WI: Greece rejects 1922 Armistice of Mudanya, occupies Constantinople

[Magnum]

Obligatory background reading:
http://hellenicresearchcenter.org/w...6/10/The-Fate-of-Greek-Majority-Psomiades.pdf

One the one hand the situation for Greece looked especially grim, and their French "allies" were deliberately sabotaging them on many levels. However, I can't help but wonder that the Greek leadership at the time basically lost it's nerve, and contrary to their initial desire to defend Eastern Thrace, acceded to the demands, all in exchange for "future diplomatic support" and help with caring for half a million refugees who had arrived in Greece

Let's say they don't.

A week later, the Greeks were expecting to be able to field 60k men in Eastern Thrace:

What needs to be considered is that the entire combat-capable navy available to Ataturk at the time consisted of two old gunboats in the Black Sea. Furthermore, any efforts to organize an opposed crossing would take time, possibly weeks. Lastly, and this is the critical bit, Greece had a sizeable navy more than capable of stopping any and all Turkish attempts to cross the Straits into Europe via rowboats.


So, POD is that Venizelos is never retained for his services and/or the new Greek Government becomes aware of just how much the French are out to screw them, and they resolve to reinforce Thrace and otherwise stall for time.

Mudanya happens, the Greeks refuse to sign as OTL, demand a conference where they too can participate, one thing leads to another and the Turks start firing on British positions, Lloyd George's government falls, Allied troops start withdrawing and Greek troops occupy Constantinople, the Gallipoli peninsula and the rest of Eastern Thrace - there are some tense stand-offs with local French troops, but at the end of the day the French public opinion is no more inclined to go to war with Greece than the British public opinion is to go to war with Turkey. Riots break out in Constantinople, which the Greek soldiers eventually contain. Ataturks' attempts to cross the Bosphorus and Dardanelles are foiled by the Greek Navy, and the Sea of Marmara becomes a low-key war zone.

What next?

Do we get "a new Balkan War" as the author I linked to above speculates? If so, between whom?

What becomes of Mustafa Kemal, now that he was won everything but the one thing that really mattered - the capital of Constantinople ?

 

[formion]

@Lascaris I call upon thee.

 

[Father Maryland]

Wasn't Greece pretty much completely broke by the point they gave up? Combined with the lack of anyone willing to give or lend them money that kind of makes continuing the war pretty difficult. Greece had a much more formidable navy then the Turks and a much better equipped army. The problem is that at the time I believe that Greece had minimal defense industries meaning that all the equipment and munitions needed had to be purchased abroad with hard currency.

It doesn't really matter that the Greek navy was so much larger and better if the sailors are mutinying because they haven't gotten paid.

 

[Magnum]

This isn't the Roman Empire, soldiers don't start murdering their superiors the second a monthly payment is deferred

The Greek Navy had proven to be incredibly professional, would probably be the last branch to have their pay cut and would have been extremely motivated to stay at their posts, knowing that there wasn't much risk of the Turks harming them personally (Turkey had essentially no navy, all of their ships save for two old gunboats were interred and out of action in Constantinople) , whereas the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians in Thrace depended on them.

As to the issue of munitions and equipment - as long as the Turkish rowboats are kept on the Asian side of the Bosphorus, there isn't going to be any fighting, hence no expenditure of ammo

 

[Father Maryland]

This isn't the Roman Empire, soldiers don't start murdering their superiors the second a monthly payment is deferred

The Greek Navy had proven to be incredibly professional, would probably be the last branch to have their pay cut and would have been extremely motivated to stay at their posts, knowing that there wasn't much risk of the Turks harming them personally (Turkey had essentially no navy, all of their ships save for two old gunboats were interred and out of action in Constantinople) , whereas the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians in Thrace depended on them.

As to the issue of munitions and equipment - as long as the Turkish rowboats are kept on the Asian side of the Bosphorus, there isn't going to be any fighting, hence no expenditure of ammo

I can't offer any detailed analysis of the Greek navy at this point in time but mutinies caused by a lack of or delay in payment are actually pretty common in many militaries even in the modern era.

I was also being more or less rhetorical in my example as a way of generally demonstrating the economic dangers involved. Even if the Greeks stick to the European shore they still have to maintain large ground forces and those ground forces are going to

A) Require payment, food, and other maintenance costs.
B) Take a sizable chunk of the civilian workforce out of commission causing economic problems the longer these forces are mobilized.

The only way I can really see this succeeding is if the Greeks get some sort of benefactor whose willing to subsidize their war effort in some way.

 

[CV(N)-6]

Greek Navy 1920ish
Pretty much two ex-USN pre-dreds(lots of heavy artillery), and armored cruiser(Averof), and some destroyers

 

[Magnum]

Greek Navy 1920ish
Pretty much two ex-USN pre-dreds(lots of heavy artillery), and armored cruiser(Averof), and some destroyers

And, in addition to the DDs, 23 other light ships.

