The 1913 Ottoman coup d'état (23 January 1913), also known as the Raid on the Sublime Porte (Turkish: Bâb-ı Âlî Baskını), was a coup d'état carried out in the Ottoman Empire by a number of Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) members led by Ismail Enver Bey and Mehmed Talât Bey, in which the group made a surprise raid on the central Ottoman government buildings, the Sublime Porte (Turkish: Bâb-ı Âlî).
The coup occurred in the context of toxic partisanship in the Ottoman Empire between the CUP and the Freedom and Accord Party, including a fraudulent April 1912 general election benefiting the CUP and a coup against them in July. After receiving the permission of Sultan Mehmed V to form a new government in October 1912, Kâmil Pasha engaged in diplomatic talks with Bulgaria after the unsuccessful First Balkan War. With the looming Bulgarian demand for the cession of the former Ottoman capital city of Adrianople (today, and in Turkish at the time, known as Edirne) and the outrage among the Turkish populace and CUP leadership, the CUP carried out their coup on January 23, 1913. The Minister of War, Nazım Pasha, was killed and the Grand Vizier, Kâmil Pasha, was forced to resign. The government was then led by the triumvirate known as the "Three Pashas": Enver, Talât, and Cemal Pasha.
After the coup, opposition parties were subject to heavy repression. The new government led by Mahmud Şevket Pasha with Unionist support withdrew the Ottoman Empire from the ongoing London Peace Conference and resumed the war against the Balkan states to recover Edirne and the rest of Rumelia, but to no avail. After his assassination in June, the CUP would take full control of the empire, and opposition leaders would be arrested or exiled to Europe. Ottoman victory in the Second Balkan War and the recovery of Edirne in the face of pressure by the Entente powers moved the CUP closer to Germany ahead of World War I.
Immediate pretext
While the inner circle of the CUP may already have decided earlier to stage a coup to return to power, the proximate occasion was the CUP's fear that the government would concede to a demand by the Great Powers that the town of Adrianople (a former Ottoman capital city) be handed over to Bulgaria after the disastrous results of the First Balkan War for the Ottoman Empire.
Background
April 1912 elections and aftermath
In the 1908 elections, the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) had only managed to win about 60 of the 288 seats in the Chamber of Deputies (Turkish: Meclis-i Mebusân), the popularly elected lower house of the General Assembly. Nevertheless, it was the largest party in the Chamber.
The Freedom and Accord Party (Liberal Union/Entente) was founded on 21 November 1911 by those in opposition to the CUP, and immediately attracted 70 Deputies to its ranks. Only 20 days after its formation, Freedom and Accord won the December 1911 by-elections conducted in Constantinople by one vote. The ruling CUP, seeing the potential of Freedom and Accord to win next year's general elections, took several precautions. Hoping to thwart the nascent party's efforts to grow its ranks and better organize itself, the CUP asked Sultan Mehmed V to dissolve the Chamber and announced its call for early general elections in January 1912.
These early April 1912 general elections were known infamously as the "Election of Clubs" (Turkish: Sopalı Seçimler) after the beating of opposition (Freedom and Accord) candidates for the Chamber of Deputies with weapons like clubs and sticks as well being marred by electoral fraud and violence in favor of the CUP. The fraud included early balloting, secret counting and reporting of votes, ballot stuffing, reapportioning electoral districts, and more, although the CUP still enjoyed genuine support outside of the cities. The results of the elections had CUP win 269 of 275 seats in the Chamber, with Freedom and Accord only netting 6 Deputies.
Angered at their loss in the election, the leadership of Freedom and Accord sought extra-legal methods to regain power over the CUP, complaining vocally about electoral fraud. At around this time, a group of military officers, uncomfortable with injustices it perceived within the military, organized itself into an armed organization known as the "Savior Officers" (Turkish: Halâskâr Zâbitân) and made their presence known to the imperial government. The Savior Officers, quickly becoming partisans of Freedom and Accord, soon created unrest in the capital Constantinople. After gaining the support of Prince Sabahaddin, another opposition leader, the Savior Officers published public declarations in newspapers.
