While in 1941-1942. Germany won victories on the Russian front, Turkey's relations with Britain and the United States were rather cold. Only after a radical change in the war, the defeat of the Nazis at Stalingrad, Ankara's position began to change. At a conference in Casablanca in January 1943, Churchill and Roosevelt agreed to negotiate with the Turkish government. At the same time, Churchill attached particular importance to Turkey as a "battering ram" against the Soviet Union. Turkey could launch an offensive in the Balkans and cut off a significant part of Europe from the advancing Russian troops. And after the defeat of the Third Reich, Turkey should again become a strategic foothold of the West in its confrontation with Russia.
British Prime Minister Churchill held talks with Turkish President Inonu in Turkish Adana (January 30 - 31, 1943). The British and Turks hit it off. Britain and the United States promised to help strengthen the security of the Turkish Republic. The Anglo-Saxons began to supply the Turks with modern weapons. A British military mission has arrived in Turkey to monitor the progress of supplies and help the Turkish army in the development of new weapons. Back in December 1941, the United States extended the lend-lease law to Turkey. Under Lend-Lease, the Americans supplied Turkey with goods worth $ 95 million. In August 1943, at a meeting of the leaders of the United States and Britain in Quebec, the opinion on the need for forced military assistance to Turkey was confirmed. However, at the same time, Turkey maintained relations with Germany, supplying its various raw materials and goods.
At the Tehran conference, the great powers agreed to take measures to involve Turkey in the anti-Hitler coalition. British Prime Minister Churchill proposed to Stalin to put pressure on Ankara. That if the Turks do not enter the war on the side of the anti-Hitler coalition, then this will have serious political consequences for the Turkish Republic and affect its rights to the Black Sea Straits. Stalin said that this is a secondary issue, the main thing is the opening of a second front in Western Europe. Soon Churchill, in a conversation with Stalin, again raised the question of the straits. He stated that Russia needs access to ice-free ports and that the British now have no objection to the Russians having access to warm seas. Stalin agreed with this, but said that this issue could be discussed later.
It seemed that Stalin was indifferent to the question of the straits. In reality, the Soviet leader always attached great importance to this issue. Stalin pursued the Russian imperial policy, returning to the empire all previously lost positions and achieving new successes. Therefore, the Black Sea Straits were in the sphere of Moscow's interests. But the fact was that at that time the German army was still standing near Leningrad and in the Crimea. And England and the United States had the opportunity to be the first to land troops in the Dardanelles and occupy Istanbul-Constantinople. Therefore, for the time being, Stalin preferred not to reveal his cards.
On December 4-6, Churchill and Roosevelt met with Turkish leader Inonu in Cairo. They noted "the closest unity that exists between the United States, Turkey and England." However, Turkey maintained economic relations with the Third Reich. Only after the victory of the USSR in the Crimea and in the west of Ukraine, with the exit of the Red Army to the Balkans, Ankara broke off relations with Germany. In April 1944, under pressure from the allies, Turkey cut off the supply of chromium to Germany. In May - June 1944, Soviet-Turkish negotiations were held with the aim of drawing Turkey into the anti-German coalition. But mutual understanding was not achieved. On August 2, 1944, Turkey announced the severance of economic and diplomatic relations with the Third Reich. On January 3, 1945, Ankara broke off relations with Japan.
On February 23, 1945, Turkey declared war on Germany. This act was purely symbolic. The Turks were not going to fight. They wanted to be eligible to participate in the United Nations conference as a founding state. In order not to be outside the system of international relations, which was built by the victorious powers. Ankara feared that the great powers might organize the international administration of the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles. At the Crimean Conference in February 1945, Stalin made a special statement on the Black Sea Straits, demanding the free passage of Soviet warships through the straits at any time. The Americans and British agreed to similar demands. Joining the anti-Hitler coalition allowed the Turkish Republic to avoid the landing of foreign troops on its territory and to ensure sovereignty over the strait zone.
March 19, 1945 Moscow denounces the 1925 Soviet-Turkish Treaty of Friendship and Neutrality. People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Molotov told the Turks that due to the profound changes that had taken place especially during the world war, this treaty no longer corresponded to the new situation and needed serious improvement. The Soviet government decided to abolish the Montreux Convention; the new regime of the straits was to be established by the USSR and Turkey; Moscow was to receive Soviet military bases in the straits to maintain the security of the USSR and the world in the Black Sea region.
In a conversation with the Turkish ambassador in Moscow, S. Sarper, Molotov raised the issue of the lands that Russia ceded to Turkey under the 1921 treaty - the Kars region and the southern part of the Batumi region (Ardahan and Artvin), the Surmalinsky district and the western part of the Alexandropol district of the Erivan province. Minesweeper asked to remove the issue of territories. Then Molotov said that then the possibility of concluding a union treaty disappears and it can only be a question of concluding an agreement on the Black Sea Straits. At the same time, the Soviet Union needs a security guarantee in the form of military bases in the straits zone. The Turkish ambassador rejected this demand and said that Ankara is ready to raise the issue of the Black Sea Straits if territorial claims against Turkey are ruled out and the issue of bases in the straits in peacetime is removed.
The question of the Black Sea Straits was discussed at the Potsdam Conference in July 1945. The British announced their readiness to develop an agreement so that Russian merchant ships and warships could freely pass through the straits from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean and back. Molotov outlined the position of Moscow, which had already been transferred to Ankara. In response, Churchill said that Turkey would never agree to this. Thus, Britain and the United States refused to change the straits regime in the interests of the USSR. The Anglo-Saxons no longer needed help in the war with Germany; they doubted whether they needed Russian help in the fight against Japan. The Americans have already tested nuclear weapons.
