Mehmed Talat Pasha
Encyclopedia
Talaat Pasha

Talaat Pasha (also transliterated as Tala'at Pasha or Talat Pasha ' href="/topics/Turkish_language">Turkish
Turkish language
Turkish is a language spoken as a native language by over 83 million people worldwide, making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Its speakers are located predominantly in Turkey and Northern Cyprus with smaller groups in Iraq, Greece, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo,...

: Mehmed Talât or Mehmet Talat) (1874–1921) was one of the leaders of the Committee of Union and Progress
Committee of Union and Progress
The Committee of Union and Progress began as a secret society established as the "Committee of Ottoman Union" in 1889 by the medical students İbrahim Temo, Abdullah Cevdet, İshak Sükuti and Ali Hüseyinzade...

 that controlled the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

 during the First World War.

He was born in Edirne Vilayet. He was of Pomak
Pomaks
Pomaks is a term used for a Slavic Muslim population native to some parts of Bulgaria, Turkey, Greece, the Republic of Macedonia, Albania and Kosovo. The Pomaks speak Bulgarian as their native language, also referred to in Greece and Turkey as Pomak language, and some are fluent in Turkish,...

 descent. His career in Ottoman politics began by becoming Deputy for Edirne in 1908, then Minister of the Interior, and finally in 1917 Grand Vizier
Grand Vizier
Grand Vizier, in Turkish Vezir-i Azam or Sadr-ı Azam , deriving from the Arabic word vizier , was the greatest minister of the Sultan, with absolute power of attorney and, in principle, dismissable only by the Sultan himself...

. He fled the empire with Enver Pasha and Djemal Pasha in 1918, and was assassinated in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

 in 1921 by Soghomon Tehlirian
Soghomon Tehlirian
Soghomon Tehlirian was a native of Yerznka, an Armenian Evangelical survivor...

, a survivor of the Armenian Genocide
Armenian Genocide
The Armenian Genocide—also known as the Armenian Holocaust, the Armenian Massacres and, by Armenians, as the Great Crime—refers to the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I...

.

Mehmed Talaat, when Interior Minister, ordered on April 24, 1915 the arrest of Armenian leaders
Armenian notables deported from the Ottoman capital in 1915
The deportation of Armenian notables, also known as the Red Sunday refers to the night when leaders of the Armenian community of the Ottoman capital, Constantinople, and later other centers were arrested and moved to two holding centers near Ankara by the Minister of the Interior Mehmed Talaat Bey...

 in Constantinople, and requested the Tehcir Law
Tehcir Law
The Tehcir Law was passed by the Ottoman Parliament on May 27, 1915 and allegedly came into force on June 1, 1915, with publication in Takvim-i Vekayi, the official gazette of the Ottoman State...

 of May 1915 that initiated the Genocide of the Ottoman Empire's Armenian population.

Early life

Mehmed Talaat was born in 1874 in Kırcaali
Kardzhali
Kardzhali or Kurdzhali is a town in Bulgaria, capital of Kardzhali Province in the Eastern Rhodopes. Near the town is the noted Kardzhali Dam.-Geography:...

 town of Edirne Vilayet into the family of a junior civil servant working for the government of the Ottoman Empire. His father was from a village in the mountainous southeastern corner of present-day Bulgaria
Bulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...

. He had a powerful build and a dark complexion. His manners were gruff, which caused him to leave the civil preparatory school without a certificate after a conflict with his teacher. Without earning a degree, he joined the staff of the telegraph company as a postal clerk in Edirne
Edirne
Edirne is a city in Eastern Thrace, the northwestern part of Turkey, close to the borders with Greece and Bulgaria. Edirne served as the capital city of the Ottoman Empire from 1365 to 1453, before Constantinople became the empire's new capital. At present, Edirne is the capital of the Edirne...

. His salary was not high, so he worked after hours as a Turkish language teacher in the Alliance Israelite School which served the Jewish community of Edirne.

At the age of 21 he had a love affair with the daughter of the Jewish headmaster for whom he worked. He was caught sending a telegram saying "Things are going well. I'll soon reach my goal." With two of his friends from the post office, he was charged with tampering with the official telegraph and arrested in 1893. He claimed that the message in question was to his girlfriend. The Jewish girl came forward to defend him. Sentenced to two years in jail, he was pardoned but exiled to Salonica as a postal clerk.