Finally, after giving a memorandum to the Military Council, the Savior Officers succeeded in getting Grand Vizier Mehmed Said Pasha (who they blamed for allowing the early elections that led to the CUP domination of the Chamber) and his government of CUP ministers to resign in July 1912.
Great Cabinet
After Mehmed Said Pasha's resignation, a new, non-partisan cabinet was formed by Ahmed Muhtar Pasha, an old military hero, which was known as the "Great Cabinet" (Turkish: Büyuk Kabine) because it included three former Grand Viziers as ministers and sometimes as the "Father-Son Cabinet" (Turkish: Baba-Oğul Kabinesi) because it included Ahmed Muhtar Pasha's son, Mahmud Muhtar Pasha, as Minister of the Navy. Although the Savior Officers had succeeded in making sure that the Great Cabinet was free of CUP members, the CUP's domination of the Chamber of Deputies had not changed. Soon, however, rumors began to circulate that the government would dissolve the Chamber of Deputies and call new elections. The rumors were confirmed when, a few days after Ahmed Muhtar Pasha took office, the Savior Officers sent another memorandum, this time to the President of the Chamber of Deputies (and CUP member), Halil Bey, demanding that the Chamber be dissolved for new elections within 48 hours. The CUP members in the Chamber condemned and censured this threat. However, thanks to a law he had passed through the Senate, Ahmed Muhtar Pasha was able, with the sultan's support, to dissolve the Chamber with ease on 5 August, after which Sultan Mehmed V immediately called for new elections by imperial decree.
While preparations for new elections were underway, however, the First Balkan War erupted early in October 1912, catching Ahmed Muhtar Pasha's administration off-guard. Martial law was declared, the new elections were cancelled on 25 October, and Ahmed Muhtar Pasha resigned as Grand Vizier on 29 October after just three months in the premier's office in order to defer to the premiership of Kâmil Pasha, who had good relations with the British and was expected to produce a favorable settlement to the disastrous war.
Government of Kâmil Pasha and lead-up to the coup
Although the foreign crisis in the Balkans put a temporary halt to domestic politics, it did not stop them. Unlike his predecessor Ahmed Muhtar Pasha, who had been non-partisan, Kâmil Pasha was an ardent anti-Unionist and was determined to use his premiership to destroy the CUP. After 1 January 1913 when the party came under the control of Gümülcineli İsmail, he saw both the CUP and Freedom and Accord as dangerous revolutionary committees.
Using his friendly relations with the British, Kâmil Pasha also sat down to end the ongoing First Balkan War diplomatically. However, the heavy Ottoman military defeats during the war continued to sap morale, as rumors that the capital would have to be moved from Constantinople to inland Anatolia spread. The Bulgarian Army had soon advanced as far as Çatalca, a western district of modern Istanbul. At this point, Kâmil Pasha's government signed an armistice with Bulgaria in December 1912 and sat down to draw up a treaty for the end of the war at the London Peace Conference.
The Great Powers–the British Empire, France, Italy, and Russia–had begun to engage in the relationship of Bulgaria with the Ottoman Empire, citing the 1878 Treaty of Berlin. The Great Powers gave a note to the Sublime Porte (the Ottoman government) that they wanted the Ottoman Empire to cede Adrianople (Edirne) to Bulgaria and the Aegean islands under its control, most of which by that time had been captured by the Greek Navy, to the Great Powers themselves. Because of the losses experienced by the army so far in the war, the Kâmil Pasha government was inclined to accept the "Midye-Enez Line" as a border to the west and, while not outright giving Edirne to Bulgaria, favored transferring control of it to an international commission.
After the capture of Salonica (Thessaloniki), the birthplace of many progressive political leaders and movements of the era, by Greece in November 1912, many CUP members were arrested by Greek forces and exiled to Anatolia. At the same time, Freedom and Accord found itself on the brink of dissolution after intra-party conflicts.