More than enough to counter the zero ships the Turks could field in the Sea of Marmara

 

[Magnum]

As an aside, the Averoff can still be seen TODAY by anyone who visits Athens. A very impressive ship

 

[formion]

@Magnum , I finally found Lascaris' timeline from the old forum. It basically has the same POD that you describe

http://www.oocities.org/drammos/ww2.html

 

[Lascaris]

Obligatory background reading:
http://hellenicresearchcenter.org/w...6/10/The-Fate-of-Greek-Majority-Psomiades.pdf

One the one hand the situation for Greece looked especially grim, and their French "allies" were deliberately sabotaging them on many levels. However, I can't help but wonder that the Greek leadership at the time basically lost it's nerve, and contrary to their initial desire to defend Eastern Thrace, acceded to the demands, all in exchange for "future diplomatic support" and help with caring for half a million refugees who had arrived in Greece

Let's say they don't.


View attachment 496985
View attachment 496984

A week later, the Greeks were expecting to be able to field 60k men in Eastern Thrace:

View attachment 496986
View attachment 496987


What needs to be considered is that the entire combat-capable navy available to Ataturk at the time consisted of two old gunboats in the Black Sea. Furthermore, any efforts to organize an opposed crossing would take time, possibly weeks. Lastly, and this is the critical bit, Greece had a sizeable navy more than capable of stopping any and all Turkish attempts to cross the Straits into Europe via rowboats.


So, POD is that Venizelos is never retained for his services and/or the new Greek Government becomes aware of just how much the French are out to screw them, and they resolve to reinforce Thrace and otherwise stall for time.

Mudanya happens, the Greeks refuse to sign as OTL, demand a conference where they too can participate, one thing leads to another and the Turks start firing on British positions, Lloyd George's government falls, Allied troops start withdrawing and Greek troops occupy Constantinople, the Gallipoli peninsula and the rest of Eastern Thrace - there are some tense stand-offs with local French troops, but at the end of the day the French public opinion is no more inclined to go to war with Greece than the British public opinion is to go to war with Turkey. Riots break out in Constantinople, which the Greek soldiers eventually contain. Ataturks' attempts to cross the Bosphorus and Dardanelles are foiled by the Greek Navy, and the Sea of Marmara becomes a low-key war zone.

What next?

Do we get "a new Balkan War" as the author I linked to above speculates? If so, between whom?

What becomes of Mustafa Kemal, now that he was won everything but the one thing that really mattered - the capital of Constantinople ?

Back in the mists of time I had done a variant of this, with the Lausanne negotiations breaking down and the Greek army reoccupying East Thrace and Constantinople in April-May 1923, by April the Greek army had fully reorganised and was back to pre November 1920 levels of efficiency and the negotiations nearly did break down, to the extend of the attack being already underway when Turkey backed down.

At the time of Mudanya... the revolutionary government possibly did lose its nerve, but by the same token the army was in a mess and they knew it which explains it. Soo send Pangalos out to take over the army of Thrace right away. The man for all his faults did know his job, including reinstalling discipline in short order. So he's sent there right away, starts executing troublemakers etc just like OTL and by the time of Mudanya was the 60,000 men Plastiras was talking about are there (basically the Greek third corps that had retreated mostly intact, plus disciplined units from the remains of the southern group of divisions at this point with more being reorganised ) This gives both Athens enough confidence and Venizelos something to play with (OTL he was asking if he could have 4-5 effective divisions, here he has them) That and the navy are probably enough to hold on to Eastern Thrace.

Constantinople? Not as certain the allies just leave it up for grabs. So quite possibly after the Turkish army tries a d fails to cross over at Chanak and quite probably send troops through Constantinople with French and Italian complicity, which fail to break Catalca before the Greek navy cuts them off you do get an armistice with Constantinople still part of Turkey but the Greeks holding to Eastern Thrace. This will have interesting consequences down the road and probably means the Greek community and patriarchate are forced out in the peace treaty.

General balkan war? That is doubtful. Bulgaria was disarmed and if it moved Yugoslavia and Romania were going to jump it. Come to that the Greeks were negotiating with the Yugoslavs, over Yugoslavia sending a corps sized expeditionary force and heavy artillery to support them, but Yugoslavia asked for territorial concessions, specifically the town of Florina. I'd suggest this is actually part of the POD. Get Venizelos involved as he was pragmatic enough to agree in a heartbeat while at the same time he proposes that his protégé Pangalos is put in command in Thrace. This way you get both a much stronger army in Thrace and a clear message that Greece is not just on its own...

 

[Magnum]

Constantinople? Not as certain the allies just leave it up for grabs. So quite possibly after the Turkish army tries a d fails to cross over at Chanak and quite probably send troops through Constantinople with French and Italian complicity, which fail to break Catalca before the Greek navy cuts them off you do get an armistice with Constantinople still part of Turkey but the Greeks holding to Eastern Thrace. This will have interesting consequences down the road and probably means the Greek community and patriarchate are forced out in the peace treaty.

