Yet in 1953, on the 500<sup>th<\/sup> anniversary of Istanbul\u2019s conquest, different circumstances called for different history. Turkey had just held its first free multi-party elections in 1950 and, with Greece, joined NATO in 1952. In this context, historical details that could undermine NATO unity were downplayed, while in the most inventive interpretations, the Ottoman victory was presented as the triumph of UN values over Russia and its godless communist ideology.<a href=\"#_ftn2\" name=\"_ftnref2\">[2]<\/a><\/p>\n<h2>\u201cNow Was Not the Time to Offend Christian Nations\u201d<\/h2>\n<p>A recent Turkish comedy sketch casts a modern-day, latte-drinking hipster as a military commander trying to find a politically correct way to refer to the enemy while planning an offensive against Greek forces in 1922. After asking whether there will be a vegan option in the mess hall, he declares that calling Greek soldiers \u201cthe enemy\u201d is \u201cotherizing them\u201d and calling them \u201coccupiers\u201d verges on \u201chate speech.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn3\" name=\"_ftnref3\">[3]<\/a><\/p>\n<p>And yet, a not-so-dissimilar scenario actually played out in 1953 involving the Turkish President, the Ecumenical Patriarch and the U.S. Consul General in Istanbul.\u00a0 In January of that year, Patriarch Athenagoras, relating a conversation with President Celal Bayar to his U.S. government interlocuter, explained that :<\/p>\n<p><em>[T]he Turks were a \u2018kind people\u2019 and were certainly intelligent enough to realize that now was not the time to offend Christian nations. Consequently, the present government would play down the [conquest] celebration this spring and handle it in a tactful manner.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>When the Patriarch added that he himself would be willing to participate in the ceremonies, Bayar \u201cwas most gratified\u201d and told him that \u201cit would, of course, be necessary to hold the anniversary celebration, but it would not be on a large scale and the Greeks should not feel sensitive about a matter of such ancient history.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn4\" name=\"_ftnref4\">[4]<\/a>\u00a0 In fact, government rhetoric went out of its way to minimize any element of Greek-Turkish rivalry. The Ottomans&#8217; defeated foe was always referred to the Byzantines, never the Greeks. Newspapers were quick to remind \u201cour Greek friends\u201d that the alternative to the Turkish conquest of Istanbul was never continued Byzantine rule but rather Slavic domination and Byzantine incorporation into the \u201cState of Moscow.\u201d<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>Newspapers were quick to remind \u201cour Greek friends\u201d that the alternative to the Turkish conquest of Istanbul was never continued Byzantine rule but rather Slavic domination and Byzantine incorporation into the \u201cState of Moscow.\u201d\u00a0 <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Unsurprisingly, this approach to the celebrations generated considerable domestic criticism. Many authors have suggested that whatever new enthusiasm the Ottoman past enjoyed in the 1950s was a product of the ruling Democratic Party\u2019s more tolerant approach to public religiosity.\u00a0 In reality, the opposition Republican People\u2019s Party (CHP) proved as eager to exploit the political potential of the occasion as the conservative government. In fact, CHP members repeatedly complained that the Democratic Party\u2019s \u201cdull\u201d and \u201cwretched\u201d ceremonies were an insult to the memory of Sultan Fatih Mehmet II on this \u201csacred\u201d and \u201clofty\u201d occasion.<a href=\"#_ftn5\" name=\"_ftnref5\">[5]<\/a> The CHP spent much of the 1950s criticizing the Democratic Party (DP) for failing to follow through on the elaborate anniversary preparations \u0130smet \u0130n\u00f6n\u00fc had begun in 1944. In one speech, CHP district president \u0130lhami Sancar described the \u201cgreat sadness\u201d Turkish citizens felt over the government\u2019s trivialization of May 29th.<sup>.<\/sup>He promised that, if brought back to power in 1954, the CHP would put on a ceremony worthy of Fatih himself.