Paradise Lost: Smyrna 1922 - The Destruction of Islam's City of Tolerance (28 page)

The inescapable conclusion was that both Greeks and Turks were behaving with absolute disregard for law and order. The cycle of violence had become so ingrained and widespread that it was no longer possible to point the finger of blame at specific individuals. ‘The atrocities reported against Christians on the one hand, and Moslems on the other,’ concluded the report, ‘are unworthy of a civilised government.’

Toynbee told his readers that the current carnage should act as ‘a warning of what might happen on a much larger scale if the statesmen whose policy was responsible for this war of extermination in Anatolia’ – Venizelos and Lloyd George – ‘should altogether fail to retrieve the mischief which they had made’.

Toynbee feared that if the Greek army did not defeat the nationalists – and was therefore forced to flee from Turkey – the entire country would be plunged into a bloodbath. ‘The horror which I have deliberately described was almost bound to be repeated through the length and breadth of the occupied territory,’ he wrote, ‘from Brusa to Aidin and from Eski-Shehir to Smyrna.’

The troubles afflicting the Greek-controlled zone around Smyrna came as no surprise to British prisoner 2691, also known as Rahmi Bey. He had predicted such a turn of events many years earlier. Now, kept under lock and key in Malta, he was powerless to do anything to save the city he cherished.

The great Levantine families of Smyrna were appalled by the incarceration of their wartime ally and protector. They were even more shocked to discover that he was being held without any prospect of a trial. To their eyes, it seemed a gross travesty of justice, yet the British no longer displayed any interest in the international rule of law. Admiral Calthorpe had announced at the time of the arrests that the prisoners were ‘to be tried and punished in such a manner as the Allies may subsequently decide upon’.

The Levantines petitioned the British authorities in Constantinople, begging them to release the man who had guaranteed their lives and fortunes during the Great War, although their pleas fell on deaf ears. ‘I consider it most undesirable that a man of his character and importance should be set at liberty,’ wrote the acting High Commissioner in Constantinople. ‘There seems to me no justification for his release solely on the grounds that he did not actually order the massacre of the foreign population in Smyrna.’

This was a gross misrepresentation of Rahmi Bey’s wartime role. He had protected not only the Levantine community, but had also done his best to shield the Greeks and Armenians from the appalling excesses of the central government.

Nevertheless, there was growing unease in the Foreign Office about the decision to imprison Rahmi Bey. It was he, after all, who had attempted to negotiate a peace with the British government. And he had furthermore been prepared to stage a
coup d’état
against the discredited wartime administration of Enver Pasha.

The Foreign Office was also concerned about the increasingly vociferous campaign being waged by the Levantines of Smyrna. They wanted Rahmi released and made no secret of the fact that they were prepared to pull all possible strings in order to achieve it. Their campaign soon had an effect in Whitehall: several senior civil servants added their voices to the growing chorus of disapproval at the incarceration of Rahmi Bey. Even Venizelos seemed surprised by the British government’s decision. When the diplomat, Harold Nicolson, asked him what he thought about Rahmi’s imprisonment, Venizelos mumbled something about Greek deportations before changing the subject. He told Nicolson that ‘he would really prefer not to talk up the case’.

The more the Levantines of Bournabat protested, the louder was the chorus of disapproval. Nevile Henderson, a senior diplomat living in Constantinople, declared himself appalled by the actions of his government, even going so far as to describe the establishment of the prison camp in Malta as ‘the one action of ours since 1918 which I am absolutely incapable of defending’.

In the end, it was Charlton Whittall, one of Herbert Octavius’s younger brothers, who secured Rahmi’s release. He leaned so hard on the British government – and quite possibly threatened to use his extensive media contacts to ensure damaging publicity in
The Times
and elsewhere – that prisoner 2691 was eventually set free in October 1921. There were no apologies for having held him without trial and no question of compensation. Rahmi never spoke out publicly about his incarceration so it is impossible to know whether his feelings had changed towards the country he had admired for so long. He certainly had no desire to return to Constantinople now that it was in the hands of the British. He headed to Morocco in order to enjoy the comforts and sunshine of Casablanca. It was infinitely preferable to facing an uncertain future in war-torn Turkey.

