The Young Turks’ Balkan Policy (1908-1913)

The Young Turk movement had the most serious impact on Rumelia where actually the Young Turk revolution itself started. The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) which came to power after the revolution of 1908 had also its centre in Rumelia until the Balkan Wars of 1912/13. Furthermore, the Macedonian Question and the CUP’s political attempts to resolve that question played an important role in the development of the Committee’s political thinking. After the failure of its policy of creating a “union” among different ethnic groups in the Balkans by making compromises and negotiations with armed committees and political organisations, the CUP tried to achieve this goal by implementing restrictive laws such as disarming the population in Macedonia and Albania. Not only these attempts failed but also the Ottoman Empire lost its Balkan territories in consequence of the Balkan Wars. Both of these experiences in Macedonia and the trauma caused by the loss of Rumelia played a very important role in the radicalisation of the CUP after 1913. Finally it is important to remember that most of the leading members of the CUP were from Rumelia. Mehmet HACISALİHOĞLU

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