Crescent and Iron Cross

In the year 1908 a military group in Constantinople, styling itself the 'Young Turk' party, seizedand deposed Abdul Hamid, and shut him up at Salonika, there to spend the remainder of hisinfamous days. They put forth a Liberal programme of reformation, one that earned them at themoment the sympathy of civilised Europe (including Germany), and the Balance of Power verymistakenly and prematurely heaved a sigh of relief. For upwards of a century it had maintained inConstantinople the corrupt and bloody autocracy of the Sultans, fearing the European quarrels thatwould attend the dismemberment of that charnel-house of decay known as the Ottoman Empire, and now (just for the moment) it seemed as if a sudden rally had come to the Sick Man, and heshowed signs of returning animation and wholesome vitality. The policy of the Powers, after acentury of failure, looked as if it was justifying itself, and they were full of congratulations towardsTurkey and each other. But never, in the whole century of their pusillanimous cacklings, had theymade a greater mistake. Whether the Young Turks ever meant well or not, whether there was or was not a grain ofsincerity in this profession of their policy, is a disputed question. There are those who say thatoriginally they were prompted by patriotic and high-minded aims, when they proclaimed their objectof 'Organisation, ' and of reform. But all are agreed that it matters very little what their original aimswere, so speedily did their Liberal intentions narrow down to an Ottomanisation such as AdbulHamid had aimed at, but had been unable to accomplish before his evil sceptre ceased to sway thedestinies of his kingdom. In any case this programme earned its authors the sympathy of Europe, and probably this, and no more than this, prompted it. They wished to establish themselves, unquestioned and undisturbed, and did so; and I do not think we shall be far wrong if we take theoriginal Young Turk programme about as seriously as we took the parody of a Parliament withwhich Abdul Hamid opened (as with a blessing) his atrocious reign. The very next year (1909) theypermitted (if they did not arrange) the Armenian massacres at Adana, and the Balance of Powerbegan faintly to wonder whether the Young Turks in their deposition of Abdul Hamid had not slainan asp and hatched a cockatrice. Given that their aims originally were sincere, we can but marvel atthe swiftness of the corruption which in little more than a year had begun to lead them not intopaths of reform and Liberal policy, but along the road towards which the butcher they had deposedhad pointed the way. It must have made Abdul Hamid gnaw his nails and shake impotent hands tosee those who had torn him from his throne so soon pursuing the very policy which he invented, and to which he nominally owed his dethronement. Strange, too, was it that his overthrow shouldcome from the very quarter to which he looked for security, for it was on the army that each Sultanin turn had most relied for the stability of his th