Said complicity would have to rise to the level of getting into a shooting war with the Greek navy whilst transporting the Turkish troops and supplies themselves.
It's pretty difficult to move such large numbers of men on a dime across such a body of water - looking the other way whilst twenty guys in a rowboat sneak into Constantinople at night is one thing; transporting tens of thousands of men and their equipment without the British or anyone else noticing is quite another.

In contrast, the Greeks had, according to one account I read, 8k men 1 days march away from Constantinople, at Catalca.

 

[Magnum]

Assuming the idea works and Greece secures Eastern Thrace and Constantinople, what effects are looking at?

- Retaliatory genocide against local Turks?
- Rioting and massive destruction in Constantinople?
- Can the Turkish leadership afford, politically, to make peace with Greece?
- Would this leave an opening for communism, now that islamism has been rejected and secular nationalism has proven inept, whilst the Soviets have been providing massive support?

 

[Whiteshore]

So, ITTL, I take it "Constantinople" refers to the European side of the city of the Bosphorus while "Istanbul" refers to the Asian side of the city?

 

[thekingsguard]

I mean, the straights do make for a fairly easily defined border...

 

[Lascaris]

Assuming the idea works and Greece secures Eastern Thrace and Constantinople, what effects are looking at?

- Retaliatory genocide against local Turks?
- Rioting and massive destruction in Constantinople?
- Can the Turkish leadership afford, politically, to make peace with Greece?
- Would this leave an opening for communism, now that islamism has been rejected and secular nationalism has proven inept, whilst the Soviets have been providing massive support?

Local Turks are almost assuredly included in the exchange of populations following the peace and it's most unlikely you are not going to have a peace, Turkey was almost constantly at war since 1911 and it's a bit difficult to insist on continuing a war when a sea separates you from the enemy and he has a navy and you don't...

 

[Lascaris]

Said complicity would have to rise to the level of getting into a shooting war with the Greek navy whilst transporting the Turkish troops and supplies themselves.
It's pretty difficult to move such large numbers of men on a dime across such a body of water - looking the other way whilst twenty guys in a rowboat sneak into Constantinople at night is one thing; transporting tens of thousands of men and their equipment without the British or anyone else noticing is quite another.

In contrast, the Greeks had, according to one account I read, 8k men 1 days march away from Constantinople, at Catalca.

Probably more, but I'll note that in July the French and Italians did deploy their armies in front of Constantinople to stop the Greek army from occupying it, with the British forced to follow along. I can hardly see them leaving Constantinople open to be occupied by the Greeks. Would that extend to stopping the RHN from showing up on the Bosporus with the Turkish army already crossing over to Constantinople? I don't think that is politically feasible in the long term. But still probably enough to hand over Constantinople to the Kemalists.

 

[Pauh the federalist]

Turkey stews in revanchism and succumbs to a nationalist government sometime over the next decade and joins the axis when they invade Greece in WW2. If the germans still lose, turkey might be divided further with Greece picking up more territories along the Aegean Sea in the west

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megali_Idea
an expanded allied or nuetral Kurdish state in the south which is expanded to the Mediterranean to function as a buffer state to separate post-war British Iraq and french Syria from the new soviet border

https://ianbachusa.wordpress.com/ma...rs-ethnic-make-up-of-towns-kurdish-clans-map/
an expanded Soviet border in the east that covers its claims and expands
Georgian and Arminian SSR's

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_territorial_claims_against_Turkey
and in the center a communist Turkish state. with borders similar to the ww1 treaty of severs (pick below), with post-war turkey consisting of much of the green and yellow parts (Italy and turkey) The soviets taking roughly the brown part (Arminian and Georgian claims), Kurds making use of mixed and majority populations to take the french and British Turkish ww1 claims for use as a buffer state. and Greece taking the area around the Aegean sea following more or less a restricted Megeli idia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Sèvres

 

[Magnum]

snip

Leaving aside the fact that ww2 is hardly guaranteed to go as we know it, or even happen at all with a 1922 POD, do you really expect there to be any Greeks left on the Aegean east coast ittl by '45 ?

 

[Lascaris]

Leaving aside the fact that ww2 is hardly guaranteed to go as we know it, or even happen at all with a 1922 POD, do you really expect there to be any Greeks left on the Aegean east coast ittl by '45 ?

Not a single one... but this did not stop the allies with the the eastern territories of Germany. By the same token though Germany did not lose territory to France, Belgium and Holland either all of which entertained such thoughts. So an Axis Turkey probably loses Sevres Armenia, Pontus included to the Soviets, an independent Kurdistan (because the first British act in such a war would be to drop SOE there) plus some Berlin style arrangement for Constantinople.

 

[pattersonautobody]

I prefer the King not getting bit by a monkey as a POD