<a href=\"#_ftn6\" name=\"_ftnref6\">[6]<\/a> Newspapers criticized the government over its handling of the celebrations as well. Cartoonists showed Istanbul\u2019s mayor instructing his doorman \u201cIf Fatih calls, tell him I\u2019m out\u201d, or contrasted the Prime Minister\u2019s presence at Queen Elizabeth\u2019s coronation in London with his empty chair in Istanbul.<a href=\"#_ftn7\" name=\"_ftnref7\">[7]<\/a>\u00a0 <em>Cumhuriyet<\/em> argued the government\u2019s embarrassing performance was a missed opportunity to show the world how civilized and advanced Turkey was. It could have been \u201clike Cannes,\u201d one author mused, \u201cthe Venice Biennale or a French Colonial exposition.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn8\" name=\"_ftnref8\">[8]<\/a><\/p>\n<p>CHP supporters even went as far as to suggest that the DP had deliberately downplayed the 500<sup>th<\/sup> anniversary in order to placate Greece and America, asking: \u201cWhy was Hagia Sophia not lit up like every other mosque or museum in the city?\u201d and \u201cDo we get indignant when the Greeks celebrate the independence they won from us?\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn9\" name=\"_ftnref9\">[9]<\/a> The Istanbul University Students\u2019 Union published an official complaint in the newspaper <em>Vatan<\/em> warning that those who downplayed the celebration of Fatih\u2019s victory in order to \u201cwin or placate friends\u201d committed a mistake that might \u201cendanger the future\u201d by calling Istanbul\u2019s Turkishness into question.<a href=\"#_ftn10\" name=\"_ftnref10\">[10]<\/a><\/p>\n<h2>Ottomans Versus Soviets<\/h2>\n<blockquote><p><em>Visitors to an exhibit of Turkish children\u2019s paintings at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, for example, learned that Fatih\u2019s empire was \u201ca veritable \u2018united nations\u2019 of people.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>In fact, in the early Cold War, Turkish leaders had their own ideological agenda they sought to advance through conquest celebrations. Specifically, politicians and journalists were eager to wrap Fatih Sultan Mehmet\u2019s mantle around Turkey\u2019s participation in the Korean War as part of the United Nations\u2019 forces. Saying Fatih\u2019s achievement was much more than just a military victory, Istanbul Mayor Fahrettin G\u00f6kay told a crowd assembled on May 29<sup>th<\/sup> that Fatih had in fact given the world an example of the United Nations five hundred years before its time. <a href=\"#_ftn11\" name=\"_ftnref11\">[11]<\/a>\u00a0 In a subsequent speech, professor \u015einasi Altunda\u011f declared:<\/p>\n<p><em>Great Fatih&#8230; May your spirit rest in peace. Your noble ideals will live forever with the Turkish nation and the Turkish Republic upon the sound foundation laid by Atat\u00fcrk. Is it even necessary to elaborate? Look at Korea. Look at the Atlantic Pact\u2026We, Fatih\u2019s children, show our greatest display of being worthy of him through serving the cause of world peace with our soldiers\u2019 blood in Korea today. Now we bow with honor before all of our holy martyrs who, beginning with Fatih, have died for their country and who now give their lives for world peace under the United Nations in Korea today.<a href=\"#_ftn12\" name=\"_ftnref12\">[12]<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>Columnists, too, made similar comparisons, with one asking, \u201cwhat difference is there between Ulubatl\u0131 Hasan, who first raised our flag over the walls of Istanbul, and the commander who went into battle in Korea wrapped in the Turkish flag?\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn13\" name=\"_ftnref13\">[13]<\/a> Some U.S. accounts echoed this rhetoric as well. Visitors to an exhibit of Turkish children\u2019s paintings at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, for example, learned that Fatih\u2019s empire was \u201ca veritable \u2018united nations\u2019 of people.\u201d As a result \u201c[t]he great heroism of the Turkish troops in Korea expresses not only the enduring fighting qualities of the Turks but the success of this 500-year-old experiment in international living.