THE SMYRNA CATASTROPHE

 THE SMYRNA CATASTROPHE: GENOCIDE OF GREEKS IN ASIA MINOR REMEMBERED.

 

 

Yesterday marked 99 years since the catastrophe of Smyrna, when Greeks were slaughtered and forced to flee from the city due to the fire set by the brutal Turkish forces.

 

It was a cataclysmic event of such enormous importance for modern Greek history, that it shaped generation upon generation after 1922, adding yet another unforgettable and tragic event in Greece’s long history.

 

A terrifying blaze, called The Great Fire, destroyed much of the city, except Turkish property, causing the majority of Greeks in Asia Minor to flee from their homes and seek shelter primarily in Greece but also in other countries.

 

Historians of the time, talking to countless eyewitnesses and reading written accounts of the terrible event that angry Turkish mobs slaughtered innocent Greeks, including children, and set the city on fire.

 

Turkey continues to deny this, claiming it was the Greeks that killed each other and set their houses on fire.  Couldn’t they find a better excuse?

 

Smyrna was undoubtedly one of the wealthiest cities not only in Asia Minor but also in Europe.  It was home to one of the largest populations of Greeks and Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.  Together they constituted the Christian community of the city, which lived peacefully side by side with the Muslim and Jewish communities for centuries.

 

However, politics, the rising tide of nationalism, and the outbreak of the First World War, were the factors that determined the fate of Smyrna and its citizens for the 20^th century and beyond.

 

After a series of catastrophic events, the majority of Greeks and Armenians were slaughtered as part of the Greek and Armenian Genocides which actually  began in 1914 and lasted until 1923.

 

The Smyrna catastrophe and many acts of the Greek genocide were witnessed by foreigners – including the US Navy officers and their dairies documented the devastation wrought during those Turkish atrocities, but little was done to help the victims.  Only a Japanese ship collected some people and took them to Greece.   

 

 

A new book called: “The Greek Genocide in American Naval War Diaries”, edited by Robert Shenk and Sam Koktzoglu, outlines the reports the protests engaged in by the US Navy commanders in 1921-1922.

 

Although technically neutral during the conflict, American vessels were allowed in the sea off Smyrna and other ports in Asia Minor after the First World War and the events unfolding onshore in 1921-1922 were recorded by horrified naval officers.

 

As retired US admiral James Stavrides says in the forward of the book the Americans were in a very difficult position at the time.  “Shouldn’t you do something?  You are a representative of America after all!”  And these are essentially slow killings of men and then heartless deportations of women and children, which ended up with the death of many of the latter as well.

Civilian Turks of the city joined the troops in destroying whatever shred of Hellenistic Civilization.

 

Kemal Ataturk, then the leader of Turkish troops made it known that he wanted to be known as the founder of the “New Islam”.  It is iconic, however, as he was actually been born in Thessaloniki and in previous years he pretended that Greece was a friend.

The day after the initial fire, Patriarch Chrisostomos of Smyrna, the head of all Greek Orthodox faithful around the world was hanged by Turkish soldiers  after being brutally tortured.  The atrocities had no end until the destruction of Smyrna was completed.   

 

Today, very few of the baroque buildings remain standing in Smyrna, to remind the visitor of the grandeur of the long-lost past.  In the interior of the city, towards the old town of Smyrna, only a few buildings survive from that time, with architectural elements that echo the majestic buildings which once stood along the waterfront.    

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