When the Middle East Became a Colony for Europe

Many people today believe that the Jewish State of Israel is responsible for the troubles in the Middle East. While it is true that the Arab states oppose the existence of Israel- even to the point of waging war- the Middle East would still not know peace and stability even if all the Jews left the region tomorrow. The problems in the Middle East today go way back in history.

If you look at the Middle East in the 19th century, long before anybody even thought of creating a Jewish State, you will see that a lot of the problems today started when Europeans colonized the region for their own economic advantage.

In the 19th Century, the Ottoman Turkish Empire controlled most of the Middle East region, and had kept control of the region for about 400 years. In the 1500's, Turkish armies defeated the Mamelukes of Egypt, then advanced far into Europe- the Turks conquered Hungary, the Balkans, and threatened to take over Vienna and the nation of Austria. By the late 1700's, however, Austria and Russia had taken back much of the Turkish possessions in Central Europe. The Turks also had not kept up with the scientific and technological advances of the Europeans (you can see more about this in a previous hub).

By 1800, the nations of Europe probably could have easily conquered the entire Ottoman Empire. Each of these nations, however, did not want to see any of the others gain an advantage in the Middle East, so they all made diplomatic maneuvers to strengthen the Ottoman government. It was also the anonymous bureaucrats who kept the government and the military machinery operating. The Ottoman Empire kept operating at this time, in spite of the Sultans, many of whom were inept rulers.

In 1798, Napoleon Bonaparte brought a small French army to Egypt. He needed military victories to complete his plan for taking control of France, and the backward Mameluke army seemed to be the place to get those victories.  Napoleon quickly took control of Egypt, but was forced to leave by the Turkish army before accomplishing all of his goals (see the video slide show for more details).  Napoleon eventually forgot about Egypt as he nearly conquered all of Europe.

Napoleon's adventure brought to Egypt a Turkish officer named Mohammed (or Mehmet) Ali. The Mamluk warlords quickly fell to Ali, who took control of Egypt and transformed it into an autonomous region of the Ottoman Empire. Ali tried to modernize Egypt, building factories, setting up a railroad system, and persuading farmers to plant cotton as a cash crop. Trouble came, however, when Ali sent his new Egyptian army to put down a Greek revolt in1829. European nations rallied to support Greek independence, and the armies of the Great Powers dismantled the Egyptian army. They also tore down some of the factories and schools that Ali had set up. The Europeans sent a clear message- the people of the Middle East could try to modernize, but not to an extent that threatened European interests.

Egypt fell into debt to European banks (see the video slide show for more details), and the Sultans in Istanbul, rulers of the Ottoman Empire, also fell into the same trap. The Ottoman Sultans had tried to modernize their land in the same way that Mohammed Ali tried to do for Egypt. Building a modern society, along with a modern army, is not cheap, and the Sultans found themselves hopeless stuck in debt to European banks. Most of the Empire's revenues went towards paying off the debt, until the Europeans stepped in and took over the finances of the Ottoman Empire.

Of course, finances were not the only area of the Ottoman Empire that Europeans invaded. More trouble for the Turks came from the fact that a considerable number of Christians- mostly members of the Eastern Orthodox Church- lived inside the Ottoman Empire. The Russian Czar made a claim that he could interfere in Ottoman politics in order to protect the Orthodox Christians.

In the 1850's, the Czar kept pressing this claim until war broke out. This became known as the Crimean War, because all the battles were fought on the Crimean peninsula, on the north side of the Black Sea. Britain and France stepped in on the side of the Turks because they did not want to see Russian gain an advantage in the Middle East. One of the battles of this war inspired the famous poem, "Charge of the Light Brigade." The Crimean War was also the first war to be photographed. Other than that, there's not much to say about this war.

The Crimean War ended inconclusively- neither Russia nor the Turks gained much, nor did Britain and France, for all the men who were killed. But the war served to show how the Ottoman Empire figured in European politics: not as a major power, but as an entity that needed to be protected.

Many people began to regard the Turks as a backward people, a people in a lower class than the Europeans. Some Turks even believed this of their own people. Several young Turks had attended university in Europe- they had been sent there by the Sultans. These young men saw the progress of technology in Europe, and they began to see their own country as backward. As these men took positions in the Ottoman government, they took steps to modernize their country.

In 1876, Sultan Abdul Aziz declared that the Ottoman Empire was bankrupt. The capital, Istanbul, fell into chaos, and the Sultan was deposed, replaced by Sultan Abdul Hamid II. By this time, the Ottoman government was filled with young men who had attended European universities, where they learned about constitutional governments. They decided that the Ottoman Empire would work better with checks and balances on the Sultan's sole authority. The new Sultan reluctantly agreed, and an Ottoman constitution was drawn up, providing for an Assembly of elected officials to share the Sultan's power.

Two years later, the Sultan dissolved the Assembly. He imposed tight censorship on newspapers, and set up a system of spies to identify anybody who criticized the Ottoman government. The Sultan also improved telegraph communications (which served his purpose for keeping track of his people), and opened the Orient Express railway from Istanbul to Paris.

Sultan Abdul Hamid revived the claim to the office of Caliph- the Successor to Mohammed- which the Turkish Sultans had claimed years earlier. Abdul Hamid believed that the Ottoman Sultan should consider himself as the leader of the entire Moslem community- the umma. If the Russian Czar wanted to lay claim as the protector of all Orthodox Christians, then the Sultan wanted to be seen as the protector of all Moslems.

But none of this solved the deep financial troubles of the Ottoman Empire. The Sultan had avoided European occupation of his realm, as the British had occupied Egypt, but this was not by anything the Sultan had done. Europeans prevented other Europeans from occupying the Ottoman Empire. The Turks, meanwhile, were still hopelessly stuck in debt, still hopelessly falling behind the Europeans in science and technology. It was only by the will of Europeans that the Ottoman Empire, or "the sick man of Europe, as some reffered to it, continued to exist.