Page 556 - Mastermind: The Truth of the British Deep State Revealed

Turkey fought 10 years to be able to reach the road to Lausanne. From

the Balkan Wars that started in 1912 until the end of the Turkish Indepen-
dence War in 1922, 5 million people lost their lives. Compared to other coun-

tries that fought in WWI, this represented the biggest casualty. The Turkish
nation emerged battered, tired and impoverished from this horrible war and

it lacked a state. However, despite all the setbacks, the Turkish people never
gave up and made a comeback with a new state through the Treaty of Lau-

sanne. This treaty is the sole peace treaty that is still in effect since WWI. All
other treaties signed in the post-war era were revoked by WWII. In other

words, Turkey is the only country that has spent the last 93 years without a
war.

The Conference of Lausanne was an arduous, tense and strenuous ne-
gotiation process that saw hard bargaining. The negotiations started on No-
vember 20, 1922 but only on July 24, 1923 were the parties able to reach an

agreement and sign the treaty. Furthermore, matters like Mosul, the Straits

and Hatay could not be solved and were postponed to a later date. From time
to time, talks hit a dead end and were halted or suspended. However, the new
Turkish state was resolute on the National Pact (Misak-ı Milli) and would not

budge on its stance on the Straits or the capitulations. Therefore, when the

negotiations came to an end, the National Pact borders were preserved to a
large extent despite minor surrender of some lands.

Britain, which proved to be the main source of difficulty for the new

Turkish state during the negotiation process, due to its deceitful policies and
ruses - even intercepting telegrams of the Turkish delegation - intensely em-

ployed deep state policies during the Lausanne negotiations and did its best
to try and ambush the Turkish side.

Britain before the Lausanne negotiations

It will be helpful to understand the British approach to Turkey before the
Lausanne negotiations, and how it shaped its relevant strategies under the in-

fluence of the deep state. This point is important because this section of the
book will focus mainly on the British deep state ruses against Turkey during

the negotiations. To do that, one should first understand how the then British
leaders viewed Turks and young Turkey.

Mastermind: The Truth of the British Deep State Revealed