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Remembered Today:

Ill-treatment of British and Anzac POWs Turkey


Davidwhitman

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In an article in the Sydney Morning Herald on 16 November 2010, the Turkish Ambassador to Australia Oguz Ozge stated the following: "... a number of persons have very recently started alleging that Anzac prisoners of war were subjected to ill-treatment in camps around Gallipoli. We should not let those ill-founded arguments damage the long relationship that has been forged between Australia and Turkey out of adversity in Gallipoli." The full article can be viewed at http://www.nationaltimes.com.au/opinion/politics/turkish-ambassador-responds-to-professor-tatz-20101116-17ux1.html?rand=1289864023646

I would like those in this forum who have researched the treatment of Allied POWs in Turkey during WW1 to give their opinion on whether the above statement by the ambassador is reflective of historic truth or is just diplomatic garbage.

Thank you in advance

David

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David,

I think it is common knowledge that the Allied POW's of the old Ottoman Empire were treated harshly to say the least. This is the main reason so many of them never came home. They were starved and lived in squalid conditions where disease and illness were rife. Their captors were living in the same conditions in many areas and a great deal of compassion was shown to some British wounded in Palestine.

I do, however, agree with the Turkish ambassador, as this happened 95 years ago. All the soldiers are now gone and it was the Turks who welcomed and cared for our fallen as their own after the war. There are also accounts of Allied soldiers not taking the best care of the Turkish POW's as well.

Just one persons perspective.

Cheers Andy.

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David,

Perhaps of interest is John Still's "A Prisoner in Turkey". Still was an officer with 6/East Yorks and captured at Sulva.

Available free here:

http://www.archive.org/stream/prisonerinturkey00stiliala/prisonerinturkey00stiliala_djvu.txt

Some interesting statistics on survival rates of men taken prisoner by the Turks, Still's own capture and the murder of his c/o at the point of capture together with his recollections of 3 years as a POW.

As for the ambassador's comments; I don't think its helpful for him to call research into poor treatment of POWs "ill-founded". Nations can enjoy perfectly good relationships without glossing over, forgeting or ignoring their mutual history regardless whether something occured 95 years ago or 9 years ago.

Jim

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Thank you Andy and Jim for your replies

O.K, we have a consensus so far that the assertion that "the Anzac POWs were harshly treated in Turkey during WW1" is NOT ill-founded as the Turkish ambassador claims. Therefore, we can say that the ambassador's position on this is one of denial.

Andy: Hypothetically speaking, if once all the Australian POWs who were detained in Japan during WW2 pass away, and the current Japanese government denies that the prisoners were ill-treated during captivity, would you excuse the Japanese government's position simply because they are looking after the graves of our fallen soldiers on their soil?

Regards

David

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For a balanced view on Still's conflicting accounts, see Prof Tim Travers' book 'Gallipoli 1915' [iSBN 0 7524 1975 7] Travers' chapter 9 'The Experience of Modern War at Gallipoli: Stress, Strain and Survival' refers; pages 194>

I have not seen Prof Tatz's article which prompted the response from the Ambassador, however, Mr Ozge's comment seems very fair - " We are convinced that the events of 1915 are not a matter for legislators to consider because we take "genocide" very seriously. That is why we believe that historians from Turkey, Armenia and third countries should come together to ascertain the facts"

He is also correct in that it is unhelpful to try and widen the argument.

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Andy: Hypothetically speaking, if once all the Australian POWs who were detained in Japan during WW2 pass away, and the current Japanese government denies that the prisoners were ill-treated during captivity, would you excuse the Japanese government's position simply because they are looking after the graves of our fallen soldiers on their soil?

Regards

David

David,

I was waiting for that question, however, don't even go there.

Cheers Andy.

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Here are some first-hand accounts of being a POW in Turkey during WW1. None of them agree with the Turkish Ambassador's opinion.

Brown, H. A. Diary. Mitchell Library ML MSS 5. (AE2 Submarine POW Turkey).

Halpin, J. Blood in the Mists, Sydney, Macquarie Head Press, 1934.

