of Sakarya with the following exchange of telegrams and some
commentary about the role of Gen. Stratigos in fomenting
the Greek Army's confusion at the front line.//
Gen. Papoulas being shown the minarets of Bursa, Spring 1921.
The Army’s Thoughts
In order to be clear about the basis within which the army worked and how it
understood the national interest, we herewith provide verbatim the answer the
army provided to the nonsense of the Minister of War or, more rightly, his advisor
Mr. Stratigos:
To the Minister of War
I have the honor to report the arrival of your order number 15809, which
was received today and which orders us to remain on the line we currently occupy.
This order also puts on the army the responsibility for the conduct of this
extensive operation, as well as for the initiative that will have a profound effect
on the political and military situation. In this regard, I present these matters
below: 1 – up until now the army has remained faithful to the contents of the
report that was accepted and approved at Kütahya; 2 – when the army saw that
it would be inappropriate to move forward toward Ankara, this was presented in
report number 19303, which was sent by means of General Stratigos on 22
August. We received the Prime Minister’s response, number 13554 of 23 August,
which was sent from Bursa. This response recommended that our decisions and
movements be made without being affected by political considerations, that they
not be linked to either political considerations or any idea previously accepted and
approved, and that we conform only and exclusively to advantageous and
beneficial military concepts.
Following the presentation of the aforementioned report, on 23 August I
informed you of my decision regarding withdrawal to behind the Sakarya and, as
this movement was conducted with exemplary success, I ordered the occupation of
the west bank of the Sakarya on the night of 30/31 August. I waited 4 days after
pulling back from the Sakarya; because no new order came from the government,
on 3 September, in accordance with the 15 July report and the Prime Minister’s
order number 15353, I gave the order to gradually move in order to occupy the
Eskişehir line. The same day, I received your order number 15355, which made
known the Prime Minister’s response; this response of the Prime Minister did not
impose on the army the requirement for the adoption of the other decisions. I did
not deem it appropriate to respond to this last order until the end of the first
operation. On 5 September at hour 21, after the start of the movement I ordered,
I received your order number 15790, which directed me to inform you of our
investigations related to which line we thought would be most appropriate to
occupy. Because the army’s opinion related to the return to the Eskişehir position
from Sakarya had been known since the Council of War discussions at Kütahya,
and because this opinion was approved by the government, I could not imagine
that an intermediary line of occupation between the Sakarya and the positions east
of Eskişehir would be under consideration. Consequently, I suppose and perceive
that an investigation of positions to be occupied in the future is under consideration
and I will present this investigation in the very near future. Additionally, on 5
September General Stratigos called the Deputy Chief of the General Staff by
telephone from Eskişehir, said that he had read the army’s orders and that these
orders were suitable to the ideas of the government.
Consequently, when today, 7 September, I received your order number 15800
directing us to remain at the occupied positions, I was dumbfounded; I had no
knowledge of instructions number 13007, which were said to have been sent by
means of General Stratigos and which were mentioned in this order, and I still have
not received the aforementioned instructions.
Yesterday I informed you about the occupation of the (Yeni Yaltıklı – Penik)
line; however, these intermediate lines have no military importance and the distance
from the main Eskişehir line is quite short. The army should freely occupy a
definite line when it has the initiative in a military operation, not under enemy
pressure. The army has had to dispatch forces from the front to reinforce the 2nd
Infantry Division and, in particular, the Afyonkarahisar group. In short, as the cold
season has come and the rains are approaching, any further delay would not be
favorable. Based on these aforementioned reasons, the army believes that, at this
time, it must continue the ordered march in order to transit the few kilometers that
still separate it from Eskişehir.
From the beginning, the army has conducted the operation in accordance with
the presented and approved program and is continuing the initiative in a strictly
orderly fashion, based on the means it has on hand, mindful not of the enemy but
of itself. Additionally, please allow me to present another operation. In my report
number 19003 of 19 August, I requested that I be replaced if the government does
not have confidence in the army command. Once again I repeat this request of mine
and ask that you urgently respond so that no doubt or hesitation remains that might
have an effect on the conduct of the operation.
A. Papoulas
Note – the resignation in question was submitted because of a heated telegram
from the government, which was not receiving the reports summarizing the military
situation in an orderly manner because of the disruption of communications.
I received the following telegram in response to the above telegram:
Minister of War
Number
15819 8 – 9 – 21
To the Command of the Army of Asia Minor
Your telegram number 19970 has been received. With regard to your
request concerning confidence in the army command, l reiterate what I wrote
in the last paragraph of my order number 155595 of 23 August. In addition, let me
here clearly state to you that if during the time that I have administered the Ministry
of War, I had any idea or notion about the need for a change in command I would
have done so immediately. Consequently, the matter of ..... trust in the command is
not a subject under discussion. I think that you received order number 15802,
which was in cipher, without any corruption of the original and in its proper form;
and because responses were requested again from you to three questions, which I
had posed previously, in my order number 15790, which you received on the fifth
of the month, I request that you inform me as quickly as possible with regard to the
reasons and the meanings you discern from this order of mine. When it comes to
the continuation of the operation ordered by the army and which is ongoing, the
response sent by the Prime Minister, number 16554 of 23 August, which you stated
in your telegram had been rerceived, continues to definitively remain in force.
Theotokis 20152
Very well. So as can be understood, the Ministry had fallen into contradictions.
Actually, on one hand saying that we must conform to the Prime Minister’s telegram,
which recommended completely free movement in the operation, and on the other
hand wanting an answer to the order that called for an expansion of the front.
I must confess that if I had not known the Minister’s sangfroid, I would have
thought he had lost his mind. So what had happened in this period? Because the
Minister had a blind faith in Stratigos he signed order number 13790 that the
aforementioned individual wrote to the army, without even reading it. Consequently,
the orders signed by the Minister but written by someone else were naturally
contradictory.
Here we must make and explain the point that neither the Prime Minister nor
his Cabinet members knew about the Minister’s orders or Statigos’s impact on these
matters. After all of these affairs, this man wants to be seen as the defender of the
crimes he himself committed because of his impropriety, incoherence, insanity and
indifference, and of people who have committed crimes that I am unaware of.
Dead Greek soldiers being buried near Sakarya, August 1921.
//END OF PART V//
Hiç yorum yok:
Yorum Gönder