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn14\" name=\"_ftnref14\">[14]<\/a><\/p>\n<p>More dramatically, legend had it that Turkish troops serving in Korea were actually aided by the spirit of the \u201chappy soldiers\u201d who died in Fatih\u2019s conquest. In 1952, a young soldier returning from Korea to Diyarbakir reportedly stopped into a coffee shop in the F\u0131nd\u0131kl\u0131 neighborhood of Istanbul. Looking around, he announced that he had come to see the Sofu Baba and asked if anyone could show him the man\u2019s home. The customers were shocked. \u201cSon,\u201d one of them said, \u201cthere\u2019s no one alive here by that name. He\u2019s one of our saints. You can find his tomb.\u201d Even more shocked, the soldier explained that he had met the Sofu Baba in the heat of battle. Surrounded by communist troops and facing death, he and his comrades had begun to lose hope. Suddenly, a radiant, bearded old man appeared. The man stroked his back, imparting a feeling of indescribable warmth, and asked why he was afraid. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t suit you,\u201d he said, \u201cnow fight.\u201d When the soldier asked the old man who he was, the man said \u201cI\u2019m the Sofu Baba. From Istanbul. I live in F\u0131nd\u0131kl\u0131. Come find me after the war.\u201d\u00a0 He then disappeared into the smoke as the men launched their assault.<a href=\"#_ftn15\" name=\"_ftnref15\">[15]<\/a><\/p>\n<h2>The Origins of Ottoman Tolerance<\/h2>\n<blockquote><p><em>The geopolitical circumstances of the early Cold War period also helped consolidate the enduring narrative of \u2018Ottoman tolerance.\u2019<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The geopolitical circumstances of the early Cold War period also helped consolidate the enduring narrative of \u2018Ottoman tolerance.\u2019 Turkish statesmen were well aware of the criticism their country faced, both in America and the Soviet Union, for its historic treatment of Christian minorities. Turkey also faced accusations from its new Western allies that its neutrality in World War Two been motivated by ideological sympathy toward fascism. The rhetoric of tolerance sought to respond to these criticisms and justify Turkey\u2019s place in a new Western world order defined by international cooperation and freedom.<\/p>\n<p>Returning from a 1950 UNESCO conference consisting of \u201cprofessors from all the world\u2019s democratic countries,\u201d a representative of the Ministry of Education wrote that Turkey would need to \u201cfacilitate the teaching of a broader historical viewpoint in keeping with UN ideals.\u201d This viewpoint should be based on \u201cthe reality of nations\u2019 ever-growing economic, political and civilizational ties and their dependence on one another,\u201d in place of \u201cour previous flat, narrow and extremist national views and teachings.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn16\" name=\"_ftnref16\">[16]<\/a> Among other things, this effort (which, he noted, also required other countries to purge their schoolbooks of anti-Turkish prejudice) would promote world peace, end national rivalries, and, most importantly, help defeat the spread of Communism. The author cited American history textbooks written \u201cwithout religious prejudice\u201d as examples that could serve as a \u201cguide\u201d in the creation of a \u201cunited world.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn17\" name=\"_ftnref17\">[17]<\/a> He then lamented that \u201cif we had had the power in the Seljuk and Ottoman eras, we ourselves could have served as exemplars of the humanitarian ideal.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn18\" name=\"_ftnref18\">[18]<\/a> In this context, the discourse of Ottoman tolerance offered a way to nationalize the era\u2019s internationalism and give a patriotic gloss to the spirit of global peace.<\/p>\n<p>The discourse of Ottoman tolerance also echoed U.S. attacks against Soviet \u201creligious persecution,\u201d suggesting that Turkey\u2019s historic embrace of religious freedom marked it as a part of the free world. In 1948, an article in Ankara University\u2019s <em>Faculty of Language, History and Geography Journal <\/em>argued that Ottoman Christians had always been happy compared to Russia\u2019s Muslims,<a href=\"#_ftn19\" name=\"_ftnref19\">[19]<\/a> and explicitly contrasted the lack of religious compulsion in Islam with the mandatory atheism prescribed by Communism.<a href=\"#_ftn20\" name=\"_ftnref20\">[20]<\/a> The author also concluded that the Ottoman Empire had never been at war with Christianity, only the Slavs. In the sphere of public rhetoric, Celal Bayar gave voice to these sentiments when he declared \u201cFatih began the practical application of the ideas of religious freedom and freedom of conscience for which people still struggle today.