ultitude was more impressive than boisterous protests.
Their eyes glowed with sullen hatred. Scattered through this throng of
mute, prostrated, hopeless people circulated watchful and sinuous
emissaries, who were to carry word of this misfortune to the remotest
confines of Islam. In a few hours they would be in Anatolia. A couple of
days later the news would have spread to Konia, Angora, and Sivas. In a
brief space of time it would be heralded throughout the regions of
Bolshevist influence, extending to the Caucasus and beyond. In a few
weeks all these centres of agitation will be preparing their
counter-attack. Asia and Africa will again cement their union of faith.
Intelligent agents will record in the retentive minds of people who do
not read, the history of our blunders. These missionaries of
insurrection and fanaticism come from every race and class of society.
Educated and refined men disguise themselves as beggars and outcasts, in
order to spread the news apace and to prepare for bitter
vengeance."[187]

Events in Turkey now proceeded precisely as the Italian Premier Nitti
had foretold. The Allied masters of Constantinople compelled the Sultan
to appoint a "friendly" cabinet which solemnly denounced Mustapha Kemal
and his "rebels," and sent a hand-picked delegation to Sevres, France,
where they dutifully "signed on the dotted line" the treaty that the
Allies had prepared. The Allies had thus "imposed their will"--on paper.
For every sensible man knew that the whole business was a roaring farce;
knew that the "friendly" government, from Sultan to meanest clerk, was
as nationalist as Mustapha Kemal himself; knew that the real Turkish
capital was not Constantinople but Angora, and that the Allies' power
was measured by the range of their guns. As for Mustapha Kemal, his
comment on the Sevres Treaty was: "I will fight to the end of the
world."

The Allies were thus in a decidedly embarrassing situation, especially
since "The Allies" now meant only England and France. Italy was out of
the game. As Nitti had warned at San Remo, she would "not send a single
soldier nor pay a single lira." With 200,000 soldiers holding down the
Arabs, and plenty of trouble elsewhere, neither France nor Britain had
the troops to crush Mustapha Kemal--a job which the French staff
estimated would take 300,000 men. One weapon, however, they still
possessed--Greece. In return for large territorial concessions, Premier
Venizelos offered to b