Halpin, J. 'Captives of the Turk', in Reveille RSS&AILA, NSW Branch, Sydney. 1 Mar 1934, 1 Apr 1934, 1 May 1934, 1 Jun 1934, 1 Jul 1934, p25, 26. p48. p?. p29. p15..

Jones, E. H. 'The Road To En-Dor ', London, Pan Books, 1955.

Lushington, R. F. A Prisoner With The Turks 1915 - 1918, London, Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co. Ltd, 1923.

Luscombe, L. H. The Story of Harold Earl - Australian, Brisbane, W. R. Smith & Paterson, 1970.

Richardson, L.D. Diary. Mitchell Library ML MSS 2447. Signaller, 1LHR. Anzac. Experiences as a POW in Turkey.

Wheat, J.H. Papers. Mitchell Library ML MSS 3054. (AE2 Submarine POW Turkey).

White, T. W. Guests of the Unspeakable. The Oddyssey of an Australian Airman - being a record of Captivity and Escape in Turkey, 2nd Australian edition, Sydney, Angus & Robertson, 1935.

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David

As Andy said we will not go there with the "Knights Of Bushido"

in WW2.

Once started , I never let up.

And being Politically Inncorrect , to me it will ALWAYS be VJ day , not

VP day

Peter

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2 thoughts

They are not ill founded comments, but then 95 years down the line they should not be allowed to damage present day relations

Chris

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They would only damage present-day relations if one party insisted that its incorrect interpretation of what happened should be accepted by all and made a pre-condition of 'good relations' merely on the basis that that suits that party's view of its own history and society.

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Dear Bryn

I agree with you. Why would relations between two states be affected by the historical truth about the mistreatment of Anzac POWs unless one of the states has something to hide or is unwilling to honestly confront it's past. It obviosly sends the wrong message to would-be belligerents who mistreat POWs. The message is: It's O.K. to do it, just be powerful enough to deny it and claim that bringing the issue up will harm good relations! I am suddenly realising how the Armenians feel who lost a large portion of their women and children during the Great War.

Regards

David

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Dear Bryn

I agree with you. Why would relations between two states be affected by the historical truth about the mistreatment of Anzac POWs unless one of the states has something to hide or is unwilling to honestly confront it's past. It obviosly sends the wrong message to would-be belligerents who mistreat POWs. The message is: It's O.K. to do it, just be powerful enough to deny it and claim that bringing the issue up will harm good relations! I am suddenly realising how the Armenians feel who lost a large portion of their women and children during the Great War.

Regards

David

David stated in his original post of this thread, and the text of the Ambassador's comments reached via the provided link corroborate, that his comment was limited to the treatment of ANZAC prisoners in camps in the area of Gallipoli. Although I have studied Gallipoli for years, from both sides, but in the main on the activities of Turley and its allies, I do not recall seeing anything about the treatment of Allied prisoners in the area of the Gallipoli theatre. I certainly have read examples of POWs held by the Turks in other parts of the Turkish Empire being treated badly. I do not know about the situation in Turkish POW camps in the Gallipoli area, if indeed there were camps there. I can observe that after reading meny dozens of primary sources from both sides forming the opinion that the general impression of the relations between the combatents on the Gallipoli battlefield seem to have been surprisingly good, if that is not an oxymoron. For example, I have read many mentions of the Turks allowing Allied collection of the wounded in no-man's-land without molestation, and even providing aid such as water to Allied wounded.

I can observe that in my readings of Gallipoli I have read Allied accounts of the mistreatment of Turkish POWs, including attempts (serious or simulated) by Australians to ignite Turkish prisoners in a POW cage. But generally my impression is that behavior in the area of the combatents was generally good, and both sides respected the other.

The "Armenian question" has been raised a couple of times, and I hesitate to "rise to the bait", but I have to observe that for some years now the Turkish government has been proposing, and even pressuring the Armenian government to agree to a major, transparent scholarly inquiry into the nature of the events between the Turks, Armenians, and also the Kurds, the Tatars, and perhaps the Georgians caught up in those events, such an inquiry to include the participation of Turkish, Armenian, and foreign experts, and generally the Armenians have repeatedly refused to agree to such an inquiry. About a year ago Turkey pushed hard for the proposal, and offered Armenia significant consessions if they would agree, and for a while it seemed that they were agreeing. At that time the President of Armenia visited France, which has a large Armenian diaspora, and furious Armenian demonstators reportedly threatened the President and the French had to deploy riot police to protect the Armenian President from Armenians opposed to such an inquiry. I believe that the Armenians have since pulled back from agreeing to such an inquiry.

