Atatürk, Founder of the Turkish Republic | Early History of Modern Turkey | Biography Documentary
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This documentary is a filmed biography of
Mustafa Kemal Atatürk (1881-1938), an Ottoman-Turkish army officer who later became the first
President of Turkey. The film shows his efforts to establish and modernize the
Turkish Republic.
He is credited with being the founder of the
Republic of Turkey. His surname,
Atatürk (meaning "
Father of the
Turks"), was granted to him in 1934 by the
Turkish parliament.
Historical background and Atatürk’s career:
Atatürk was born around 1881 in the city of Salonica (now
Thessaloniki, Greece), which at that time was part of the
Ottoman Empire. His family was middle-class, and Turkish-speaking. Though he claimed to be descended from
Turkish nomads, he had blue eyes and fair hair, therefore some historians believe he was at least partly of
Balkan ancestry.
During
World War I (1914-1918), the Ottoman Empire allied itself with
Germany and Austria-Hungary. By this time, the aging empire had lost almost all of its territory in
Europe and
Africa. Moreover, the so-called
Young Turk Revolution of 1908 had stripped autocratic powers from the sultan and ushered in an era of parliamentary government. In
1915 Mustafa Kemal distinguished himself throughout the nearly yearlong
Gallipoli Peninsula campaign, in which he helped stop a large force of
British and
French troops from taking
Istanbul. He was soon promoted from colonel to brigadier-general.
Under the punitive
peace treaty of
Sèvres signed in
August 1920, the
Allied powers stripped all
Arab provinces from the Ottoman Empire, provided for an independent
Armenia, put the
Greeks in charge of a region surrounding
Smyrna (now
Izmir) and asserted economic control over what little country remained. However, Mustafa Kemal had already organized an independence - national movement based in
Ankara, the goal of which was to end foreign occupation of the Turkish-speaking areas and to stop them from being partitioned.
In
1921, with Mustafa Kemal at the head of the army, turkish troops forced the
French and
Italians to withdraw from the south. Then the Turks stopped the
Greek advance near
Sakarya, and sent them into a full-scale retreat all the way back to Smyrna on the
Mediterranean Sea.
After these victories, Mustafa Kemal was ready to march against Istanbul, which was being occupied by the British and other Allied powers. Therefore, the British agreed to negotiate a new peace treaty and sent invitations to both the sultan’s government in Istanbul and Mustafa Kemal’s government in Ankara. But before the peace conference could begin, the
Grand National Assembly in Ankara passed a resolution declaring that the sultan’s rule had already ended. The last
Ottoman sultan fled his palace. A new peace treaty, the
Treaty of Lausanne, was then signed in July 1923 that recognized an independent Turkish state. That October, the Grand National Assembly proclaimed the Republic of Turkey and elected Mustafa Kemal as its first president.
As a president, Atatürk launched a programme of revolutionary social and political reform to modernise
Turkey (Turkish: Atatürk Devrimleri). These reforms included the emancipation of women, secularization and the introduction of
Western legal codes, dress, calendar and alphabet, replacing the
Arabic script with a
Latin one. Under his leadership, thousands of new schools were built, primary education was made free and compulsory. The principles of
Atatürk's reforms, upon which modern
Turkey was established, are referred to as Kemalism Atatürkism (Turkish: Kemalizm, Atatürkçülük, Atatürkçü düşünce).
Abroad Atatürk pursued a policy of neutrality, establishing friendly relations with Turkey's neighbors.
On
November 10,
1938, Atatürk, who never had any children, died in his bedroom at the
Dolmabahce Palace in Istanbul. He was replaced by
İsmet İnönü, prime minister during most of Atatürk’s rule, who continued his policies of secularization and westernization.
Atatürk,
Founder of the Turkish Republic |
Early History of Modern Turkey |
Biography Documentary