November 10, 2025

Today marks the 87th anniversary of Atatürk’s passing into eternity. It is a solemn occasion when the people of Türkiye reaffirm their deep gratitude to him and their commitment to his worldview.

What makes him so unique?

In 1876, the array of diplomatic problems arising from the decay and impending disintegration of the Ottoman Empire had become a major issue: the “Eastern question”. The powers principally concerned – other than the Turks themselves – were Russia, Austria, and Great Britain. In St. Petersburg, a strong pan-Slav party saw the Ottoman collapse as a glittering opportunity to realize a dream of four centuries: to restore the Cross to Hagia Sophia and seize control of the Straits. To Vienna, any retreat by the Sultan from his vast, ill-governed Balkan provinces was an automatic signal for Habsburg aggrandizement. As for London, it was a long-established British policy to prop up the Sultan and resist any move to break up the Ottoman Empire. At stake was Britain’s India lifeline, which ran through the Sultan’s domains. Especially the capital, Constantinople, must not be allowed to come under the influence of another great power.[i]

During the Ottoman Empire-Russia war of 1877-78, the Tsar’s army reached the suburbs of Istanbul. The Treaty of San Stefano, signed between the warring parties on March 3, 1878, brought Ottoman control over the Balkans to an end. The Ottoman Empire was forced to recognize the independence of Romania, Serbia, and Montenegro, as well as the creation of a huge principality of Bulgaria. Great Britain took the initiative, telling others that it would not submit to Russia’s dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire. At that point, German Chancellor Bismarck stepped in, and the Berlin Congress opened on June 13, 1878.

Exactly a month later, the conference completed its work, and a treaty was signed. The Russian advance on the Straits was rolled back as the new Bulgaria was drastically shrunk in size. Austria accepted payments for her support of Türkiye in the form of a protectorate over the provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Britain’s fee was for the cession of Cyprus.[ii]

In brief, the Ottomans avoided the worst, but paid a price.

On October 6, 1908, Austria annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Bulgaria declared independence.

On September 29, 1911, Italy invaded the Ottoman province of Libya. During the conflict, Italian forces also occupied the Dodecanese islands in the Aegean. The Sultan had no other alternative than to sign a peace treaty with Italy in Ouchy on October 25, 1912. Libya and the Dodecanese were left to Italy.

On October 8, 1912, Montenegro declared war against the Ottoman Empire, followed by Bulgaria and Serbia on October 17. And two days later, Greece joined them. When peace was signed in London on May 30, 1913, the Empire lost more territory.

After the invasion of Libya by Italy and the First Balkan War, the demise of the Empire was a foregone conclusion. Decades and decades of decadent rule, failure to grasp, let alone keep pace with, political, economic, cultural, and technological progress, had brought the once mighty empire to a point where its territories and even its capital were up for grabs. Major powers were making plans for their claims on Ottoman territories, and these were being taken up in intensive diplomatic talks among them.

The beginning of the First World War only added momentum to the process. Tsarist Russia saw the War as the greatest opportunity to get hold of İstanbul and the Turkish Straits.

The negotiations on the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire among the three Entente allies took some time. Britain and France knew they had to keep Russia in the war to avoid a German victory on the Western Front. Finally, Sir Mark Sykes and François Georges Picot, after negotiating potential British and French spheres of influence in the Middle East, arrived in Petrograd in March 1916 to finalize Ottoman partition terms with Sazonov inside the Russian Foreign Ministry. In addition to the areas she had already conquered, the notorious Sazonov-Sykes-Picot Agreement of May 1916 gave Russia İstanbul and the Straits in case the allies won the war, fulfilling the ambition of every emperor since Catherine the Great.[iii]

Nonetheless, the project failed.

Firstly, Allied defeat and withdrawal from Gallipoli in January 1916 proved that Türkiye was not going to be written off so easily. Secondly, the Bolshevik revolution ended the tsarist rule, made public all the imperialistic secret agreements concluded with Britain and France, and on March 3, 1918, in Brest-Litovsk, Russia’s new leaders signed a peace treaty with the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Empire, Bulgaria) ending its participation in the First World War.

Regardless, the victors of the war were determined to partition the Ottoman Empire and confine it to Central Anatolia. Thus, the war continued, and on August 10, 1920,  the Sultan signed the Treaty of Sèvres, which was designed to strangle the “Sick Man of Europe”.

The foregoing only shows the huge challenges Atatürk faced as he landed in the Black Sea city of Samsun on May 19, 1919, to launch Türkiye’s War of Independence. Against a multitude of incredible difficulties, he who had led Turkish troops to victory in Gallipoli also led the War of Independence to a successful conclusion. With the Treaty of Lausanne signed on July 24, 1923, the Treaty of  Sèvres went into the dustbin of history. On October 29, 1923, the Turkish Republic was declared. Then came his profound reforms in governance, education, and the economy that moved Türkiye forward and inspired many countries that were to become independent in the years that followed. Turkish women got the right to vote and to be elected in 1934, well before many European countries.

Atatürk lived only eighteen years after the Ottoman Empire became history at Sèvres. During those eighteen years, the world witnessed “Ataturk: The Rebirth of a Nation”, to use the title of Patrick Kinross’s book. Atatürk’s achievements prevented Türkiye from becoming history, and ensured our future, needless to add, so long as we remain on the right path. This is why the Anıtkabir (the Atatürk Mausoleum) is only a monument of our endless gratitude for what he has done for us. His resting place is the hearts and minds of the Turkish people, from where he still inspires us.

[i] Robert K. Massie, Dreadnought, Britain, Germany and the Coming of the Great War, (Vintage Books, 2007), 197.

[ii] Ibid., 200.

[iii] Sean McMeekin, The Russian Revolution, A New History, (Profile Books, 2017), 74.