The future had indeed become uncertain. The inherent gaiety of the Levantine families continued to suggest that all was well. When the Girauds had toasted the New Year at their spectacular fancy-dress ball, they seemed oblivious to the fact that Smyrna was teetering on the edge of financial catastrophe. Nor did they realise that the continued fighting in central Anatolia was taking its toll on people’s morale. So long as the troops met with success on the battlefield, Smyrniots felt that they had nothing to fear, but when news of the Greek army’s reversals reached them, there was widespread despondency. For the first time, Smyrna’s inhabitants began to question the wisdom of the army pushing deeper into Anatolia.

James Morgan, the British vice-consul in Smyrna, was the first to predict that the city was heading for serious trouble. In January 1921, he noted that the annual caravans from the interior of the country had failed to arrive. ‘There is practically no commerce between Smyrna and the parts outside the Greek occupation,’ he wrote. He also observed that a significant number of Jewish merchants had sold their warehouses and left the metropolis – a sure sign of lean times ahead.

Yet neither he, nor anyone else, could have foreseen the speed with which the city would fall into decline. The economy went into sudden meltdown in the spring of 1921. There was no trade, no exports, no goods to be bought and sold. For the first time in living memory, silence reigned over the normally bustling port of Smyrna. The only naval activity in the bay was the coming and going of Greek destroyers and landing craft.

In April, Courthope Monroe, the British commercial secretary in Constantinople, visited Smyrna in order to see for himself the sorry state of affairs. He had been forewarned of the crisis facing the city, yet nothing prepared him for the reality of the situation. ‘The condition of the town itself beggars description,’ he wrote in his report to London, ‘and the inhabitants, both European and native, seem completely apathetic.’

He was shocked to discover that the Turkish municipality – which had remained open for business during the first months of Stergiadis’s governorship – had now ceased to function. Even the Ottoman Gas Company, which supplied all of the city’s lighting, had shut up shop. ‘After nightfall,’ wrote Monroe, ‘with the exception of one or two hotels and the larger shops, the town is in complete darkness.’

Street cleaning, public maintenance and the city’s sewage disposal had likewise stopped functioning. ‘The streets have large holes in them’ – the consequence of too many armoured vehicles rumbling through the city – ‘and where they have fallen in, [they] communicate with underground cesspools and the smell and filth is indescribable.’

This woeful situation was starting to have a profound psychological effect on all who lived in Smyrna. The Levantine and European merchants had always enjoyed hearty working lunches to the accompaniment of liberal quantities of wine and spirits, but now they seemed to do very little else with their days. ‘The English club fills at noon with the majority of the European businessmen,’ wrote Monroe, ‘who apparently do not leave it again until six o’clock, which fact alone proves the complete stagnation of business.’ It was a similar story in the city’s bars and brasseries. ‘[They] are filled with Greek officers, who appear to spend most of their day in drinking and discussing politics.’

In the summer of 1921, the Greek community at long last got the lift that it so sorely needed. King Constantine landed in Smyrna and was given a hero’s welcome. He was the first Christian king to tread on Anatolian soil since the time of the Crusades and the symbolism of his visit was not lost on the local Greeks. They poured onto the streets to hail a man whom they viewed as their saviour and conqueror.

A few people in Smyrna were surprised by the king’s blond hair and blue eyes, and passed comment on the fact that he did not look very Greek. The king – whose father was Danish – was infuriated by such remarks. ‘It is not true,’ he wrote in a letter to the princess of Saxe-Weimar. ‘I cannot bear the cold; I hate the fog; I am a Greek and was born in Greece.’

His tour of duty had been suggested by government ministers in the hope that it would raise morale in the army. The king himself saw his visit rather differently. To the alarm of many, he expressed his desire to lead the Greek army into battle just like the medieval kings of old. ‘A king and a prince should be soldiers,’ he wrote. ‘[And] in a country like mine, the king must really be the chief of his army.’ More worrying still was the fact that he had come to believe the myth that he – a Constantine – was predestined to reclaim the throne of a newly triumphant Byzantine empire.

