Page:Turkey, the great powers, and the Bagdad Railway.djvu/345

 Anglo-French differences in the Near East were brought to a head by the rapid rise of the military power of the Angora Government, for it was against France that Mustapha Kemal's troops launched their principal early attacks. General Gouraud—his hands tied by an Arab rebellion which had necessitated a considerable extension of his lines in Syria—was unable to repulse the Turkish invasion of Cilicia, which reached really serious proportions in the autumn of 1920. Time and again French units were defeated and French garrisons massacred by the victorious Nationalists. In these circumstances, France "had to choose between the two following alternatives: either to maintain her effectives and to continue the war in Cilicia, or to negotiate with the de facto authority which was in command of the Turkish troops in that region." The French armies in Syria and Cilicia already numbered more than 100,000 men; to reënforce them would have been to flout the opinion of the nation and the Chamber, "which had vigorously expressed their determination to put an end to cruel bloodshed and to expenditure which it was particularly difficult to bear." To negotiate with Mustapha Kemal was, to all intents and purposes, to scrap the unratified Treaty of Sèvres. The French Government chose the latter alternative. It is said that during the London Conference of February-March, 1921, "M. Briand declared to Mr. Lloyd George on several occasions, without the British Prime Minister making the slightest observation, that he would not leave England without having concluded an agreement with the Angora delegation. M. Briand pointed out that neither the Chamber nor French public opinion would agree to the prolongation of hostilities, involving as they did losses which were both heavy and useless."[15]

Accordingly, on March 9, 1921, there was signed at