What's that all about?

Bob Lembke

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Limiting the scope of the discussion to camps 'in the Gallipoli area' is nothing but semantics. The ambassador is probably not an expert on the POW camps of the First World War and has merely assumed that some of them were in the Gallipoli area. And without seeing the original article by Tatz I have no idea whether he actually phrased the matter in that way, or whether the ambassador is paraphrasing with his own version.

If not, does anybody have any idea which specific POW camps in the immediate area might he might be referring to? With their names and/or locations we can check against American ambassador / Red Cross / Papal records, all of whom, during the war, visited POW camps and/or areas where fighting had taken place in Turkey. We can also check POW reports, to see whether any of them mention being held in any of them - but so far I've never heard of a single camp anywhere near the Gallipoli area mentioned in any such source.

If you want a counter to the 'they were great mates actually' school of thought, read the accounts I referred to earlier, especially the ones by Jack Halpin.

Even if there were POW camps in the Gallipoli area, and I don't believe there were, so what? Why should the subject be geographically limited?

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The "Armenian question"

What's that all about?

Good points you raised Bob about the ambassador seeming to be exclusively referring to treatment of Allied prisoners in the Gallipoli penisula, not the Ottoman Empire as a whole. But, with all due respect to the ambassador, that's a rather ridiculously limited analysis of the treatment of POWs by the Turks in WW1 and to me is willfully, and offensively, misleading. There weren't any Allied POW's in Gallipoli itself so nothing bad ever happened to them, seems to be a reasonable inference to the ambassadors comments. Also, I am interested into who these "number of persons" the ambassadors refers to are.

As to the, "Armenian question", I fail to see any relevance to that with treatment of Western prisoners and have no idea, and am quite offended, by the ambassador's clumsy, patently incorrect, attempt to link the two.

Antony

EDIT: Thought a bit about my comment and realised a better summation would be to say that for the Ambassador, to incorrectly, imply that Allied prisoners weren't mistreated and to then use that as evidence the something else didn't happen, is just wrong.

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As to the, "Armenian question", I fail to see any relevance to that with treatment of Western prisoners and have no idea, and am quite offended, by the ambassador's clumsy, patently incorrect, attempt to link the two.

Having read the newspaper article linked in the first post above

then you will see that this is in fact, the very point which the Ambassador himself is making

As you, and he, correctly point out, this is a red herring, and there is in fact no connection between the two.

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Thank you all for your replies

Antony, you raise a good point. Who are these "number of persons" the ambassador is referring to?

As far as I know, the issue of the ill-treatment of the Anzac POWs has appeared in the comments section of various websites recently, and the contributers are always referring to the ill-treatment of British and Anzac POWs in "Turkey" during WW1, and not just "around Gallipoli". So, either the ambassador has made a semantical error, or he has deliberately limited the scope to just "around Gallipoli", where there were no camps. For the purposes of this thread, I am assuming the ambassador is referring to the POWs in Ottoman Turkey, otherwise as Antony states, it would be "wilfully and offensively misleading".

The purpose of my initiation of this thread, is to ascertain answers to the following questions:

a) Were the British and Allied POWs ill-treated in Turkey during WW1 according to "the rules and conduct of war" which were already in existence before the Great War?

B) Are the claims being made about their ill-treatment a "new allegation" as the ambassador claims?

c) Once we ascertain the answers to the above questions, Is the ambassador's position one of denial of a historical truth?

So far, there has been a consensus that the British and Anzac POWs were mistreated, with some claiming it was a mutual act and the Turkish POWs were also being mistreated by the Allies.

The reason why it's important to get to the bottom of this issue is because for the first time since the end of WW1, the official position of the state of Turkey on the treatment of Allied POWs has been made public by a representative of the Turkish state. Up until now they have been silent on the issue.