Left with little political power and flexibility, the CUP began to plan a coup against Kâmil Pasha's government. In addition, an animosity had already been brewing between Kâmil Pasha and the CUP since the 1908 Young Turk Revolution that had started the Second Constitutional Era. During the more than four years since, Kâmil Pasha had made a series of efforts to keep CUP members far from government and keep the army, which had many CUP members among its ranks, out of politics. By January 1913, the CUP was thoroughly frustrated with Kâmil Pasha. Although the coup was to be a surprise attack, the CUP had made definitive decisions to carry it out far in advance.
Although he was killed during the coup, both the CUP and Freedom and Accord claimed that they had been planning to give Minister of the Navy Nazım Pasha a position in their next cabinet. The CUP's Talaat Bey went as far as to say some time after the coup that the CUP had previously offered Nazım Pasha the position of grand vizier and the leadership its cabinet.
Events
March towards the Sublime Porte
On 23 January 1913, at 14:30, Lieutenant Colonel Enver Bey (later and better known as Enver Pasha), one of the top leaders of the Committee of Union and Progress, was notified by a CUP member named Sapancalı Hakkı that everything was prepared for the raid as he waited in the military supply-station inspectorate (Turkish: menzil müfettişliği) building near the Nuruosmaniye Mosque. After receiving this news, Enver Bey mounted a white horse waiting for him and began to ride the several blocks from Nuruosmaniye towards the Sublime Porte, which was a metonym referring to a group of government buildings that housed the offices of the Grand Vizier, his imperial government, and other state offices. At this time, Talaat Bey (later known as Talaat Pasha) also began to make his way towards the Sublime Porte with a group of CUP loyalists.
When Enver Bey arrived in front of the Ministry of Public Works (Turkish: Nafıa Nazırlığı) building, fellow CUP members Ömer Naci and Ömer Seyfettin were already provoking a crowd that had gathered by loudly proclaiming that Kâmil Pasha was about to cede Adrianople to the Bulgarians. The speeches made by Ömer Naci and Ömer Seyfettin were effective, and the front of the Sublime Porte was soon filled with a crowd shouting slogans against Kâmil Pasha's government. Moreover, up to 60 CUP members were placed around the Sublime Porte's buildings.
Entering the Sublime Porte
Enver Bey, along with confederates Talaat Bey, Sapancalı Hakkı, Yakub Cemil, Mustafa Necip, and about 50 others, entered the Sublime Porte compound of government buildings and made their way into the Grand Vizier's building, in which Kâmil Pasha and his cabinet were in session. An aide-de-camp to the Grand Vizier, Ohrili Nâfiz Bey, heard the commotion and opened fire on the raid party but was unable to hit any of them. Himself wounded in the exchange, Ohrili Nâfiz Bey hid in the aide-de-camp office; when Mustafa Necip entered the office, Ohrili Nâfiz Bey shot and killed him but died himself of his wounds sustained from Mustafa Necip.
An aid-de-camp and nephew of Nazım Pasha, Kıbrıslı Tevfik Bey, had also drawn his revolver and fired at the raid party, his bullet also striking Mustafa Necip. After the raiders returned fire, Kıbrıslı Tevfik Bey was instantly killed. During the shooting, a secret police agent and an attendant of the Sheikh ul-Islam were also killed.
Shooting of Nazım Pasha
Hearing the gunshots, Minister of War Nazım Pasha stepped out of his room and rushed towards the raid party. According to the memoirs of future Turkish president and prime minister Celâl Bayar, Nazım Pasha angrily shouted at the men, "What is going on? You came to raid the grand vizier's office?", using "ill-mannered" profanities in his rage, after which Enver Bey saluted him and tried to explain his intentions. At this time Yakub Cemil, approaching Nazım Pasha from the back while he was engaged with Enver Bey and the rest of the coup party, fired his gun at Nazım Pasha's right temple, killing him.
Another account claimed that Enver Bey had tried to stop Yakup Cemil from killing Nazım Pasha, but Yakup Cemil had refused to listen. Yet another version of events held that either Enver Bey or Talaat Bey had accidentally killed Nazım Pasha while trying to protect themselves from gunfire from his aid-de-camp Kıbrıslı Tevfik Bey.