e 'deportation' schemes which,
in 1915, proved so successful with the Armenians, and the effect of it
was that neither Greeks nor Bulgarians were left in Thrace. Then
followed the expulsion of Greeks from the Mediterranean sea-board, but
this was never completely carried out because the European war
intervened, and the attention of the Nationalists was claimed by their
over-lord. Later, as we shall see, a further deportation of Greeks was
begun, but again that was stopped, for Germany saw that it would never
do to have her Turkish allies murdering settlers of the same blood as
those she hoped would become her allies. Of course, when it was only a
question of Armenians she did not interfere.
The design, then, of the new 'Liberal' regime, of which those three
measures, the massacres at Adana, the expulsion of Greeks and Bulgarians
from Thrace, and of Greeks from the sea-board of the Mediterranean, were
early instances, was to restore the absolute supremacy of the Turks in
the Ottoman Empire. It was obvious that the problem was one of
considerable difficulty, since the Turks at the time composed only some
forty per cent, of the whole population. They numbered about 8,000,000,
while in the Empire were included about 7,000,000 Arabs, 2,000,000
Greeks, 2,000,000 Armenians, and 3,000,000 more of smaller
nationalities, such as Kurds, Druses, and Jews. But the Turks were
backed by Germany, and nowadays, since the abolition of the
Capitulations, which leaves all alien races unprotected by foreign
Powers, such as survive, after the extermination of the Armenians, are
completely at the mercy of the Government in Constantinople. All these
peoples speak a different language from the Turks, and have a different
religion, for the Nationalist party, with a view to the Ottomanisation
of the Arabs, have definitely stated that Arab Moslems are not of the
true faith, and that their own Allah (in whose name they subsequently
exterminated the Armenians) is the God of Love--German equivalent
Got--whereas the Arab Allah is the God of vengeance. The sinister motive
in this discovery needs no comment, for it is obvious that it releases
the Ottoman Government from the prohibition in the Koran, whereby Moslem
may not fight against Moslem. Therefore the Arabs were declared not to
be true Moslems. Later on, that motive was translated into practical
measures.
Among the first tasks with regard to the Arabs that faced the
Nationalist party from what
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