 | |
 Turkey |  Soviet Union |
|---|---|
| Diplomatic mission | |
| Embassy of Turkey,Moscow | Embassy of the Soviet Union,Ankara |
Soviet Union–Turkey relations were the diplomatic relations between theSoviet Union and the Republic ofTurkey.
The Soviet Union and the new Turkish governments were outsiders to the great powers and gravitated toward each other after World War I.[1] According to Onur Işçi:
Beginning in 1920, bitterness against the postwar international order drove Soviet-Turkish relations. Nationalist Turks and internationalist Bolsheviks laid to rest four centuries of rivalry between their imperial predecessors as they found themselves in a convergence that each side defined as anti-imperialist. At the heart of their cooperation was a geopolitical alignment that sought to shield the greater Black Sea region from Western intrusions. .... All the way up to the final hours of peace in 1939, the first principle that guided Turkish diplomacy was good neighborly relations with Moscow in the context of friendship rather than subordination.[2]
The Ottoman government signed theTreaty of Brest-Litovsk between theBolshevik government of Russia and theCentral Powers on March 3, 1918, but it became obsolete later that year. Russian Bolsheviks and the Soviet government were led byVladimir Lenin, who emerged victorious from theRussian Civil War by 1921 and viewed theTurkish revolutionary (national) movement under the leadership ofMustafa Kemal as congenial to their ideological and geopolitical aspirations. Lenin's government abdicated the traditional claims of the Russian Empire to the territories ofWestern Armenia and theTurkish Straits.
The Soviet supply of gold and armaments to theKemalists in 1920 to 1922 was a key factor in the latter's successful takeover of the Ottoman Empire, which had beendefeated by theTriple Entente but won theArmenian campaign (1920) and theGreco-Turkish War (1919–1922).[3]
Before the Amasya Circular, Mustafa Kemal met with a Bolshevik delegation headed by ColonelSemyon Budyonny.[citation needed] The Bolsheviks wanted to annex parts of theCaucasus, including theDemocratic Republic of Armenia, which were formerly part ofTsarist Russia. They also saw a Turkish Republic as a buffer state or possibly a communist ally. Mustafa Kemal's declined to consider adopting communism until after an independent national was established. Having Bolshevik support was important for the national movement.[4]
The first objective was the securing of arms from abroad. They obtained these primarily fromSoviet Russia, Italy and France. These arms—especially the Soviet weapons—allowed the Turks to organise an effective army. The Treaties ofMoscow andKars (1921) arranged the border between Turkey and the Soviet-controlledTranscaucasian republics, while Russia itself was in a state ofcivil war in the period just before the establishment of theSoviet Union. In particular,Nakhchivan andBatumi were ceded to the future USSR. In return, the nationalists received support and gold. For the promised resources, the nationalists had to wait until theBattle of Sakarya (August–September 1921).
By providing financial and war materiel aid, the Bolsheviks, underVladimir Lenin aimed to heat up the conflict between the Allies and the Turkish nationalists in order to prevent the participation of moreAllied troops in the Russian Civil War.[5] At the same time, the Bolsheviks attempted to export communist ideologies to Anatolia and supported individuals (for example:Mustafa Suphi andEthem Nejat) who were pro-communism.[5]
According to Soviet documents, Soviet financial and war material support between 1920 and 1922 amounted to: 39,000 rifles, 327 machine guns, 54 cannon, 63 million rifle bullets, 147,000 shells, 2 patrol boats, 200.6 kg of gold ingots and 10.7[6] millionTurkish lira (which accounted for a twentieth of the Turkish budget during the war).[6] Additionally the Soviets gave the Turkish nationalists 100,000gold rubles to help build an orphanage and 20,000 lira to obtain printing house equipment and cinema equipment.[7]
TheRussian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic was the first state that formally recognised theKemalist government of Turkey in March 1921 after theRepublic of Armenia which signed theTreaty of Alexandropol with the Turkish revolutionaries on 2 December 1920. TheTreaty of Moscow, signed on 16 March 1921 between Lenin's government and the Grand National Assembly of Turkey government (although theSultanate was still nominally in existence), followed bilateral treaties that the Moscow government concluded withPersia andAfghanistan earlier that year (apart from those with the states on the territory of the former Russian Empire).
Under the 1921 Treaty of Moscow,[8] the two governments undertook to establish friendly relations between the countries. Under Article II, Turkey cededBatum and the adjacent area north of the village ofSarp toSoviet Georgia (Kars Oblast went to Turkey). Article III instituted an autonomousNakhchivan oblast underSoviet Azerbaijan's protectorate. Article V had the parties agree to delegate the final elaboration of the status of theBlack Sea and theTurkish Straits to a future conference of delegates of the littoral states if the "full sovereignty" and security of Turkey and "her capital city of Constantinople" were not injured. The Treaty of Moscow was followed by an identicalTreaty of Kars signed in October 1921 by the Kemalists withSoviet Armenia, Soviet Azerbaijan and Soviet Georgia, which formed part of theSoviet Union after the December 1922Treaty on the Creation of the Soviet Union.
On 16 December 1925, the Turkish government withdrew its delegation, which let theLeague of Nations Council grant a mandate for the disputed region ofMosul to Britain without its consent. Kemal countered the diplomatic reverse[9] by concluding anon-aggression pact[10] with the Soviet Union on 17 December. The pact was later amended and prolonged and then was prolonged again for another ten years on November 7, 1935.[11]The key episode was agreement on theMontreux Convention in July 1936 in which Turkey regained control over the Straits, which it was allowed to remilitarise.[12]
In parallel to the fluctuating bilateral relations, the communist leaders, party functionaries, diplomats and scholars paid close attention to the origins, evolution and transformational phases of Kemalism.[13]
Turkey officially remained neutral during theSecond World War until 23 February 1945, but the Soviet Union viewed Turkey's continued relationship withNazi Germany, whose warships were allowed passage through the Straits, as inimical to itself.[14]
On 19 March 1945, Soviet Foreign MinisterVyacheslav Molotov advised Turkey's ambassador in Moscow that the Soviet Union was unilaterally withdrawing from the 1925 Non-Aggression Pact. When the Turkish government enquired on what conditions a new agreement could be concluded, it was informed by Molotov that in addition to bases in the Straits, the Sovietsclaimed part of eastern Turkey, which was assumed to refer to the districts of Kars, Artvin and Ardahan, which the Russian Empire and the short-lived DRA had held between 1878 and 1921.[15]
At thePotsdam Conference (July 1945), Stalin demanded a revision of the Montreux Convention. The British and the Americans agreed with the Soviet demand for the Straits always to be open to the warships of the Black Sea powers and, in principle, remain closed to those of outside powers. However, the Soviets also demanded to be allowed to join the defence of the Straits, which was rejected by Turkey, which was backed by the West.[15]
In March 1947, with the proclamation of theTruman Doctrine, the Americans underwrote the frontiers of Turkey andGreece and the continued existence of non-communist governments in both countries.[15]
The Turks sought aid from the Americans and joinedNATO in 1952. The Soviets and the Turks were in different camps during theKorean War and throughout theCold War. In effect the Truman doctrine and NATO contained the Soviets expansion to the South.[16]
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