Later, he married Hayriye Hanım (later known as Hayriye Talaat Bafralı), a young girl from Yanya.

Between 1898 and 1908 he served as a postman on the staff of the Salonica
Thessaloniki
Thessaloniki , historically also known as Thessalonica, Salonika or Salonica, is the second-largest city in Greece and the capital of the region of Central Macedonia as well as the capital of the Decentralized Administration of Macedonia and Thrace...

 Post Office. Eventually, having served 10 years at this postal unit, he became head of the Salonica Post Office.

Young Turk Revolution

In 1908 he was dismissed for membership of the Committee of Union and Progress
Committee of Union and Progress
The Committee of Union and Progress began as a secret society established as the "Committee of Ottoman Union" in 1889 by the medical students İbrahim Temo, Abdullah Cevdet, İshak Sükuti and Ali Hüseyinzade...

 (CUP), the conspiratorial nucleus of the Young Turk movement. However, after the Young Turk Revolution of 1908 he became deputy of Edirne in the Ottoman Parliament, and in July 1909 he was appointed Minister of Interior Affairs. He became Minister of Post and then Secretary-General of the CUP in 1912.

After the assassination of the Prime Minister Mahmud Sevket Pasa in July 1913, Talaat Pasha again became Minister of Interior Affairs. Talaat, with Enver Pasha and Djemal Pasha, formed a group called the Three Pashas
Three Pashas
"The Three Pashas", also known as the "dictatorial triumvirate", of the Ottoman Empire included the Ottoman minister of the interior, Mehmed Talaat , the minister of war, Ismail Enver, and the minister of the Navy, Ahmed Djemal,...

. These men formed the triumvirate that ran the Ottoman government until the end of war
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

 in October, 1918.

The Armenian Genocide

On April 24, 1915, Talaat issued an order to close all Armenian political organizations operating within the Ottoman Empire and arrest Armenians connected to them, justifying the action by stating that the organizations were controlled from outside the empire, were inciting upheavals behind the Ottoman lines, and were cooperating with Russian forces. This order resulted in the arrest on the night of 24/25 April 1915 of 235 to 270 Armenian community leaders in Constantinople
Armenian notables deported from the Ottoman capital in 1915
The deportation of Armenian notables, also known as the Red Sunday refers to the night when leaders of the Armenian community of the Ottoman capital, Constantinople, and later other centers were arrested and moved to two holding centers near Ankara by the Minister of the Interior Mehmed Talaat Bey...

, including politicians, clergymen, physicians, authors, journalists, lawyers, and teachers. Although the mass killings of Armenian civilians had begun in the Van
Van, Turkey
Van is a city in southeastern Turkey and the seat of the Kurdish-majority Van Province, and is located on the eastern shore of Lake Van. The city's official population in 2010 was 367,419, but many estimates put this as much higher with a 1996 estimate stating 500,000 and former Mayor Burhan...

 vilayet several weeks earlier, these mass-arrests in Constantinople are considered by many commentators to be the start of the Armenian Genocide.

Talaat also issued the order for the Tehcir Law
Tehcir Law
The Tehcir Law was passed by the Ottoman Parliament on May 27, 1915 and allegedly came into force on June 1, 1915, with publication in Takvim-i Vekayi, the official gazette of the Ottoman State...

 of June 1, 1915 to February 8, 1916 that allowed for the mass-deportation of Armenians, which some academics define as the vehicle of the Armenian Genocide
Armenian Genocide
The Armenian Genocide—also known as the Armenian Holocaust, the Armenian Massacres and, by Armenians, as the Great Crime—refers to the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I...

.

Talaat, as minister of the interior, bears much of the responsibility for the deportation of the Armenians
Armenians
Armenian people or Armenians are a nation and ethnic group native to the Armenian Highland.The largest concentration is in Armenia having a nearly-homogeneous population with 97.9% or 3,145,354 being ethnic Armenian....

 from the empire's eastern provinces to Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....