Regards

David

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In any consideration of the 'they did it too' comeback, common, for example when the topic of the Armenians is raised (though I'm not going to be side-tracked into that area), it's important to look at proportionality. It's all very well to deliberately kill prisoners and then state, "yeah, but you mistreated our prisoners too," but what form did that mistreatment take? The Japanese do the same thing. There's this idea that, since 'you' interned Japanese citizens and took their possessions from them, then everything's 'even' and therefore you have no grounds to complain about what the Japanese forces did.

Where are the many accounts of Turkish POWs being deliberately killed or otherwise mistreated? I'm talking about Red Cross reports or other contemporary sources. I know, for example, that the Red Cross visited POW camps set up by the Allies. Has anyone found evidence of systematic brutality in their reports?

Besides, if we really want to get into mistreatment of specifically Anzac prisoners, we could start with the many hundreds of wounded left behind when the Turks counter-attacked on 25th April. Only four Anzacs survived into captivity that day. Now THAT's something that's not often brought up, but which needs to be more thoroughly investigated than it has been.

I've said it before and I'll probably say it again - there were isolated cases of goodwill - and I want to emphasise they were isolated, rather than common occurrences - between the forces at Gallipoli and there was certainly mutual respect for fighting qualities, but there are many many more accounts of the ordinary business of war. We should not romanticise the relations between the two sides at Gallipoli - they were fierce enemies. To pretend they were actually best buddies is insulting to all those who died. On both sides. It was the soldier's job to kill the enemy, and both sides did that with no holds barred.

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I've just gone back and read Tatz's original article as well as the comments it attracted. Tatz does not even mention Anzac POWs. The Turkish ambassador seems to have thrown that in because some people have mentioned it in their comments on Tatz's article. I guess these are the 'number of persons' he is referring to. For me all the ambassador's reaction (and a couple of the comments following it) does is confirm exactly what Tatz is saying.

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Dear Michaeldr

You state that there is no connection between the Armenian Question and the issue of the Anzac POWs, and that this is what the ambassador himself conveyed in his letter.

Can you explain then, why the Turkiish ambassador was denying visas to Australian archeoligists destined for Gallipoli because of a genocide monument in the western suburbs of Sydney? If there is no connection between the two, then why would the ambassador have targetted the archeoligists destined for Gallipoli? The story can be read here http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/09/29/3025501.htm

There are many other ways the ambassador could have expressed dissatifaction with the genocide monument, but by using the Gallipoli card, it's the ambassador himself who is connecting the two issues.

Cheers

David

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A few observations.

As others have suggested, it is likely that there were no Turkish POW camps (as opposed to POW cages) in the Gallipoli area. I have been reading sources from the Turkish/German/Austrian side for years, and have assisted the author of a work on the topic of Gallipoli, published in German and Turkish, on new editions of his work, and have never run across mention of same. That is not conclusive, of course, but additional corroboration. (It does seem that the Turks did move their POWs over long distances, frequently to their detriment.) So the core topic of discussion seems to be rather vacuous, mistreatment or none in non-existant camps.

I have never studied the various statutes on the international standard of what is expected of beligerants in the treatment of POWs; let me pose the question; are they basically based on absolute standards of treatment, or on relative standards? Let me explain my probably murky question: Do the standards specify that POWs are to be fed, say, 2100 calories a day, or do they specify that they are to be fed no worse than the troops of the captor power? (That example is a bit loaded, the little I know about this is that, at least in WW II, the captor power was supposed to feed POWs as well as their own forces.)

One would think that outright physical mistreatment was to be avoided. Nutrition is another matter. A point I am leading up to is the generally horrible treatment of Turkish troops in the Turkish Army of WW I. Were the Allied POWs of WW I treated significantly worse than Turkish troops? (I would suspect worse, upon occasion; I have not studied this matter.)

(for full disclosure, I must disclose that my father volunteered to fight in the Turkish Army in 1915, really liked and admired them, and was tickled pink to be able to run guns to them in 1922 when the Greeks were driving deep into Anatolia, and no one would give the Turks "the time of day". I generally like the Turks, and do not suffer Muslo-phobia, just attended an Id, invited by a friend and neighbor Muslim Marine. I also have lost a number of relatives in camps, and came close to being put in one myself; they wern't Turkish.)