Therefore, the British and Americans proposed their own project to amend the Montreux Convention. The Westerners proposed to introduce the principle of unlimited passage of the military and merchant fleet through the Black Sea straits both in peacetime and in wartime for all states. It is clear that this proposal not only did not strengthen the security of the Soviet Union in the Black Sea basin, but, on the contrary, worsened it. Churchill and Truman created their new world order and now wanted to deprive the USSR and other Black Sea states of even those small privileges that they had under the Montreux Convention. As a result, without reaching an agreement, the issue was postponed. Thus, the question of canceling the convention dragged on and soon finally died out. The Montreux Convention on the Status of the Straits is still valid.
Leaders and members of the delegations of the winning countries at the Potsdam Conference. Sitting in armchairs, from left to right: British Prime Minister Clement Attlee, US President Harry S. Truman, USSR Council of People's Commissars Chairman Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin. Standing from left to right: Chief of Staff of the US President, Admiral of the Fleet William D. Leagy, British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, US Secretary of State James F. Byrnes and USSR Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov
A new world war began - the "cold" one. The United States and Britain openly became enemies of the USSR. In order to psychologically suppress and intimidate Moscow, the Westerners staged various provocations. Thus, in April 1946, the American battleship Missouri arrived in Constantinople, accompanied by other ships. Formally, the American ship brought the body of the deceased Turkish ambassador to the United States. However, this was only a pretext for violating the Montreux Convention.
From that time on, the Anglo-Saxons began to draw Turkey into their military alliance. In 1947, Washington provided Ankara with a $ 100 million loan to purchase weapons. From 1947 to 1954, the Americans provided military assistance to the Republic of Turkey for $ 704 million. In addition, from 1948 to 1954, Turkey received technical and economic assistance worth $ 262 million. Ankara introduced the death penalty for belonging to the Communist Party. In 1952, Turkey became a member of the North Atlantic Alliance.
During this period, the USSR sent certain signals to Turkey and the West, showing how this could all end. The Soviet press, especially in Georgia and Armenia, recalled the historical lands of Armenia and Georgia, which fell under the Turkish yoke. An information campaign was conducted on the return of Russia-USSR Kars and Ardahan. It was hinted through diplomatic channels that Moscow was planning to punish Turkey for its hostile behavior during World War II. To do this, finally throw the Turks from the Balkan Peninsula, occupy Constantinople, the strait zone, deprive Turkey of the coast of the Aegean Sea, which historically belonged to Greece. The issue of restoring not only the Russian-Turkish border of 1914, but also other territories of historical Armenia - Alashkert, Bayazet, Rishche, Trebizond, Erzurum, Bayburt, Mush, Van, Bitlis, etc. was being worked out. That is, the USSR could restore the ancient Great Armenia on the territory of the Armenian Highlands, which occupied a significant part of Turkey. Also, Moscow could present claims from Georgia - Turkey included the territories of Meskhetia, Lazistan and other historical Georgian lands.
It is clear that Moscow was not going to be the first to start a war and dismember Turkey. This was a warning to the leaders of the West and Turkey. London and Washington launched the Cold War III. The Americans were preparing for an air war against the USSR and even nuclear attacks (How Stalin and Beria saved the USSR from the threat of a nuclear war; Why did the US not wipe Russia off the face of the earth). And the Soviet leadership showed how such plans would end. The Russian army had superiority over the enemy in the European and Middle Eastern theaters in the infantry, conventional weapons - tanks, guns, aircraft (except for strategic aviation), and the officer corps. In response to US air attacks, the USSR could occupy all of Western Europe, dropping Westerners into the Atlantic and the Middle East, Turkey. After that, Moscow could resolve the Turkish issue (including the issue of the Black Sea Straits and the Armenian, Kurdish and Greek issues) in its strategic interests.
Soon after the death of I. Stalin on May 30, 1953, the Soviet government informed the Turkish ambassador to Moscow, Faik Khozar, that “in the name of maintaining good-neighborly relations and strengthening peace and security,” the governments of Georgia and Armenia renounce their territorial claims to the Republic of Turkey. Moscow also revised its previous opinion on the Black Sea Straits and considers it possible to ensure the security of the Soviet Union from the straits on conditions equally acceptable to both the Union and Turkey.
July 8, 1953The Turkish ambassador made a response statement, which spoke of Turkey's satisfaction and the preservation of good-neighborly relations and the strengthening of peace and security.
Later, Khrushchev, speaking at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU in June 1957, criticized Stalin's diplomacy regarding the Turkish question. Like, Stalin wanted to take the straits, and therefore we "spat in the face of the Turks." Because of this, they lost "friendly Turkey" and received American bases in the southern strategic direction.
This is an obvious lie of Khrushchev, like exposing the "personality cult" and deceiving the millions of innocents who were repressed by Stalin. Suffice it to recall the hostile position of Turkey during the Great Patriotic War, when Turkey was Hitler's ally. When the Turkish leadership was preparing the army for the invasion of the Caucasus, waiting for the Germans to take Moscow and Stalingrad. When Ankara blocked the straits for us and opened them for the German-Italian fleet.
It is also necessary to remember that after the defeat of Germany, Turkey immediately went to a rapprochement with Britain and the United States, found new Western patrons. The Turks created armed forces with the help of Western countries, accepted financial and military assistance from Westerners. We entered the NATO bloc. Provided their territory for American bases. Everything to strengthen "peace and security". And in 1959 they provided their territory for the American Jupiter medium-range ballistic missiles.
Thus, the Stalinist policy was quite rational. With the help of the Turkish question, Moscow contained the aggression of the West.
