Independent Republic of Pontus?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_Pontus

The Republic of Pontus was a proposed Pontian Greek state in the north-eastern part of modern Turkey from 1917 to 1922.[1] The Republic of Pontus was never officially proclaimed, but a central government of an embryonic state existed, though not occupying all the claimed areas.[2] The Pontian Greeks rebelled against the Ottoman Empire during the First World War, under the leadership of Chrysanthus, Metropolitan of Trebizond. In 1917 Greece and the Entente powers considered the creation of a Hellenic autonomous state in Pontus, most likely as part of a Ponto-Armenian Federation.[3] In 1919 on the fringes of the Paris Peace Conference Chrysanthos proposed the establishment of a fully independent Republic of Pontus, but neither Greece nor the other delegations supported it.

(more after in the link)

I don't know anything about the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. Could this have happened with a worse Ottoman defeat? Is this going to lead to a flamewar?
 
trust nothing on wiki about Turkey between the years 1895-1925

that being said, maybe the West wants to Knee cap the Turk, or Atatürk falls down the stairs and the Nationalists fall apart

the West wanted a strong Turkey to keep the new USSR out of Mediterranean
 

yourworstnightmare

Banned
Donor
Don't trust Wiki. However the fact that not even the Greeks took a Pontic state serious is true. Too few Pontic Greeks to pull it of.
 

Thande

Donor
This reminds me of yesterday, I was researching some stuff for LTTW in the Caucasus, and I normally use Wikipedia as the initial basis for my research before going off to hunt books to look at particular topics in more detail. Anyway I got to where I was wondering what the distribution of Armenians in modern north-eastern Turkey was in 1800 and actually tried to look it up on Wikipedia before remembering what site I was on and face-palming :rolleyes:

And yes, from everything I've seen, this was a total fantasy even by Greater Greece standards.
 
Had the Russians not collapsed it would have been a popssibility in an Entente victory scenario

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 

yourworstnightmare

Banned
Donor
Why would Pontus be possible, when there weren't enough Pontic Greeks around to create an own state. If Greeks will be a minority in the new republic, there would not be any point with it. Greece never thought a Pontic Republic is possible, and that's something, since they though the Megali idea was.
 
What if Trebizond received a population boost from, I dunno, Ukrainian refugees?
Well, why would the refugees leave a war torn, poverty stricken region for another? Plus they wouldn't be Greek, they would be Slavs. The Crimean Greeks were not that numerous to begin with and they would go to Greece most likely.
 
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4e/Proportions_des_populations_en_Asie_Mineure_statistique_officielle_d1914.png

Any Pontic Greek state would have clear Turkish majorities in their own land. Chalk it up as ASB, unless they go for the ethnic cleansing route.
 
Its not ASB (far too over-used a term) because a victorious Russian Empire would want to fracture the remnant Ottoman state as much as possible, and posing as liberators in creating a puppet Pontus would be a good route for this

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
Population exchange - or ethnic cleansing - could make it a reality, but for this you need a total Turkey-screw, and I mean total. Perhaps a success at Gallipoli prevents the Russian revolution and the Russians crush the Ottomans (unlikely at best). With Anatolia occupied Mustafa Kemal is in no position to found the Turkish Republic (or he dies in the fighting) and Greeks, Armenian and so on dismantle Turkey.

Of course, the World would be unrecognizable - no Soviet Union to begin with
 
To have a state there, you need enough guns to keep everyone in line. For those guns, you'd need a Russia strong enough to effectively annex the territory, and insane enough to withstand the guerrilla warfare for pretty much zero benefit.

That's not terribly likely, given how many internal problems Russia would have to "get over", and the immediate opposition of other powers to Russian moves in the area. But given how "heavy-handed" responses are often a favorite for dealing with troublesome populations, you might actually end up with a state that has a Christian majority within a few decades, which might neatly coincide with whenever Russia might decide that it's too much trouble to keep its armies there.

But an independent state in the 20's would not be viable. Unless of course you go for a Pontus state that isn't Greek. Which I suppose might be possible if the rest of Turkey is shafted enough that the locals don't fancy the idea of getting back into it. Extensive Civil War possibly.
 
I read the idea from Tripartite Alliance Earth. The Ottomans experience a somewhat worse WWI.

The horror of the Allies upon the discovery of the killing fields of the Armenian genocide kept the League of Nations from showing the Ottomans even the attenuated mercy meted out towards Germany. The Treaty of Sèvres, reluctantly signed in 1919 by Sultan Mehmed VI, was particularly harsh. Under its terms, Turkey was forced to:

  • pay large reparations to independent Armenia in compensation for the genocide;
  • recognize the independence of Syria, Kurdistan, Iraq, and Trebizond;
  • recognize the French protectorate over Lebanon and the British protectorate over Palestine;
  • cede the western provinces of Thrace and Ionia to Greece, and the eastern provinces of Kars and Ardahan to Armenia;
  • allow Franco-British economic interests unhindered access to Turkish markets;
  • and, gallingly, cede the entire imperial capital of Constantinople to the League of Nations as a Free City.

Moreover, following the transfer of the once-Turkish territories to Greece and Armenia, their Muslim populations -- more than two million people -- were promptly expelled to the Turkish state, now including only most of Anatolia. The signing of the Treaty of Sèvres might the Sultan discredited whatever legitimacy remained to the Ottoman Turkish state, now with its capital in Izmit.
 
So in this ATL there was an Armenian genocide unlike OTL, plus the total Turkish population to be murdered or ethnically cleansed in the areas ceded was somehow several million lower than OTL?
 
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