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn21\" name=\"_ftnref21\">[21]<\/a> One of the few official conquest publications translated into English in 1953 was a pamphlet called \u201cThe Importance of the Conquest of Istanbul for Mankind and Civilization,\u201d which explained that \u201c[t]he respect of the Turks for all religions, even in the days before Mohammedanism, is no[w] proved by recent research.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn22\" name=\"_ftnref22\">[22]<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The regional politics of the early Cold War also played a role. Among other justifications used to bolster Soviet claims to northeastern Anatolia was the argument, advanced by two Georgian scholars in 1945, that Ottoman Turks had \u201cspread violence and death\u201d across Georgia, \u201cimposing their religion and language by sword.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn23\" name=\"_ftnref23\">[23]<\/a> \u015einasi Altunda\u011f set out to rebut these claims at the Fourth Turkish Historical Society Congress with a vigorous defense of the Ottoman Empire\u2019s tolerance.<a href=\"#_ftn24\" name=\"_ftnref24\">[24]<\/a> Citing the \u201cemotion and loyalty\u201d the Georgians felt toward the Ottomans, Altunda\u011f went to explain that the Ottomans\u2019 cultural policies were clear: \u201cToday, are languages like Greek, Bulgarian, Serbian, and Albanian not still around..? Did the Greeks, Bulgarians, Serbs and Georgians re-learn their languages and Christianity after leaving the Ottoman Empire?\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn25\" name=\"_ftnref25\">[25]<\/a>\u00a0 \u201cA tolerance reigned in the Ottoman Empire that was the envy of other nations\u2026. To steal a Christian\u2019s chicken or pasture a horse on a Christian\u2019s field was equivalent to a murder and punishable by death\u2026. Once ten Janissaries were executed for the unjust killing of a Christian.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn26\" name=\"_ftnref26\">[26]<\/a><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>Celebrating Fatih\u2019s religious tolerance went hand in hand with celebrating his supposed secularism.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Celebrating Fatih\u2019s religious tolerance went hand in hand with celebrating his supposed secularism. Several authors went as far as to suggest that in making Hagia Sophia into a mosque \u2013 instead, presumably, of destroying it \u2013 Fatih was not only showing his secular ideals but his respect for Christians\u2019 culture as well. Despite the ruined state in which the Byzantines left Hagia Sophia, Fatih supposedly admired its mosaics of the Virgin Mary and violently intervened to stop a Janissary from damaging the marblework. Thus, in turning the building into a museum, Atat\u00fcrk was acting on the same impulse that had inspired Fatih\u2019s action.<a href=\"#_ftn27\" name=\"_ftnref27\">[27]<\/a>\u00a0 In a particularly striking effort to recast Fatih as an exemplar of religious tolerance, B\u00fclent Ecevit, who would go on to be Prime Minister, offered American readers the following anecdote in January 1955:<\/p>\n<p><em>In [Hagia Sophia] were some of the finest mosaics that Byzantine artists had executed&#8230; Yet representation of the human form was forbidden by the Mohammedan religion. So, the new rulers of the city, who were of the Mohammedan faith, had no choice but to destroy them. Could Mehmet the Conqueror, the liberal Sultan who was later to bring over the famous Italian artist Bellini to his court to do his portrait, allow such an act? For nearly five centuries the whole world believed that he did! But a few years after Turkey became a secular republic\u2026 it was discovered that Mehmet the Conqueror had only had those mosaics covered with sheets of durable cloth&#8230;\u00a0 So, when the plaster and the sheets of cloth were removed, the mosaics were there \u2013 as fresh as they were in 1453.