Some time ago someone on this Forum (I think it was David), in an off-Forum discussion, led me to the formal legal current definition of "genocide", and given my reading of the legal definiotion, I have to fully admit that the Turks committed genocide on the Armenians, but I have to observe that the definition is so broad (one can easily commit "genocide" and not kill a solitary soul.) that clearly the Armenians also committed "genocide", certainly against the Kurds, on a number of occasions in the ongoing fighting between the Turks, Armenians, Kurds, Tatars, and probably Turkomen and Georgians from 1894 to 1923, that they are committing "genocide" in the Nagaro-Kahrabat enclave within Azeribajan from the 1990's to the present, and that there must be 100 or 200 genocides presently unfolding in the world today, probably including 30 in the present-day Middle East. The formal definition of "genocide" is so broad and has such a low threshold as to be useless, IMHO.

Bob

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What you say regarding the definition of genocide may be true, Bob. But that makes the common Turkish claim that it never happened all the more ridiculous. Like you, I like the Turks (at least those I've met), but nobody would think less of them if they just admitted it happened and moved on. In fact most people would commend them for being able to look such things in the eye and deal with them. The only people they're fooling with their constant denials and excuses is themselves, and that's a bit worrying to 'outsiders', because it indicates some kind of deep-seated psychological need to believe in a lily-white past, and an inability to accept any blame for anything that occurred, even though those doing the denying were not involved.

The other thing is the common demand from Turks that non-Turks 'butt out' because it's 'nobody's business but the Turks'. There are two problems with that. First, it's apparently not most Turks' business either, as they refuse to recognise it happened, and second, people can all decide what they want to be interested in without 'advice' from insecure people worried that someone might shine a light into a dark corner.

The constant reference to this being 95 years ago (and the implication that therefore it shouldn't matter) works both ways. Modern Turkish society should be able to admit that these things occurred in the past, precisely because it was 95 years ago, and recognise that just because a victim may also be guilty of the same crime really is irrelevant. One crime does not cancel the other crime out, as if it never happened. It's the denial of these things, and the deeper implications of that inability to face facts, that's the problem to non-Turks.

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Dear Bob

For those of us who have followed your postings in the past on the Armenian Genocide, it's quite a relief to know that you have finally recognised that the Armenians did in fact suffer genocide at the hands of the Ottoman Turks during WW1.

As this thread is on the treatment of British and Anzac POWs and not the Armenian Genocide, I am going to refrain from giving my opinion to your claims that the "Armenians are also guilty of genocide". I think that Bryn gave a convincing answer to that type of counter-argument in one of his posts. I will leave your allegations to the the scrutiny of the readers to make their own enquiry as to whether a subservient subject people (with no state), who were not allowed to bear arms and had no beauractratic structure (police, army etc) were able to organise a genocide.

In answer to your enquiry into the statutes or international standards regarding POWs, you may want to look at "Convention (II) with Respect to the Laws and Customs of War on Land and its annex: Regulations concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land. The Hague, 29 July 1899." available at http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/FULL/150?OpenDocument Chapter II deals with Prisoners of War.

What is not commonly noted by historians dealing with Anzac history is that following the end of the Great War, a report was commissioned by the attorney general of Great Britain on the "Breaches of the Laws and Customs of War" by Germany and Turkey. The report can be found in the British National Archives, Ref. CAB/24/85. From p. 164 onwards, the report includes a "Memorandum as to the Turkish and Turko-German offences against the Laws of War" in Turkey. It deals with the Treatment of the British (including Anzac) POWs. The report includes detailed information on the ill-treatment of the POWs in the various camps in Turkey and includes the names of the Turks/ Germans responsible for the ill-treatment , as well as the names of the British and Anzac POWs who were victims or witnesses. It makes compelling reading.

It is also not commonly known that shortly after the war, about 118 Turks were arrested and sent to Malta for their role in the Armenian massacres and the ill-treatment of allied POWs. Some of them were accused of being involved with both crimes. The complete list of the detained Turks can be found in the British National Archives doc. no. CAB/24/127.

It is very obvious that the ill-treatment of the allied POWs was well documented and an effort was made to convict the perpetrators immediately after the end of the war.