. Most historians blame him for the barbarity of the operation and the deaths of millions of people (and not only of Armenian origin). Although Talaat was the minister of the interior, many historians argue that Enver Pasha deserves equal blame for the extermination of the Armenians.
He is reported to have said the following to Ambassador Henry Morgenthau, Sr.
Henry Morgenthau, Sr.
Henry Morgenthau was a lawyer, businessman and United States ambassador, most famous as the American ambassador to the Ottoman Empire during the First World War. He was father of the politician Henry Morgenthau, Jr. and the grandfather of Robert M. Morgenthau, who was the District Attorney of...

 in Ambassador Morgenthau's Story
Ambassador Morgenthau's Story
Ambassador Morgenthau's Story is the title of the published memoirs of Henry Morgenthau, Sr. covering the time when he was Woodrow Wilson's American ambassador to Constantinople, 1913-1916. The book took over two years to complete. The ghostwriter for Henry Morgenthau was Burton J. Hendrick...


Turkish feminist-nationalist Halide Edip wrote in her Memoirs:

Grand vizier, 1917-1918

In 1917, Talaat became the Grand Vizier, but was unable to reverse the downward spiral of Ottoman fortunes in his new position.

Over the next year, Jerusalem and Baghdad
Baghdad
Baghdad is the capital of Iraq, as well as the coterminous Baghdad Governorate. The population of Baghdad in 2011 is approximately 7,216,040...

 were lost, and in October 1918 the British shattered both Ottoman armies they faced. With defeat certain, Talaat resigned on October 14, 1918.

Exile 1919–1921

Talaat Pasha fled the Ottoman capital in a German submarine on 3 November 1918, from Constantinople harbour to Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

. Just a week later the Porte capitulated to the Allies and signed the Armistice of Mudros.

Public opinion was shocked by the departure of Talaat Pasha, even though he had been known to turn a blind eye on corrupt ministers appointed because of their associations to the CUP. Talaat Pasha was known as a courageous and patriotic individual, and he would willingly face the consequences. With the occupation of Constantinople Izzet Pasha resigned. Tevfik Pasha took the position of Grand Vizir the same day that British ships entered the Golden Horn. Tevfik Pasha lasted until 4 March 1919, replaced by Ferid Pasha whose first order was the arrest of leading members of the CUP.

Turkish Courts-Martial of 1919–1920

Following the occupation of Constantinople by the Allied Powers, the British exerted pressure on the Sublime Porte and brought to trial the Ottoman leaders who had held positions of responsibility between 1914 and 1918, for having committed, among other charges, the Armenian Genocide
Armenian Genocide
The Armenian Genocide—also known as the Armenian Holocaust, the Armenian Massacres and, by Armenians, as the Great Crime—refers to the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I...

. Those who were caught were put under arrest at the Bekiraga division and were subsequently exiled to Malta
Malta exiles
Malta exiles is the term for politicians, high ranking soldiers , administrators and intellectuals of the Ottoman Empire who were sent into exile on Malta after the armistice of Mudros during the Occupation of İstanbul by the Allied forces...

. The courts-martial were designed by Sultan Mehmed VI
Mehmed VI
Mehmet VI was the 36th and last Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, reigning from 1918 to 1922...

 to punish the Committee of Union and Progress for the Empire's ill-conceived involvement in World War I. The Pashas who had held the highest positions in the administration and whose names were at the top of the execution lists of the Armenian assassination teams could be condemned in absentia because they had gone abroad.

By January 1919, a report to Sultan Mehmed VI accused over 130 suspects, most of whom were high officials. The indictment accused the main defendants, including Talaat, of being "mired in an unending chain of bloodthirstiness, plunder and abuses". They were accused of deliberately engineering Turkey's entry into the war "by a recourse to a number of vile tricks and deceitful means". They were also accused of "the massacre and destruction of the Armenians" and of trying to "pile up fortunes for themselves" through "the pillage and plunder" of their possessions. The indictment alleged that "The massacre and destruction of the Armenians were the result of decisions by the Central Committee of Ittihadd". The Court released its verdict on July 5, 1919: Talat, Enver, Cemal, and Dr. Nazim were condemned to death in absentia.

However, the British were determined not to leave Talaat alone. The British had intelligence reports indicating that he had gone to Germany, and the British High Commissioner pressured Damad Ferit Pasha and the Sublime Porte to demand from Germany to return to Ottoman Empire. As a result of efforts pursued personally by (Sir) Andrew Ryan, a former Dragoman and now a member of the British intelligence service, Germany responded to Ottoman Empire stating that it was willing to be helpful if official papers could be produced showing these persons had been found guilty, and added that the presence of these persons in Germany could not as yet be ascertained.