<a href=\"#_ftn28\" name=\"_ftnref28\">[28]<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>Later that same year of course, a pogrom targeted Istanbul\u2019s non-Muslim population, destroying stores and churches and leaving at least a dozen people dead. Ecevit was one of the few authors to see a contradiction with the lofty rhetoric of Ottoman tolerance. In a column titled \u201cFatih, Forgive Us,\u201d he lamented that the destruction visited on Istanbul\u2019s minorities was a painful rejection of the principles Fatih had demonstrated 502 years earlier upon entering the city. <a href=\"#_ftn29\" name=\"_ftnref29\">[29]<\/a><\/p>\n<h2>Modern Echoes<\/h2>\n<p>The popular image of the Ottoman Empire that was consolidated in the 1950s \u2013 mighty but just, tolerant but undeniably Turkish \u2013 has proved remarkably enduring in Turkish films, museums, and popular culture, even as a range of different political movements have refined their own versions of the Ottoman past. Current Islamist invocations of Ottoman piety, just like liberal invocations of Ottoman multiculturalism, both count on the same fundamental continuity between the Ottoman and Turkish states articulated by early nationalists. At the same time, the malleability of the Ottoman legacy can help explain its contestation in popular culture today.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>Later, everyone headed to the Golden Horn for a laser light show, with rainbow colors to symbolize Fatih\u2019s tolerance.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>On May 29, 2010, for example, Istanbul celebrated with speeches, re-enactments and a laser light show. Along the city walls, men dressed in Janissary costumes and fake mustaches marched alongside uniformed military academy students and drum majorettes. The Justice and Development Party (AKP) mayor of Istanbul stressed the fact that within three days of taking the city, Fatih ordered the Janissaries back to their barracks to restore order. Fatih, it seemed, supported the AKP in its struggle to establish civilian control of the military. A Turkish military officer, by contrast, spoke about the many characteristics Fatih and Atat\u00fcrk shared. Later, everyone headed to the Golden Horn for a laser light show, with rainbow colors to symbolize Fatih\u2019s tolerance.<\/p>\n<p>On May 29<sup>th<\/sup>, 2019, Istanbul\u2019s CHP mayoral candidate, Ekrem Imamo\u011flu, shared a video on Twitter in which he quoted Fatih as saying that he \u201ccame to conquer hearts, not land.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn30\" name=\"_ftnref30\">[30]<\/a> Imamo\u011flu then promised that, like Fatih, he would again make Istanbul a city where residents of all faiths and languages lived together in peace and justice. Meanwhile, AKP supporters spread accusations Imamo\u011flu was secretly Greek and warned that his victory would be a triumph for Turkey\u2019s \u201cinternal Byzantines.\u201d One paper called on him to deny that he spoke Greek in order to lead \u201cthe city conquered by Fatih.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn31\" name=\"_ftnref31\">[31]<\/a> A year later, Imamo\u011flu won widespread praise from his secular constituency for purchasing a Gentile Bellini painting of Fatih that went on sale in London. The pro-AKP press, in turn, condemned him for wasting money on a drawing done by an infidel.<\/p>\n<p>In the summer of 2020, Erdo\u011fan sought to put his own definitive stamp on the Fatih legacy with the reconversion of Hagia Sophia into a mosque. His speech on the occasion presented the building\u2019s transformation as both an act of piety and a fulfillment of Turkish sovereignty.<a href=\"#_ftn32\" name=\"_ftnref32\">[32]<\/a> In doing so, he echoed a longstanding Islamist narrative in which Atat\u00fcrk\u2019s secularism represented a foreign imposition on the Turkish nation.<a href=\"#_ftn33\" name=\"_ftnref33\">[33]<\/a> More pointedly, his rhetoric reinforced the \u201cinternal Byzantines\u201d accusation levelled against the CHP, suggesting that the party was a disloyal fifth column working on behalf of modern-day crusader states. Yet by casting Hagia Sophia\u2019s reconversion in terms of national sovereignty, Erdo\u011fan also succeeded in winning support for his decision from members of the secular opposition as well. Former CHP presidential candidate Muharrem \u0130nce, for example, announced he would be willing to attend the opening prayers himself, tweeting \u201cHagia Sophia is inside Turkey\u2019s borders and opening it to prayer is Turkey\u2019s sovereign right. Neither Greece, America, Russia nor any other country can decide this.