Mülki ve Askerî Görevlilerin Raporlarına Göre Yunan İşgali Altında Balıkesir (1920-1922)
İtilaf Devletlerinin müsaadesi ve desteğiyle Batı Anadolu’ya giren Yunanlar, 30 Haziran 1920’de Balıkesir’i işgal ettiler ve iki seneyi aşkın bir süre burada kaldılar. İşgalle birlikte Anadolu’nun içlerine doğru ilerleyen Yunanlar, yerli sivil halka karşı gittikçe şiddetini arttıran zalimce tavırlar sergilemeye başladılar. Söz konusu büyük mezalim dışında Yunanlar, işgal ettikleri bölgelerin haberleşme, malî ve idarî faaliyetlerine de hâkim olup kendilerine ait bir yönetim kurarak kente, dolayısıyla ülkeye yerleşme arzusuna kapıldılar. İşgal esnasında bölgede görevli mülki ve askerî amirlerin İstanbul Hükûmeti’ne hitaben kaleme aldıkları raporları içeren arşiv belgelerinin temel alındığı bu çalışmayla işgal esnasında bölgede yaşanan gelişmeler hakkında tafsilatlı malumat elde etme imkânı bulundu.
Balıkesir under Greek Occupation According to the Reports of Civil and Military Officials (1920-1922)
The Greeks, who entered Western Anatolia with the permission and support of the Entente Powers, occupied Balıkesir on June 30, 1920, and stayed there for more than two years. With the occupation, the Greeks advancing towards the interior of Anatolia began to adopt increasingly violent manners towards the indigenous civilians. Apart from the great atrocities in question, the Greeks also dominated the communication, financial and administrative activities of the regions they occupied, and by establishing an administration of their own, they desired to settle in the city and therefore in the country. This study, based on archive documents containing reports addressed to the Istanbul Government by the civilian and military chiefs in the region during the occupation, reveals detailed information about the developments in the region at that time.
The Greek invasion in Balıkesir, which started on June 30, 1920 and lasted for more than two years, had financial, administrative and socio-cultural consequences as well as military ones. This article discusses both the activities carried out by Greeks during the occupation in order to settle in Balıkesir permanently as well as the atrocities they committed and the problems caused thereby . The methodology chosen for the study is that of a detailed examination of the newspapers of the period and the literature at the core of reports written by some officials who were in the region at that time based on archive documents. According to these examined documents, as in other regions of occupation, the Greeks did not hesitate to implement certain practices that ignored the sovereign rights of the state in order to establish a Greek administration with steps to regulate the economic, administrative and socio-cultural structure towards the people in Balıkesir. That is to say, as can be understood from the statements of the Karesi Governor Cevdet Bey, after occupying the area, the Greeks started to work by removing the law enforcement officers from Balıkesir. They applied actions that led to the confiscation and restriction of communication tools that are vital in many ways in war or peace. They also saw to the dissolution of local personnel, and even to the establishment of a post office on their own behalf. Then, step by step, they liquidated and neutralized the managers of key government departments such as finance, courthouse and education. Finally, they prepared the ground for the realization of their goal of fully dominating the administrative mechanism in the region by sending the Karesi Governor Cevdet Bey, who was the greatest civilian authority of the port at the time , from Balıkesir to Istanbul. Their reason for doing this was that he defended the law of his state and did not submit to what they wanted him to do. In his stead they appointed someone as the deputy governor who could enforce their own wishes and they took over the administration, albeit indirectly, by implementing a bureaucratic occupation in addition to a military occupation in Balıkesir. In so doing the Greeks made a big mistake. They could have prevented the formation of a resistance movement in Balıkesir, which became an epic in the War of Independence, and they could have made the people accustomed to living under Greek rule. Instead, the Greeks forcibly seized extremely limited resources such as foodstuff, weapons and animals from the people in Balıkesir and its surroundings, who were fighting for independence, and left them in poverty. In addition to this, during the occupation, as in other parts of the country, the Greek forces continued committing all kinds of atrocities against the Muslim people in Balıkesir in an increasingly violent and unlimited manner and with slanders and false accusations.
In addition to this picture of a city’s bureaucracy becoming inoperable, of severed communication channels, and especially of a Greek occupation which was intensifying day by day, there was a severe financial crisis in and around Balıkesir. The Greeks seized many of the financial resources of the region, and the state could not pay the salaries of officials, retired widows and orphans. This situation not only caused famine and poverty in and around Balıkesir, which has fertile lands, but also brought about other problems which the Greeks used to expand the occupation. Without doubt, it was not easy for the Ottoman Empire to find a solution to the economic crisis in Balıkesir , which had become particularly worn out by wars since the late 19th and early 20th centuries and had suffered from administrative weakness and economic collapse. Although the local administrators repeatedly informed the center about the situation and put forward various suggestions to solve the issue as explained in the text, it can be understood from the archive documents that these could not be implemented. Civil servants in Balıkesir could not get rid of financial difficulties for a long time and could not receive their salaries regularly even after the war was over. This time, the Balıkesir MPs brought the matter to parliament. Despite all the negativities and obstacles outlined above, a struggle against the enemy in Balıkesir took place which became an example to the nation, and a significant contribution was made to the liberation of the country from enemy occupation.
