Steer clear of Turkey

International Journal of Kurdish Studies, Jan, 2004 by Harry A. Franck

Be not led astray by the surface of things in the "new" Turkey. The present regime is eager to be considered progressive; it does not with to be blamed for the crimes of the former regime. But the leopard does not change his spots as easily as a Turk does his headgear. There has been much pro-Turk--or more exactly, pro-Kemal--propaganda since Turkey changed the form, and the form only, of her Government. Kemal and his entourage know enough of Western psychology to realize the appeal of the romantic to the world at large, and our papers have been flooded with reports of the completely Europeanized condition of the Turkey of today, of the striking character of her new sultan under the name of President. \But the Turk is still much what he was, and there is little evidence that Turkey has essentially changed under that ardent disciple of Venus and Bacchus, Mustapha Kemal Pasha. It is true that there are more and better schools, that more attention is being given to sanitation, that marriage and divorce laws are more on Western lines, that polygamy has been legally abolished, that Turkey has adopted the Swiss Civil Code and the Italian Criminal Code. But the arbitrary rule of a dictator, a wholly ruthless dictator, is still the real Government. The tourists who make up some ninety-five percent of American travelers in Turkey come back reporting that the veil has virtually disappeared. So it has--in Constantinople, the only place tourists see; also in Angora and among the women of the official class. But the great majority of feminine faces the country over are still covered; and the "new" Turkey is in a similar state, still largely what it was under the vicious and degenerate Sultans.

Never was there such a furor of hero worship as is now being poured out upon "the Gazi" (roughly translatable as "the conqueror"), as Mustapha Kemal is known among his people. Every Government office, every schoolroom in the country, even mission schools, must have a framed picture of Kemal in the place of onor. Bronze statues of Kemal are springing up all over the country. The same amount expended on schools or roads would bring a great improvement in Turkey. When "the Gazi" came to spend his summer in one of the former Sultan's palaces on the Bosphorus, Constantinople and the towns along the way from Angora spent enough in decorations and other evidences of high regard for him to have completely built the new capital. The electric light company of Constantinople expects fifty percent increase in this year's business because of the few days of special illumination in his honor. Yet these statues and the like are by no means all good-will offerings. The Kemal custom of summary trials and sudden hangings in the cold gray dawn for all those of whatever class who open their mouths against him has given the surface appearance of a happy and contented Turkey under an adored ruler. But the patient traveler who will take time to win a little confidence will hear anything but contentment from the anti-Kemalists, who dare not raise their voices in public.