\u201d<a href=\"#_ftn34\" name=\"_ftnref34\">[34]<\/a><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>Where Kemalist rhetoric presented Turkish sovereignty as having been fulfilled with the Treaty of Lausanne, Erdo\u011fan\u2019s rhetoric often suggests that it remains incomplete.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Lately, Erdo\u011fan\u2019s discussions of history and sovereignty have increasingly spilled outside Turkey\u2019s borders as well. Where Kemalist rhetoric presented Turkish sovereignty as having been fulfilled with the Treaty of Lausanne, Erdo\u011fan\u2019s rhetoric often suggests that it remains incomplete. His Hagia Sophia speech, for example, suggested that the building\u2019s liberation would be a prelude to the liberation of the Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.<a href=\"#_ftn35\" name=\"_ftnref35\">[35]<\/a> And even before Turkish officials began explicitly questioning the sovereignty of Greek islands, their \u201c<em>Mavi Vatan<\/em>\u201d or \u201cBlue Homeland\u201d rhetoric had injected an irredentist dimension into the Turkish-Greek maritime dispute over exclusive economic zones. Though these zones are not actually sovereign territory, Ankara has raised the stakes of the confrontation by referring to them as part of Turkey\u2019s homeland and displaying a plethora of maps on which Turkey\u2019s claimed zone is shown like territory, covered in the Turkish flag. Not surprisingly, this framing has helped Erdo\u011fan in building a national consensus around his policies in which the opposition has little room, or indeed inclination, to challenge him.<\/p>\n<p>Today, Ankara\u2019s embrace of a highly aggressive version of history \u2013 seen most recently in Erdo\u011fan\u2019s comments on the 100<sup>th<\/sup> anniversary of the Turkish capture of Izmir \u2013 both fuel and is fueled by a climate of rising nationalism in the country.<a href=\"#_ftn36\" name=\"_ftnref36\">[36]<\/a> Set amidst a multiplicity of alternate readings, this narrative represents a conscious decision on the part of the government to escalate rather than calm tensions in the region. Recognizing that in different political circumstances, different histories are possible can be encouraging. But it also makes the government\u2019s current choices appear all the more alarming.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref1\" name=\"_ftn1\">[1]<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/tcsavunma\/status\/1530988720941416448\">https:\/\/twitter.com\/tcsavunma\/status\/1530988720941416448<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201c569 y\u0131l \u00f6nce fethedilen \u0130stanbul\u2019a Roma \u0130mparatorlu\u011fu\u2019nun veya Bizans\u2019\u0131n hayalini kurarak bakmak kuruntudan ibarettir. 1000 y\u0131l \u00f6ncesine \u00f6zlem duyanlar kimin yay\u0131lmac\u0131, kimin bar\u0131\u015fa engel oldu\u011funu a\u00e7\u0131k\u00e7a ortaya koymaktad\u0131r.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref2\" name=\"_ftn2\">[2]<\/a> Portions of this research were originally published in Nicholas Danforth, <em>The Remaking of Modern Turkey: Memory and Modernity since the Fall of the Ottoman Empire<\/em>, Cambridge University Press, London, 2021.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref3\" name=\"_ftn3\">[3]<\/a> \u201cModal\u0131 Mesut Pa\u015fa,\u201d\u00a0 <em>Gu\u0308ldu\u0308r Gu\u0308ldu\u0308r<\/em>, Episode 306, May 14, 2022.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref4\" name=\"_ftn4\">[4]<\/a> After joining NATO, the Turkish government also quietly dropped its celebrations of the Ottoman army\u2019s 1916 victory over British forces at Kut Al Amara.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref5\" name=\"_ftn5\">[5]<\/a> \u201cFatih y\u0131ld\u00f6n\u00fcm\u00fc i\u00e7in Meclise bir soru \u00f6nergesi verildi,\u201d <em>Cumhuriyet<\/em>, 2 June 1953.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref6\" name=\"_ftn6\">[6]<\/a> \u201cFetih \u015eenlikleri d\u00fcn sona erdi,\u201d <em>Cumhuriyet<\/em>, 8 June 1953.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref7\" name=\"_ftn7\">[7]<\/a> <em>Cumhuriyet<\/em>, 28 May, 1953; <em>Cumhuriyet<\/em>, 3 June, 1953.