File No. 10044/179.
Ambassador Leishman to the Secretary of State.
Constantinople, April 15, 1909.
Sir: With further reference to my several telegraphic dispatches, I have the honor to bring to your notice a further account of recent political events at Constantinople.
As the department is aware, the revolution of last July and the new constitutional régime had been brought about by the so-called committee of union and progress, whose headquarters are at Salonica. The success of the revolution was so sudden and encountered so little resistance that the transition from the old order to the new was effected almost without bloodshed, even the partisans of the old régime curbing before the storm and expressing outward sympathy with a constitutional movement they were powerless to resist. The revolutionaries of one day became the Government party of the next, and the whole of Turkey appeared to have entered into a new era of liberty and progress.
At the same time the committee realized that their own strength, as well as the salvation of Turkey, lay in the army, and with that idea in view they labored to increase the efficiency of the military forces and to place the command of the troops under officers devoted to the new order.
The personal troops of the Sultan, composed in large part of Albanians and Arabs, had hitherto enjoyed a privileged position, but now their former prerogatives were abolished and little by little their officers were changed for new ones devoted to the committee. Several of the Palace battalions were dispatched to the distant provinces, and in their place the famous regiment of sharpshooters of Monastir, who had begun the revolution, were sent to the capital as the instruments of the committee. Two mutinies occurred on the part of the old soldiers, but these were promptly and efficaciously suppressed. Hardly a week ago the last of the Albanian troops, after having been disarmed, were sent away, and it was generally supposed that the old Pretorian Guard was a thing of the past, and that with [Page 564] it has gone the last vestige of the Sultan’s power. The hold of the committee which controlled Government, Parliament, and army appeared more absolute than ever.
The first era of universal good will and general fraternity among all the races and creeds of the Empire was succeeded by the rise of a new so-called liberal party in Parliament, which stood for decentralization and local autonomy as opposed to the centralizing and nationalist tendencies of the committee.
The constitutional victory of last summer had been sudden and universal. It had not been achieved step by step in the face of long contested opposition, but had been won, so to speak, overnight. The power of the Sultan had been shattered, and he had wisely bent before the storm and assumed the new part of a constitutional monarch. The “Softas,” or theological students, began to take alarm at the extension given to western ideas, which they regarded as hostile to the Mohammedan faith, and, although the Sheik-ul-Islam declared the constitution entirely compatible with Koranic law, the Masonic affiliations and free-thinking tendencies of many of the leaders of the committee in parliament and their disregard of religious observances were too well known among the fanatical element not to excite distrust. A short time ago a great meeting of the “Softas” occurred at Stamboul, where a political program tending to enforce the “Cheri” or sacred law was proclaimed. With this party who were the Liberals allied themselves to overthrow the party of union and progress. The midnight murder on the Galata Bridge of a journalist who made himself notorious by his attacks on the committee, became a burning question. It was taken up by the Liberals as a political assassination, though probably without foundation, and the failure of the police to discover the assassin made an enormous impression and lent color in the minds of the people that the crime had been perpetrated by order of the committee. On Monday last, at midnight, in several of the barracks the soldiers, led by their sergeants, bound and in many cases killed their officers and marched to take possession of the square in front of parliament, where they demanded the enforcement of the Cheri law, the retirement of the existing Government, the reinstatement of the dismissed officers, and a general amnesty. They were commanded by a sergeant and in their ranks were numerous “Softas,” who appeared to control their action.
Mahoud Moukhtar Pasha, the commandant of the First Army Corps, and an officer of energy and ability, hastily gathered four loyal battalions with some cavalry and artillery at the ministry of war, where he held them in readiness, awaiting the orders of the cabinet to charge the mutineers. The grand vizier had called an extraordinary cabinet meeting to deliberate, but they decided to temporize, and then handed in their resignations. When the victory of the mutineers became apparent, they were joined by all the soldiers in the capital, and, in view of the anarchy that reigned, the only surprising feature is that there were no more excesses.
In the late afternoon a new cabinet was formed under the former minister of foreign affairs, Tewfik Pasha, as grand vizier, a very respectable and worthy dignitary of the old régime. The city was, and still is, in the hands of the troops who have savagely pursued their former officers suspected of committee affiliations. On Tuesday they killed, amid circumstances of the utmost brutality, the [Page 565] minister of justice and also a prominent Syrian deputy, in each instance mistaking the unfortunate victims for others whom they wished to murder. And since then there has been a reign of terror and a succession of murders going on. All Tuesday night and Wednesday pandemonium was let loose, the headquarters of the committee and the offices of their papers were sacked and the streets were filled with soldiers, many of whom were drunk, firing off their rifles in the air; numerous accidents of course occurred. But the hounding and murder by the soldiery of their former officers is the most serious feature of the present crisis. The forces of anarchy are unchecked, and murders have even taken place in the open street. The official proclamations thus far made all announce the continuance of Parliament and constitutional forms, but with the late president and vice president of the chamber and many prominent deputies in flight to escape assassination, it is hardly doubtful if any Parliament would dare to manifest the slightest independence. The best indication of the chamber’s frame of mind can be seen in its proclamation of yesterday praising the soldiers for their “constitutional” action and reinstating the retired officers as desired by the mutineers.
The excitement of the capital is of course likely to spread to the Provinces, where of late there has been considerable effervescence and unrest. The situation is indeed one out of which anything may develop. The guards around the other embassies have of late been increased in the contingency of an antiforeign outbreak.
I have, etc.,