After the initial euphoria that greeted the king’s arrival, the Greek generals in Smyrna settled down to discuss the grim business of war. They had been unnerved by their forced retreat from the Anatolian escarpment and were concerned that military self-confidence would take a further knock. In order to retain the initiative, they conceived a spectacular offensive that would drive the Greek army into the very heart of Anatolia.

By the first week of July, the soldiers were champing at the bit. The generals held a final meeting at the king’s temporary residence in Cordelio and agreed a course of action. The Greek army would begin its offensive within days, pushing eastwards out of the Smyrna-administered zone towards the towns of Kutahya and Eski Shehir. The king himself was full of enthusiasm. ‘The morale of the army, its spirit and its certainty of success are extremely high,’ he wrote. ‘God grant that we may not suffer disappointment! It will be a very hard struggle, which will cost us enormous sacrifices; but what a triumph if we win!’

When news of this offensive reached London, it was greeted with dismay. Cabinet ministers were overwhelmingly hostile and tried to impress their views on Lloyd George. Churchill was one of the most outspoken. ‘If the Greeks go off on another half-cock offensive,’ he told the prime minister, ‘[then] the last card will have been played and lost and we shall neither have a Turkish peace nor a Greek army.’ He proposed an immediate blockade of Smyrna harbour in order to prevent the Greeks delivering any more supplies to their troops.

Lloyd George was having none of it. He remained convinced that he had aligned his country with the winning side and believed that a victorious Greece would serve Britain well. ‘He is perfectly convinced he is right over this,’ wrote his lover-cum-secretary, Frances Stevenson, ‘and is willing to stake everything on it.’

The opening shots of the Greek offensive seemed to vindicate Lloyd George. The military swept everything from its path as it advanced out of the Smyrna-administered zone. Kemal’s soldiers fought valiantly but in vain. As the Turkish defences crumbled around the town of Kutahya, a flood of wounded nationalists were rushed to the hospital at nearby Karaja Bey. Halide Edib, who had come to the front line to witness events at close range, had no illusions as to the scale of the Turkish defeat. ‘From the stairs leading to the large landing there was literally a throng of stretchers, and crammed between them were men with bandaged heads and arms and supporting each other.’ She said that the horror of the scene was such that everyone worked in complete silence. ‘The doctors with blood-smeared aprons came in and out of the operating theatre, where lacerated masses of human flesh lay on the tables.’

When she visited Colonel Ismet, commander of the nationalist forces, she saw defeat written on his face. ‘[It] was haggard and his eyes feverish, and the lines about his mouth and eyes had multiplied,’ she wrote. ‘He had to face the incalculable result of the retreat which he himself had to order.’

The Greek army had swept all before it. In the third week of July, the first troops entered the town of Kutahya. Once all the principal buildings were safely in their hands, advance columns began moving out towards Eski Shehir. Quick to see the way the wind was blowing, the inhabitants of this town packed their bags and fled.

Their flight took place in a matter of hours, for the Greek army was now advancing at a cracking pace. Eski Shehir’s population escaped by train or horse and cart, carrying with them a few clothes and a little food. ‘Among the military transports were a large number of ox-carts laden with household goods,’ wrote Edib, ‘on which children sat looking at the movement in the street with frightened eyes. The women bending coaxed the oxen to make them go faster, and the whole human stream moved on and on.’

The garrison of nationalist troops also left in a hurry, abandoning weaponry and military hardware. Less than two days after the Greek army had captured Kutahya, it found itself in possession of Eski Shehir as well. The first part of the Greek offensive had ended in spectacular triumph.

Mustafa Kemal had no illusions as to the scale of the defeat. ‘His face . . . was discomposed and sullen,’ wrote Edib. ‘He looked as he did during the worst days of the civil war [and] the trouble on his face was even deeper.’ News of the nationalists’ woes was greeted with elation on the part of Lloyd George, who now felt vindicated in his decision to back the Greeks. In a letter to his Minister for War, he poured scorn on the War Office, which had repeatedly insisted that the Greeks would be defeated by the Turks. ‘The staff have displayed the most amazing slovenliness in this matter,’ he wrote. ‘Their information about the respective strength and quality of the two armies turned out to be hopelessly wrong.’