Trevor Hill

1/22/15

Atatürk, Assumption at Zero

    In middle school, I developed an interest in affairs in the Middle East because they occupied so much time on the news. Because I’m a very history-oriented person, I wanted to know which events caused the turmoil we witness there today. Rather than get a definitive answer to my question (there really isn’t just one answer), I stumbled across something that I found much more interesting. I discovered that almost the entire Middle East was once united under a single entity, which, compared to today, actually kept order and peace and made it a stable region. This entity was called the Ottoman Empire.

Ever since my first Google search of ¨Ottoman Empire¨ in middle school, I’ve been in love with its culture, history, and government. I found stoic pictures of their leaders, the sultans, who were artistic, wise, and well-rounded. I found paintings of men and women in lavish clothing and turbans and fezzes. I became absolutely infatuated with the way that the Ottomans practiced elegance, pageantry, and sense in all things.

The sultans were the real objects of my affection. The sultans, as both governmental and religious leaders, had absolute power over everything. They were always exemplary people, and as such their decisions were usually well thought out and sensible. I have great appreciation for monarchs who did their job properly; there’s just something so wonderful about someone being all-powerful and actually using that power for good. Unfortunately, the sultanate was abolished in 1922 by Atatürk, the first elected leader of Turkey.

I can’t help but wonder, if it weren’t for the allies breaking apart the empire after World War I, would large scale conflict still exist in the Middle East? Would the Turks have been better off under the sultanate, or was Atatürk’s secular republic their best option? I, personally, have always seen something glamorous in monarchies (especially ones led by legitimate and intelligent sovereigns like the sultans), and although the freedom that citizens of a republic are allowed to enjoy is important, there’s something to be said for a monarchy that can keep peace versus a republic that can’t.

However, the Turkish people idolize Atatürk (which means “father of the Turks”) and don’t have nearly the same love for the sultans who ruled before him. Obviously, their opinion is more credible than mine. Could that mean that things really were better off under Atatürk than the sultans? I’ve decided that I want to research Atatürk, the last sultans, and the fracturing of the empire in order to develop an educated opinion on whether the Ottoman Empire’s existence was justified because it kept peace, or not justified because the peace it maintained was over a populace that couldn’t experience real freedom. Essentially, to better my understanding of Middle Eastern history, I want to know which was better, the Republic of Turkey or the Ottoman Empire?