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The victorious Allies, of course, favored the complaisant Sultan, but in their greed they served to further Kemal. The Sultan and the Grand Vizier went to Versailles to plead not to be denuded of all land and power. Clemenceau, the Tiger, said coldly: "Be silent, Your Highness! Relieve Paris of your presence." The Allies handed the Sultan the Treaty of Sevres, which split Turkey six ways. The Greeks marched in to enforce the Diktat, and Kemal roared: "Turks! Will you crawl to these Greeks who were your slaves only yesterday?" He raised an army of peasants, veterans, criminals, patriots. Two years later, a few miles outside of Ankara, he gave the orders: "Soldiers, the Mediterranean is your goal," and drove the Greeks back into the sea.
The Treaty of Lausanne which followed reversed the humiliation of Sevres. The last British admiral boarded the last British battleship in the Bosporus, snapped a respectful salute to the crescent flag and steamed off. The most defeated of enemies became the first to defy the victorious Allies, to scrap one of their treaties. The Ataturk miracle had begun: Mustafa Kemal, soldier, was master of Turkey.
Only Turks. The nation he put back together was slightly larger than Texas—296,000 sq.mi.—its vast bulk nestled in Asia Minor, with 9,000 sq.mi. wedging into Europe's southeastern corner. Kemal was satisfied. "We are now Turks—only Turks," he exulted. He wanted none of the old overextended Ottoman empire. "Away with dreams and shadows; they have cost us dearly," he said.
Kemal went on a speaking tour among his people: "Remain yourselves, but take from the West that which is indispensable to the life of a developed people. Let science and new ideas come in freely. If you don't, they will devour you."
He began taking from the West, but he took with discrimination. He wanted to democratize Turkey, for "no country is free unless it is democratic." But he recognized that "Democracy in Turkey now would be a caricature," and set his dictatorship to preparing his nation for democracy. Thirty years ago this month (on Oct. 29, 1923), Kemal became: President of the new republic, commander in chief of the army, president of the Council of Ministers, chief of the only party, and speaker of the Assembly. He began ridding the Turks of the things that reminded them of the degenerate past. First he ordered the Sultan expelled; 16 months later the Caliph (or Moslem spiritual leader) was exiled. Kemal announced that "Islam is a dead thing," and Turkey became a nondenominational state.
The break with the past had to be felt, simply and simultaneously, by all Turks. Ataturk looked about for the significant gesture. In India it had been salt-making in defiance of the British monopoly; in China it was cutting off the queue. Ataturk chose to attack the fez, traditional symbol of Ottoman citizenship. "The fez is a sign of ignorance," said he. He laid down a deadline: after that date, no brimless headgear. Some Turks, unable to find hats with brims, wore their wives' hats: better to look silly than to risk losing your head.