Turkey and its Nationalities
Writing on some "Problems of the Turkish Revolution," Christian Rakowski, late member of the Bulgarian parliament, contributes to the International, an English monthly, an article which is of great interest to Zionists. The important point brought out in the article is that there are two branches of the Young Turkish movement, one aiming at the concentration of all nationalities in the Ottoman Empire and the other advocating the federationist view which would give each separate race the opportunity to settle independently its national and religious affairs. That the federationist fraction of the Young Turkish movement is led by the Sultan's nephew, Sebah-ed-Din, is of all the more importance.
The writer says:
It will seriously affect the whole range of problems which of the parties within the Young Turkish movement contains the upper hand whether it is the group led by Ahmed Riza, which desires to found a powerful single state, or the federationist fraction led by the Sultan's nephew, Sebah-ed-Din. The latter contingency would be far more favoarble to the cause of the Christians in ,Macedonia. In any case very close relations have existed for some months between the last-mentioned group and the revolutionary organization of the Armenian Christians, and a joint programme af activity was agreed to between these groups.
The aim of this party is the formation of a federation, of autonomous races each of which would settle independently its national and religious affairs, while to the Imperial Parliament at Constantinople would be entrusted the management of political and economic questions relative to all members of the federation.
In this way Turks, Bulgarians, Servians, Albanians, Greeks, Armenians, and particularly the Arabs, who in intellectual activity and adaptability to modern economic conditions are far superior even to the Turks themselves, and in the southern and east-
ern provinces of the Empire constitute, as Mohammedans, a loyal but hitherto downtrodden element, all these races could in this way develop the most characteristic possibilities of their intellectual and moral faculties. All these races would be able to unfold their numerous capabilities hitherto confined beneath the iron yoke of Turkish tyranny and misgovernment.
Already in the last few years in Syria and the other Arab provinces of the Empire, under the influence of the progressive tendencies of their kinsfolk, the Egyptians, indications of similar tendencies have made their appearance. Under the new rule of freedom the Arab race will awaken to a life of nobler civilization. Mindful of their great historical traditions, and in view of their numerical strength, they will hardly be willing to endure the continued domination of the Turkish race to whom the Caliphats has fallen within the last few centuries.
Should no serious strife break out between the two Mohammedan races of the Empire, the Turks, who have hitherto asserted themselves by dint of their soldierly virtues, and the Arabs, who are so far superior to them in the commercial spirit, and everything that makes for supremacy in the present age of Imperialism, then by a liberal measure of national autonomy these latter must be given the opportunity of satisfying within the bounds of the Turkish Empire all their legitimate aspirations to a higher civilization.
The same statement may be applied to the Christian races, of the Empire. The birth rate of Bulgaria is 42 per 1000 annually, of Turkey only 23.5. Consequently the numerical ratio in Macedonia must change more and more in favor of the former. What has been already said as to the better adaptability and the greater economic activity of the Arab as compared to the Turk may be said likewise of the Bulgarian. The example of the Royal States of the Balkans, Bulgaria, Servia, Macedonia and Roumania, also shows how quickly these badly treated shepherds adapt themselves to modern political circumstances,