Page:The Rebirth Of Turkey 1923.pdf/171

 the West stood with bayonets fixed, confronting an East which had been largely disarmed.

It appears to be unquestioned that no clause of the Mudros armistice authorized the Allies to occupy Smyrna. The only clause which has been advanced as possibly covering the occupation, is clause 7 which gives the Allies "the right to occupy any strategic points in the event of a situation arising which threatens the security of the Allies." None of the dozen Allied officers who had been posted to Smyrna has ever claimed that a situation existed there which threatened even their own security, to say nothing of the security of the Allies. Mustapha Kemal Pasha at Sivas interpreted the occupation as a violation of the armistice by the Allies themselves and held it accordingly as no longer binding. The surrender of munitions to the Allies ceased immediately. The Anatolian peasant left his growing crops and went angrily back to war.