"To be able to come suddenly one night", or turning the wrong referendum back from Baghdad

The last Ottoman Chamber of Deputies, convened in Istanbul, adopted and proclaimed on 20 January 1920 the document known as the National Pact (Misak-ı Millî). The occupying powers reacted harshly to the proclamation of the document, and the Chamber of Deputies was dissolved. Shortly afterwards Istanbul was occupied. Nevertheless, the policy of violence and force did not eliminate the National Pact. The document became the political manifesto of the National Struggle. This document set out the minimum conditions the Turkish nation would accept for a peace treaty.

The first article of the Pact stated that the occupation of the lands occupied after the Armistice of Mudros was unacceptable, and that the lands under Turkish sovereignty at the moment the Armistice of Mudros was signed on 30 October 1918 were whole and indivisible. This article most probably angered the occupying powers the most, and first the Chamber of Deputies was dissolved, then Istanbul was occupied.

So what was the reason for this emphasis and the anger it produced? On 30 October 1918, that is, on the date the armistice was signed, a large part of Mosul was under Turkish sovereignty. Because Mosul, which Curzon later revealed to be of strategic importance with the sentence "The Euphrates is the western border of the United Kingdom," and which was a lifeline on account of its oil production, had not been seized, military forces attached to the United Kingdom, in violation of international law, continued their advance, and on 2 November Mosul began to be occupied.

Because of this stance in violation of international law, the National Pact places a special emphasis on the date of 30 October 1918, that is, the date the Armistice of Mudros was signed.

After the National Struggle, one of the most important reasons why the Lausanne Conference, which would end the First Great War for the Ottoman State (and its successor the Republic of Turkey), proceeded harshly was also Mosul. Among the 14-article directives given to the negotiating delegation as İsmet Pasha set out to attend the Lausanne Conference was the Iraq border. The directive was given to the delegation to request the districts of Sulaymaniyah, Mosul and Kirkuk, which had been occupied by Britain in violation of international law.

When İsmet Pasha said to Lord Curzon, "I will not return to Ankara without taking Mosul," Curzon said that they had signed an agreement with the Iraqi government (when the National Struggle succeeded, the British had hastily made Faisal King of Iraq and signed an agreement) in October 1922, and that if they left Mosul to Turkey they would be acting contrary to the agreement. This statement of Curzon's, and the October 1922 Treaty the British signed with Iraq, are important in that they show that Mosul is a part of Iraq and cannot be divided. Let us keep this in mind as we continue.

The Mosul Question was left outside the Treaty of Lausanne. After the signing of the Treaty of Lausanne, the British applied to Turkey and asked that an initiative be undertaken to bring the Mosul question to a solution. At the Haliç Conference convened in Istanbul, Fethi Okyar, who headed the Turkish delegation, argued like İsmet Pasha that Mosul, Kirkuk and Sulaymaniyah should be left to the Turks.

The British side, in order to create a room for diplomatic maneuver for themselves, stated to the Turkish side that Mosul and the other places could not be left, and also demanded Hakkari for the Nestorians. The aim was to produce a definitive deadlock so as to take the matter to the League of Nations (MC). In the end the Mosul Question came to the League of Nations, which was under the full dominance of Britain, and the League left Mosul to Iraq, that is, to Britain.

Turkey at first declared that it did not recognize the agreement, but in 1926, with the Treaty of Ankara, it accepted that Mosul would remain in Iraq. Here too, the point to be noted is that Mosul's being accepted as an inseparable part of Iraq was tacitly accepted by Britain, Iraq and Turkey alike.

This explanation briefly shows us the following: The referendum in northern Iraq has no legitimacy whatsoever. If there is to be persistence about its implementation, the 1926 Treaty will have ceased to exist for Britain, Iraq and Turkey alike, and Turkey, as the natural guarantor country, has the right under international law to take every measure, including intervention. President Erdoğan's statement "We may come one night, suddenly" should be read within this framework. Our hope is that these guarantor countries will come together at a conference as soon as possible on the question of Mosul and turn the wrong calculation back from Baghdad.