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref8\" name=\"_ftn8\">[8]<\/a> \u201cSamih Nafiz Tansu, \u201c500\u00fcnc\u00fc Fetih y\u0131l\u0131nda neler olmazd\u0131\u201d. <em>Cumhuriyet<\/em>, 23 May 1949.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref9\" name=\"_ftn9\">[9]<\/a>\u00a0 \u201cTerbiyemiz bak\u0131m\u0131ndan Fetih,\u201d <em>Cumhuriyet<\/em>, 8 June 1953; Sadun Savc\u0131, \u201cDolmu\u015fta,\u201d <em>Vatan<\/em>, 3 June 1953.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref10\" name=\"_ftn10\">[10]<\/a>\u00a0 \u201cFetih y\u0131ld\u00f6n\u00fcm\u00fc t\u00f6renleri bitiyor,\u201d <em>Vatan<\/em>, 7 June 1953.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref11\" name=\"_ftn11\">[11]<\/a> \u201cFatih ve Topkap\u0131\u2019daki t\u00f6rende y\u00fczbinlerce \u0130stanbullu bulundu,\u201d <em>Vatan<\/em>, 30 May 1953.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref12\" name=\"_ftn12\">[12]<\/a> \u201c\u015eehrimizdeki T\u00f6ren,\u201d <em>Zafer<\/em>, 30 May 1953.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref13\" name=\"_ftn13\">[13]<\/a> M\u00fcmtaz Faik Fenik, \u201cSeferihisar\u2019da Gen\u00e7 Ulubat\u0131l\u0131 Hasanlar,\u201d <em>Zafer<\/em>, 30 May 1953.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref14\" name=\"_ftn14\">[14]<\/a> ICE-D-4-54. MOMA, Ibid.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref15\" name=\"_ftn15\">[15]<\/a> One version of this legend is related by the Turkish Ministry of Religion outside the tomb of the Sofu Baba, located on the F\u0131nd\u0131kl\u0131 yoku\u015fu in Istanbul\u2019s Cihangir neighborhood. It can also be found at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.smartbeyoglu.com\/firma\/23015\/sofu-baba-turbesi.html\">http:\/\/www.smartbeyo\u011flu.com\/firma\/23015\/sofu-baba-turbesi.html<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref16\" name=\"_ftn16\">[16]<\/a>\u00a0 Osman Turan, \u2018Milliyet ve Insanl\u0131k Mefkurelerinin Tarih Tedrisat\u0131nda Ahenkle\u015ftirilmesi, <em>\u2019Ankara Universitesi Dil ve Tarih-Cografya Dergis<\/em>i, Volume 10, Issue 1-2, March-June 1952,\u00a0 209-239. p210<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref17\" name=\"_ftn17\">[17]<\/a> Ibid, 212.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref18\" name=\"_ftn18\">[18]<\/a> Ibid, 225.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref19\" name=\"_ftn19\">[19]<\/a> Bekir Sitki Baykal, \u2018\u015eark Buhran\u0131 ve Sabah Gazetesi,\u2019 <em>Universitesi Dil ve Tarih-Cografya Dergi<\/em>si, Volume 6, Issue 4, Sept.-Oct. 1948, 219-258. p252.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref20\" name=\"_ftn20\">[20]<\/a> Ibid, 233.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref21\" name=\"_ftn21\">[21]<\/a> <em>Be\u015f Y\u00fcz\u00fcnc\u00fc Fetih Y\u0131l\u0131nda Devlet Cal\u0131\u015fmalar\u0131na Umumi bir Bak\u0131\u015f <\/em>(Istanbul: Parsadan Bas\u0131n, 1953). 67.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref22\" name=\"_ftn22\">[22]<\/a> \u0130smail Hami Dani\u015fmend, \u201cThe Importance of the Conquest of Istanbul for Mankind and Civilization,\u201d translated by E. A. and B. M. (Publications of the Istanbul Society for Celebration of the Conquest No 15). This rhetorical outreach was sufficiently effective that the <em>New York Times<\/em> noted, \u201c[t]he modern Turk believes his was the first country to establish a legal basis for the co-existence of all religious and racial groups.\u201d Morris Kaplan, \u201cTurks Here Will Sip \u2018Lion\u2019s Milk\u2019 To Mark Victory of 500 Years Ago,\u201d <em>New York Times<\/em>, 29 May 1953.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref23\" name=\"_ftn23\">[23]<\/a> S. Djanasia and N. Berzenisvili, <em>Gurcustan Meselesi <\/em>(Georgian Academy: 1945) as quoted in \u015einasi Altundag, \u201cOsmanli Idaresi ve G\u00fcrc\u00fcler,\u201d <em>Ankara Universitesi Dil ve Tarih-Cografya Dergisi<\/em>, Volume 10, Issue 1-2, March-June 1952, p79-90.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref24\" name=\"_ftn24\">[24]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref25\" name=\"_ftn25\">[25]<\/a> Ibid, 79.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref26\" name=\"_ftn26\">[26]<\/a> Ibid, 81.