October 1918 to March 1919 – The Paris Conference (III) – Constantinople and the Straits - The League of Nations
“...the city of Constantinople, the western bank of the Bosphorus, of the Sea of Marmara and of the Dardanelles, as well as southern Thrace to the Enez-Midye line... and... that part of the Asiatic shore that lies between the Bosphorus, the Sakarya River and a point to be determined on the Gulf of Izmit, and the islands of the Sea of Marmara, the Imbros Islands and the Tenedos Islands.”
Constantinople Agreement of 1915.
The most problematic question regarding Turkey was of course the fate of Constantinople and the Straits. Russia wanted what has been promised, ie. the full implementation of the agreement of 1915, all the way from Constantinople to Gallipoli to Imbros and Tenedos to the Asiatic shore.
But in 1917, Britain and France had also promised the Greeks that they would get a sizeable part of Eastern Thrace and the Straits. Venizelos arrived to the Paris Conference determined to get as much as he could, both in Thrace and Asia minor. If Russia was to receive Constantinople, then Greece would demand Imbros and Tenedos, as well as Gallipoli and most of Eastern Thrace.
Wilson, who did not consider himself bound to the Constantinople Agreement of 1915, pleaded for the Straits to be fully demilitarized, and Constantinople to become a “free city” overseen by a Quadrilateral Commission made of France, Britain, Russia and Greece. Furthermore, he held firm that “the Turkish portion of the Ottoman empire should be assured a secure sovereignty”, which severely impaired French efforts to redirect Greece’s claims (and to a lesser extent Italy’s) to extended annexations in Asia Minor.
A pragmatic man, Kudashev was willing to accept Wilson’s proposal regarding Constantinople in exchange for extensive occupation rights in the Dardanelles and the Bosphorus, which would, in effect, make the Straits a Russian lake. He also wanted to limit Greek gains in Thrace as much as possible and let the Sultan keep most of Eastern Thrace and the Eastern shores of Marmara: Kudashev reckoned that a weakened Ottoman State spread between Europe and Asia would be entirely dependent on Russian goodwill. This was better, in any case, that to see Gallipoli and Constantinople become enclaves within a great Greek kingdom.
But Prime Minister Trepov, who reasoned mainly in terms of internal politics, was not ready to let go of Constantinople. He could not face the thought of coming back to his Emperor without Tsargrad in his bag (“Sazonov and his friends would eat us alive!”). Obsessed by the thought of coming back to Petrograd and “offer Tsagrard at the feet of His Majesty”, he was willing to let Greece and Britain have their ways in the Dardanelles. Thus, the Russian party became divided at the worst possible moment.
The negotiations became fraught with tension: the Greek delegation, who frantically lobbied the British and the American, spared no effort to stall the discussions. The mood of French public opinion was also evolving. French diplomats, afraid of antagonizing Russia, were still committed to the Constantinople Agreement of 1915, but in the press, the idea of letting Russia annex Constantinople was less and less popular: it was partly due to the influence of the Turcophile lobby, which had always been an active group of influence in French culture and politics. The war, and then news of the massacres enacted by the Turks in Armenia and Assyria had for a time silenced the outspoken Turcophiles, but with the end of the war they had resumed their action. As the writer and outspoken Mishellene Pierre Loti
[1] wrote in Le Matin: “Are we really to grant the jewel of the Bosphore to the degenerate Greek mongrels or the fanatic barbarians of the North? This would be a spat on four centuries of French-Turkish friendship”. Their lobbying didn’t really alter France’s commitment to the Constantinople Agreement, but it somewhat weakened the French diplomats’ resolve in the discussions.
In many ways, the negotiations on the Straits stalled not much because the entanglement of so many claims, but because the Russian handling of Western Poland had opened a rift between Russia and her Western Allies. Sure, no one was willing to go to war to prevent Russia from having its way, but British, American and Italian diplomats were decided to make common cause in order to thwart Russia's ambitions as much as possible. The French, having to compose with an increasingly anti-Russian press, exhausted themselves trying to mediate between the two factions.
Tensions were only heightened by the situation on the ground: Russian ships moored in the Golden Horn, Russian troops in Pera and Galata, British in Scutari and Kadikoy, Greek troops in Imbros, Tenedos, and soon in Gallipoli, encouraged by the British who wanted to put Russia before a “fait accompli”, not unlike Russia had done in Western Poland. When the Russians learned of the Greek landing in the Dardanelles, they became incensed: plans were made to prepare a military operation that would seize "a number of points on the European and Asiatic shores". Increasingly, people like Trepov or Stavka Chief-of-Staff Gurko persuaded themselves that only a show of strength would allow Russia to obtain what was her's.
But, as the Russian negotiators battled it out, disquieting news started to arrive from Russia, which required Trepov to prepare his return post-haste. This led him to quickly mollify his position so as to reach an agreement as soon as possible. Finally, after long negotiations late into the nights of March, the Allies managed to reach a solution: Russia would receive Constantinople and its defensive hinterland in full property, provided that real autonomy be granted to the citizens of Constantinople (“yes, yes, of course” nodded Trepov). In return, adding to her gains in Asia Minor, Greece would receive not only Imbros and Tenedos, but also Gallipoli and all of Eastern Thracia, from where the Sultan was to be expelled. Thus, the Ottoman Court would relocate to Bursa, the antique capital of the sons of Osman, from whence they had in illo tempore spread their wings to conquer half the world up to the gates of Vienna. Sic transit gloria mundi.
Italy, who didn’t look with unmitigated joy on Greece’s gains, was given a larger “sphere of influence” that originally envisioned, extended eastwards to the detriment of French Cilicia (the French were willing to make the necessary sacrifices in their eagerness to put these tense negotiations behind them). The nature of the Italian “sphere of influence” in Southern Anatolia was left deliberately vague. In private talks, Kudashev assured Sonnino that Russia would not object if Italy were to turn this zone into a full-fledged colonial possession.
Thus was resolved the last, and most sticking issue of the Peace Conference. The last month of the Conference (March 1919) was spent in working out the details of President Wilson’s grand scheme of a “
League of Nations” that would maintain world peace forever or something like that. Nicholas II, who before the war had thrown his weight behind the Hague Conventions on disarmament, was all too eager to get on board. Despite the Peace Conference ending with soothing unanimity and grand declarations in favour of world peace, the tensions on Poland and the Straits had left their mark: many British, French and Italian diplomats returned home to face a critical public opinion, persuaded that Russia and her Serbian ally had been granted way too much leeway during the negotiations.