Therefore, we can conlude that the Turkish ambassador's claim that these are "new allegations" and are "ill-founded" runs contary to historic truth. It's surprising that not one Australian historian or Australian newspaper has criticised the ambassador's remarks as being offensive to the memory of those Anzacs who were mistreated or died in captivity.

Regards

David

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I agree with David, and would just like to add the observation that, if politicians want to play their little word games, we can't stop them. Turkish politicians, when dealing with anything that might shine an unfavourable light on their country, need to realise, though, that ill-considered, knee-jerk responses to anything they regard as criticism is not going to be enough to fool anyone who has looked into these issues. If they expect people to accept their skewed view of history - which is no more than their own opinion, based on nothing more than an automatic need to attempt to stifle discussion on subjects they don't like - they're going to be disappointed. I was prepared, in the beginning, to give the ambassador the benefit of the doubt, on the basis that he just didn't know that there were no POW camps near Gallipoli. Not any more. Now I realise he didn't even care enough to find out.

For anyone reading this who might think, "so what, it's not like he cares what you think," I say; "want a bet?"

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I wish that politicans of all nations would stop trying to rewrite history. Like Bryn says 'we can't stop them' but they do do some damage to historical accuracy in the aim of self-gradification.

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This is an old chestnut pulled out of the fire to suit some homeland political imperative. One must look to the Turkish political scene to see where the Turkish authorities feel threatened. The statement by the Turkish Ambassador is a safe one - he knows full well that the Australian government will not respond in any shape or form. He also knows that no Australian terrorists will plant bombs in Ankara in revenge. So are the comments directed to Australia or is Australia just a piece of collateral damage on a larger stage - I suspect the latter. Reality is that all involved know this is just plain nonsense. Those Turkish historians who are well in the know such as Olneck or Oral are surprisingly mute. These men are no fools so I suspect the issue here has nothing to do with Australia.

Turkish treatment of POWs was no different in concept as to that delivered by the Allies. The Turks treated the Allied POW's like they treated their own troops. Their administration was incompetent and incapable of delivering services to the scale required to sustain a modern war. The Turkish administration was incapable of supplying their own soldiers let alone the inconvenience of a whole lot of POW's. There was no systematic policy of ill treatment. On the contrary, POW Camp Commandants were urged to be gracious in their treatment of the Allied guests. They were also left to their own devices without funds, food or supplies. Camp Commandants basically had to scrounge up shortfalls in their supplies through whatever means was available. The shortfalls were chronic and incapable of being solved by the Turkish government, such as it was. Front line troops were treated in a similar manner. Erickson notes that one regimental war diary commented that for one day, the regiment actually received their allotted rations. It was such a rare occasion that the war diary author was moved to observe the event.

The allied treatment of POW's varied too. 11,000 were sent to Burma where some 10% died during this incarceration. There is a Turkish conspiracy theory doing the rounds that all 11,000 were murdered in Burma. Then some bright lad wrote a PhD thesis on the basis that the allies deliberately caused an outbreak of Pellagra among the returning troops. This was one of those nonsense claims which is only taken seriously among the Turkish conspiracy theorists. The other big conspiracy was the deliberate blinding of Turkish troops by the Allies under the orders of the Armenians. This was given legs by a Turkish parliamentary resolution in 1922. All of this has the same veracity as the current conspiracy theories that 9/11 was engineered by the White House to allow them to run amok in the Muslim nations, and so the Taliban are secretly paid by the CIA to keep the war going while there are 10,000 Russian troops in the Chicago underground waiting orders from the UN to take over America. They are all the same whacko theories.

The defensive responses of Turkey to these claims is beginning to lessen as the military archives in Ankara are gradually opened up to the public. There is a major shift in the perceptions of the Turks, both how they see themselves and how the world sees them. As the current democratic trend increases, green shoots of liberalism are showing through. However, there are still reactionary trends - hiccups if you will - along this long road. So we need to see this outburst for what it is - it is not directed at Australia although Australia is the nation being damaged. It is part of an internal political ruction. They have used Australia because, like in all close friendships, we are a nation they feel safe doing this too so that there are no violent fall outs in Turkey. Go beyond the Byzantine lines and see what is playing out in Turkey to find the answer.

Vince

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