Part 113: Great Balkan War Aftermath
Part 113: Great Balkan War Aftermath
While I’ve gotten through the Great Balkan War and the ensuing Treaty of Constantinople, I feel as though an update talking about the aftermath of the war and the treaty is necessary before I move on to other things. With such large changes in borders, there were bound to be profound changes in the demographics and politics of the entire region. First on the chopping block are the massive demographic changes in the region, particularly the fate of the Balkan Turks. The Ottoman Empire had possessed territory in Europe for 600 years by the time they were ejected from the continent in 1946, and in that time the Turkish population in Europe had grown to number in the millions. Now, aside from the new Turkish state of Rumelia, these European Turks were effectively homeless, living in countries that viewed them with hostility. Meanwhile, there was still a large Greek population living in parts of Anatolia, and still Bulgarians and Dacians living in Rumelia. After years of war, these minorities were viewed as fifth columns at best. For example, Rumelia restricted citizenship to Muslims, disenfranchising the large Bulgarian (and smaller Greek and Dacian) minority in the country. This began a mass migration of Bulgarians out of Rumelia, and the Rumelian government invited Turks and Muslims from other countries in the area to replace them. In return, Bulgarians, Greeks and Dacians from the Ottoman Empire or Rumelia were given instant citizenship if they were to migrate to their respective ethnic nations, which scores of them did. The Ottoman Empire took in hundreds of thousands of Turks and other Balkan Muslims in the period after the war, many of them settling areas vacated by their previous Greek inhabitants. By 1960, much of the previously diverse Balkans and Anatolia had become much more homogenous (although not to the same extent as IOTL, as there was never any sort of official, mutually agreed upon policy of population swapping). The Greco-Anatolian population that once numbered well over a million was down to just a quarter of a million by 1960 (and still declining), while Greece, Bulgaria and Dacia were nearly devoid of Turks.
Speaking of the Turks, how were they doing after they lost? Well, they were down but not out. Yes, losing their territory in Europe (especially Constantinople) and in parts of the Middle East stung, they weren’t completely screwed. For one, while they’d lost a lot of Iraqi oil, they still had large oil deposits in Kuwait and Syria (and for that matter, Kuwait still gave them access to the Persian Gulf). They also maintained control of the Levantine Coast, and still had access to the Suez Canal and Red Sea. The Ottomans built new railways to reconnect Kuwait to the rest of the empire by rail, and began developing that area’s oil industry. When it comes to the relations the Ottos had with the Arab inhabitants of the area, it’s complicated. On one hand, in an attempt to secure the loyalty of Arabs living in the empire, Arabic was designated as a co-official language of the Ottoman Empire alongside Turkish. On the other hand, the Ottomans resettled a good chunk of the European Turkish migrants into the oil-producing or strategically located areas within the Arab parts of the empire, which rubbed a lot of said Arabs the wrong way.
The Great Balkan War had reshaped much of Southeastern Europe and the Near East, and had greatly weakened an empire that had been a great power for centuries. Populations shifted as the map was redrawn, and a new status quo in the Eastern Mediterranean was being formed. I’ve got to get this update in, so I’ll leave it there. Have a wonderful day, I’ll see you next time.