"We are, gentlemen, before all, Turks. I wonder why we are called
Ottomans, for who is Osman after whom we are named? He is a Turk from
Altai, who overran this country with his Turkish Army. Therefore it is
more of an honour to us to be named after his origin than after himself.
We have so far been deceived by the ignorance of our forebears, and fie
on these forebears who made us forget our nationality.... Be sure that
Turkish nationality is better for us than Islam, and racial pride is one
of the greatest social virtues[7]."

These extravagances must not be taken too literally. The Young Turk
politicians, though they have embarked on a Nationalist policy, are not
so reckless as to break openly with Islam or to denounce the founder of
their State. They see clearly enough that Turkish Nationalism carried to
a logical extreme is incompatible with the Ottoman pretension, and they
favour the view, so severely criticised by Tekin Alp, "that all three
groups of ideas--Ottomanism, Islamism, and the Turkish Movement--should
work side by side and together." But, with this reservation, they follow
the doctrinaires, who on their part are quite ready to press Islam into
their service. Tekin Alp candidly admits that

"They sought after a judicious mingling of the religious and national
impulses. They realised only too clearly that the still abstract ideals
of Nationalism could not be expected to attract the masses, the lower
classes, composed of uneducated and illiterate people. It was found more
expedient to reach these classes under the flag of religion."

This sentence reveals in a flash one motive of the Armenian
"Deportations," which followed Turkey's intervention in the War; and a
celebrated German authority, in a memorial[8] written in 1916, gives