Aubrey Herbert interview, 1921

The last official interview Talaat granted was to Aubrey Nigel Henry Molyneux Herbert, a British intelligence agent. It was nine days before his assassination. The interview was short meetings with him during three days in a park in a small German town. The interview gave chance to Talaat explain the policies of Ottoman Empire during the last 10 years.

These meetings corroborated earlier intelligence to the effect that Talaat Pasha was seeking support from Muslim countries to form a serious opposition movement against the Allied Powers, and that he was soon intending to take refuge in Ankara, which Turkish national movement
Turkish National Movement
The Turkish National Movement encompasses the political and military activities of the Turkish revolutionaries which resulted in the creation and shaping of the Republic of Turkey, as a consequence of the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I....

 was forming. Furthermore, Talaat Pasha also dared to make the threat that he was going to incite the Pan-Turanist
Pan-Turkism
Pan-Turkism is a nationalist movement that emerged in 1880s among the Turkic intellectuals of the Russian Empire, with the aim of cultural and political unification of all Turkic peoples.-Name:...

 and Pan-Islamist
Pan-Islamism
Pan-Islamism is a political movement advocating the unity of Muslims under one Islamic state — often a Caliphate. As a form of religious nationalism, Pan-Islamism differentiates itself from other pan-nationalistic ideologies, for example Pan-Arabism, by excluding culture and ethnicity as primary...

 movements against England, unless she signed a peace treaty favorable for Turkey.

During this interview Talaat maintained on several occasions that the CUP had always sought British friendship and advice; but Britain was in no mood to offer any assistance whatsoever.

Assassination, 1921

Before the assassination, the British intelligence services identified Talaat in Stockholm where he had gone for a few days. The British intelligence first planned to apprehend him in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

 where he was planning to return, but then changed its mind because it feared the complications this would create in Germany. Another view in the British intelligence was that Talaat should be apprehended by the British navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

 at sea while returning from Scandinavia by ship. At the end, it was decided to let him return to Berlin, find out what he was trying to accomplish with his activities abroad, and to establish direct contact with him before giving the final verdict. This was achieved with the help of Aubrey Nigel Henry Molyneux Herbert.

Their intelligence service established contact with its counterpart in the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 to evaluate the situation. Talaat Pasha's plans made the Russian officials as anxious as the British. The two intelligence services collaborated and signed among them the 'death warrant' of Talaat. Information concerning his physical description and his whereabouts was forwarded to their men in Germany.

It was decided that Armenian revolutionaries carry out the verdict. Arab journalist Mustafa Amin's contention is that the British intelligence itself was behind the assassinations of exiled Young Turk leaders in the early 1920s: such as Talaat, Djemal Pasha. As a matter of fact, Talaat was assassinated with a single bullet on 15 March 1921 as he came out of his house in Hardenbergstrasse, Charlottenburg. His assassin was an Armenian Revolutionary Federation
Armenian Revolutionary Federation
The Armenian Revolutionary Federation is an Armenian political party founded in Tiflis in 1890 by Christapor Mikaelian, Stepan Zorian, and Simon Zavarian...

 member from Erzurum named Soghomon Tehlirian
Soghomon Tehlirian
Soghomon Tehlirian was a native of Yerznka, an Armenian Evangelical survivor...

.

Trial of Soghomon Tehlirian

Soghomon Tehlirian admitted committing the murder. After a cursory two-day trial, he was found innocent by a German court on grounds of temporary insanity due to the traumatic experience he had gone through during the Genocide.

Posthumous Memoirs

In a very short time after the assassination of Talaat on March 1921, the "Posthumous Memoirs of Talaat" was published on October volume of The New York Times Current History. In this memoir, he accepted that the deportation was not carried out lawfully everywhere. He claimed that in the region there was hatred among the Armenians and Kurdish which had their bitter history. He also claimed that there were officials who abused their authority. He also states that region became unlawful and people took preventive measures into their own hands. He accepts that the duty of the Government was to prevent these abuses and atrocities. He claimed that as the minister of interior, he ordered to arrest those who were responsible and punished them according to the law.

Burial

He was buried in the Turkish Cemetery in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

. In 1943, his remains were taken to Istanbul
Istanbul
Istanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...

 and reburied in Şişli
Sisli
Şişli is one of 39 districts of Istanbul, Turkey. Located on the European side of the city, it is bordered by Beşiktaş to the east, Sarıyer to the north, Eyüp and Kağıthane to the west, and Beyoğlu to the south...

. His war memories were published after his death.

External links

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