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref27\" name=\"_ftn27\">[27]<\/a>\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.google.com.tr\/search?tbo=p&amp;tbm=bks&amp;q=inauthor:%22Damat+Mehmet+%C5%9Eerif+Pa%C5%9Fa%22\">Damat Mehmet \u015eerif Pa\u015fa<\/a>, Ci\u011fercan Tarih Kitaplar\u0131 Serisi no 5, <em>Faith Sultan Mehmed Han-i Sani ve \u0130stanbulun Fethi<\/em>, (Istanbul: Hilmi Kitabevi, 1953).<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref28\" name=\"_ftn28\">[28]<\/a> \u201cIstanbul a beautiful city of many names haunted by its long hectic past.\u201d <em>Winston-Salem Journal Sentinel<\/em>, 2 January, 1955.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref29\" name=\"_ftn29\">[29]<\/a> B\u00fclent Ecevit, \u201cFatih, Bizi Afet,\u201d Ulus, 9 September, 1955.\u00a0 In the course of the column, he also argued that this was true even if Turkey\u2019s cause was justified and the Ottoman Empire\u2019s minorities had in fact betrayed it.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref30\" name=\"_ftn30\">[30]<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ekrem_imamoglu\/status\/1133603511013392389?s=20\"> https:\/\/twitter.com\/ekrem_imamoglu\/status\/1133603511013392389?s=20<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref31\" name=\"_ftn31\">[31]<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sabah.com.tr\/gundem\/2019\/05\/29\/ekrem-imamoglunun-yokmus-gibi-davrandigi-cevapsiz-sorular\">\u201c<\/a> Ekrem \u0130mamo\u011flu&#8217;nun &#8216;YOKMU\u015e&#8217; gibi davrand\u0131\u011f\u0131 cevaps\u0131z sorular,\u201d <em>Sabah<\/em>, 29 May 2019.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref32\" name=\"_ftn32\">[32]<\/a> \u201cCumhurba\u015fkan\u0131 Erdo\u011fan&#8217;dan Ayasofya A\u00e7\u0131klamas\u0131,\u201d Haber Global, July 10, 2020.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref33\" name=\"_ftn33\">[33]<\/a> Specifically, he cited conservative historian Ibrahim Hakk\u0131 Konyal\u0131\u2019s claim that Fatih himself had cursed anyone \u2013 meaning Atat\u00fcrk \u2013\u00a0 who would undue his consecration of Hagia Sophia as a mosque.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref34\" name=\"_ftn34\">[34]<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/vekilince\/status\/1281701816942682113?lang=en\"> https:\/\/twitter.com\/vekilince\/status\/1281701816942682113?lang=en<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref35\" name=\"_ftn35\">[35]<\/a> In the 1950s, American diplomats worried that Turkey\u2019s invocation of the Ottoman past might alienate Arab states that Washington hoped Ankara would lead in an anti-communist alliance. Then, in the early 2000s, some Americans worried that Erdogan\u2019s neo-Ottoman rhetoric would help him build on historic ties to make friends at Washington\u2019s expense across the Arab world. Now, with Turkish troops deployed in Iraq, Syria and Libya, many Arab commentators been quick to criticize the irredentist or neo-imperialist menace in Erdogan\u2019s embrace of history.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref36\" name=\"_ftn36\">[36]<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Communications\/status\/1567145875029348352?s=20&amp;t=bApoPZnv0Hzs38bTN2Fr-w\">https:\/\/twitter.com\/Communications\/status\/1567145875029348352?s=20&amp;t=bApoPZnv0Hzs38bTN2Fr-w<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Turkish politicians have invoked Ottoman history to justify everything from interfaith tolerance to aggressive irredentism. In the early years of the Cold War, shortly after Turkey and Greece joined NATO, Ankara sought to downplay anti-Greek elements in its 1453 conquest celebrations. Now, by recasting the reconversion of Hagia Sophia and Turkey\u2019s Exclusive Economic Zone claims [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":29147,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[492,104],"tags":[],"program":[24],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29146"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29146"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29146\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45169,"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29146\/revisions\/45169"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29146"},{"taxonomy":"program","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eliamep.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/program?post=29146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}