World War I: How It Reshaped the Middle East

In our previous blog, we explored how the Soviet Union reshaped Central Asia with artificial borders and strict assimilation policies. However, they were not the only ones drawing lines on a map. At the exact same time, Western imperial powers were executing a similar “divide and rule” strategy in the Middle East.

Today, to understand the endless conflicts, border disputes, and political crises we see on the news every day, we must look back to the aftermath of World War I. The Middle East we know today was not formed by natural historical progression, but by the pens and rulers of European diplomats. 

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During the depressed days of World War I, Britain, France, and Tsarist Russia had already drawn the map of the Middle East behind closed doors. They divided the region among themselves through secret treaties (especially the Sykes-Picot Agreement). However, an unexpected storm broke out: Russia withdrew from the war due to the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. The new Soviet government created a massive diplomatic crisis by exposing these secret imperialist plans to the whole world.

When US President Woodrow Wilson published his Fourteen Points (which explicitly opposed colonialism), the perfect plans of Britain and France took a heavy blow.

The San Remo Conference

However, these obstacles were not enough to stop the Western powers. The USA, disappointed by European politics, returned to its famous Monroe Doctrine (Policy of Isolation). This massive shift left the Middle Eastern stage entirely to Britain and France. Breathing a sigh of relief without the pressure of the USA, these two powers found a new disguise to achieve their goals: The Mandate System. Consequently, at the San Remo Conference in 1920, this new version of colonialism was formalized. They reached a strict consensus to officially divide the Middle Eastern territories under mandate regimes.

After the resolution on 25 April 1920, standing outside Villa Devachan, from left to right: Matsui, Lloyd George, Curzon, Berthelot, Millerand, Vittorio Scialoja, and Nitti. Enhanced by AI

Middle East Map

According to the official excuse of the League of Nations, some regions were not yet capable of “governing themselves” or “protecting their lands from attacks.” Therefore, it was argued that these nations should be managed by a “developed” state until they reached a certain level of maturity.

By the early 1920s, the Middle East was divided between two major imperial powers:

• France: Took Syria and Lebanon under its mandate. It also strengthened its control over Algeria and Tunisia in North Africa.
• Britain: To protect its trade routes to India and secure oil fields, it brought Iraq, Palestine, Jordan, and Kuwait into its mandate system. It also took strategic points in the Arabian Peninsula under its protection.

It was an announcement that the future of millions of people would be decided by others.

Emir Faisal's party at Versailles, during the Paris Peace Conference of 1919; left to right: Rustum Haidar, Nuri al-Said, Prince Faisal (front), Captain Pisani (rear), Lawrence, Faisal's servant (name unknown), Captain Hassan Khadri

Empty Promises and the Spark of Resistance in Egypt

While Britain and France were dividing the Middle East on paper, they needed to soften the inevitable anger of the local people. To do this, they issued a joint declaration on November 7, 1918, promising Arab nations the right to “establish their own democratic governments.” However, it soon became clear that these promises were nothing more than a stalling tactic.

The first major crack in this colonial system appeared in Egypt. Britain's attempt to establish total dominance clashed heavily with Egyptian nationalists. The Wafd Party, founded by Saad Zaghloul in early 1919, led a massive resistance movement, organizing strikes and protests throughout the country. Britain tried to extinguish this fire by exiling Zaghloul and other leaders, but this move backfired and only fueled the public's anger.

Stepping Back: The Winds of Independence

Faced with a growing and unstoppable crisis, Britain was forced to declare Egypt's independence with a declaration on February 28, 1922. The ruler of the time, Khedive Fuad I, accepted this declaration and took the title of King (Melik). At the end of this long struggle, Egypt completely abolished capitulations in 1937 and became a member of the League of Nations.

It wasn't just Britain; France also had to bow to the resistance in the region. Due to increasing nationalist pressures, France was forced to sign treaties paving the way for independence for Syria in 1930 and Lebanon in 1936.

The Middle East we know today was manufactured in European conference rooms. Sykes-Picot, San Remo different names for the same ambition. However, the wounds never healed. In our next post, we turn eastward to Japan, and the Meiji Restoration.

The October Revolution: Bolsheviks (Part I)

In the previous blog, we discussed how the world was being divided among Western powers at the Paris Peace Conference. However, one country was absent from that equation: Russia. A new world order was being established, but in the East, not only was a country collapsing; new ideologies were also emerging.

In the 20^th century, the collapse of Czarist Russia started. The fear and unrest of poor peasants and workers, overwhelmed by the harsh conditions under Czarist Russia, in particular, spread gradually across Russia under the leadership of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. In fact, the first attempt at revolt came in 1905; peasants and workers managed to establish workers' councils in St. Petersburg and Moscow, known for the first time as “Soviets.”

However, the major factor accelerating the collapse of the regime was not poverty alone; it was the war beyond Russia's borders. The destructive conditions of World War I led to widespread famine among Russians, and a critical turning point came at the Dardanelles. During the Battle of Gallipoli, the Entente powers failed to achieve any decisive victory; as a result, Allied supplies and aid could not reach Russia.

Due to the lack of Allied supplies, this destroyed the last hope of the Tsarist regime. The resistance at the Dardanelles acted as a butterfly effect, transforming Russian opposition into an unstoppable force. A great rebellion breaking out on March 8, 1917, was the first spark that ended an empire that had lasted for centuries.

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The October Revolution: The Rise of the Bolsheviks

Unable to withstand the mounting pressure of the uprisings, Tsar Nicholas II was forced to abdicate on March 16, 1917. The Provisional Government, subsequently established by the Duma (the Russian Parliament), proclaimed a republic in September. However, this new government failed to address the people's most profound wound. Its insistence on remaining in the devastating fronts of World War I exhausted the patience of the peasants and soldiers who were already struggling with hunger and poverty.

It was precisely in this chaotic environment that Vladimir Ilyich Lenin stepped onto the stage, crying out the magical slogan the masses had been longing to hear: “Peace, Land, and Bread!” Under Lenin's political leadership and organized by the military genius of Leon Trotsky, the Bolsheviks stormed the Winter Palace on November 7, 1917, an event that would go down in history as the October Revolution, and seized power.

Brest-Litovsk and the NEP Era

The very first promise the Bolsheviks kept upon coming to power was “peace.” In 1918, they sat down at the table with the Central Powers and signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, an agreement carrying harsh terms, formally withdrawing Russia from World War I. Through this treaty, the Ottoman Empire also reclaimed Kars, Ardahan, and Batumi.

Having ended the war abroad, the Bolsheviks now found themselves face to face with a collapsed economy and a bloody civil war at home. Lenin realized that in order for the new regime, which would soon take the name the USSR, to survive, he would need to temporarily loosen the rigid principles of communist ideology. In 1921, he declared the NEP (New Economic Policy), a relatively flexible economic model that allowed peasants to sell their surplus grain on the open market. This move breathed new life into the Soviet economy and consolidated Bolshevik power.

Red Guard unit of the Vulkan factory in Petrograd, October 1917

When the Bolsheviks saw that the rigid practices of “War Communism” were driving the country toward catastrophe, they allowed themselves a necessary flexibility through the New Economic Policy (NEP). Under this policy, the forced seizure of agricultural produce from peasants was abandoned. Small tradespeople and merchants were given room to breathe, the nationalization of small industrial enterprises was halted, and various opportunities were even extended to foreign capital.

However, this was not a return to capitalism; it was a tactical step back. The Bolshevik government continued to keep the “commanding heights of the economy”, banks, large industrial establishments, and transportation networks, firmly in its own hands. This pragmatic move allowed the economy to recover rapidly while giving the new regime the time it so desperately needed.

The greatest obstacle standing before the Bolsheviks as they attempted to rebuild the economy was their political rivals. The revolution had split the country sharply in two. On one side stood the “Whites”, the White Army composed of those who wished to restore the monarchy, constitutionalists, Mensheviks, and the Cossacks, the privileged soldiers of the old regime. On the other stood the Bolsheviks, sworn never to relinquish power. This relentless struggle ignited the Russian Civil War. In December 1917, the Bolsheviks established a secret police organization known as the Cheka (the Extraordinary Commission) to eliminate their rivals, launching a systematic “Red Terror” across the country.

The most shattering event of this period, in which dissenting voices were silenced without mercy, came in 1918. With the stated aim of “completely destroying any hope of the old regime's return,” the Bolsheviks executed Tsar Nicholas II and the entire Romanov family by firing squad, drawing a bloody line under the age of autocracy.

The dissolution of the Constituent Assembly on 6 January 1918. The Tauride Palace is locked and guarded by Trotsky, Sverdlov, Zinoviev and Lashevich

Germany's defeat at the end of World War I handed the Bolsheviks the historic opportunity they had been waiting for. Russia, having largely escaped the chaos of the civil war and consolidated its strength, announced to the world that it no longer recognized the punishing Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, a treaty it had been forced to sign from a position of weakness. The Red Army moved to reclaim the imperial territories it had lost. In the south, it established control over the Caucasus, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia. However, the resistance in the north could not be broken; the Bolsheviks were compelled to reluctantly accept the independence of Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, and Finland.

The Moscow leadership knew that the oppressive “Russification” policy, the forced assimilation that had been Tsarist Russia's greatest mistake, would plant the seeds of the revolution’s own destruction. From the 1920s onward, they therefore pursued a cunningly calculated strategy. To prevent potential nationalist uprisings against the system, they announced that they recognized the linguistic and cultural autonomy of different peoples.

Beneath this facade of “brotherhood of peoples” and equality, the structure of the state was formally transformed into a federation. Founded by signatures put to paper in the final days of 1922, this vast construct officially took the name the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the USSR, by 1923. A new, red, and colossal actor had appeared on the map.

The Death of Lenin. Generated by AI

The Bolsheviks’ consolidation of power in Russia sent shockwaves of panic through the capitalist nations of the West. The Allied powers viewed this new “Red” regime as an existential threat, fearing that the virus of communism would leap across into Europe. In an effort to contain the spread of Bolshevism, they erected what amounted to a “quarantine wall” between themselves and the Soviet Union. To this end, they extended significant political and military support to Finland, the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania), Poland, and Romania, effectively attempting to confine the USSR within its own borders.

The Death of Lenin and the Man of Steel: Josef Stalin

By January 1924, an era had closed for the USSR: Vladimir Lenin, the architect of the revolution, was dead. From the bloody and merciless power struggle that followed his death, one man emerged victorious: Josef Stalin, known as the “Man of Steel.” With Stalin's rise to power, the relatively flexible NEP era came to an end, and the Soviet Union entered a period of rigid totalitarian control in which the state brought everything under absolute authority.

In the span of a few years, a centuries-old empire had collapsed, a new ideology had seized power, and the map of the world had been redrawn in red. The first part of our journey ends here. 

In the second part, we will follow Stalin's rise and the iron transformation of the Soviet Union into something the world had never seen before.

Part II: The Basmachi Movement: Against the Soviet Empire (Part II)