Occupied Istanbul as a Cominternian Hub: Sailors, Soldiers, and Post-Imperial Networks (1918–1923)

Burak Sayım

doi:10.1017/s0165115321000395

Abstract

AbstractBetween 1918 and 1923, Istanbul was the capital of a defeated empire and occupied by the “interallied” forces composed of Britain, France, and Italy. Notwithstanding, or precisely due to, these conditions, it functioned as a vibrant hub of global communist militancy. This article explores the brief history of occupied Istanbul and discusses different agents and aspects of communist network-making. It underlines the agency of two neglected actors: a multinational body of communist sailors who connected Istanbul and its communists to European, Middle Eastern, and Soviet ports; and European and colonial soldiers stationed in Istanbul, who counterintuitively contributed to these connections. Finally, it shows how Istanbul, as the multiethnic and multilinguistic soon-to-be-former capital of the Ottoman Empire, provided a fertile ground for communist connections.

Highlights

Historians have started paying attention to the interconnected worlds of the global left-wing movements
It underlines the agency of two neglected actors: a multinational body of communist sailors who connected Istanbul and its communists to European, Middle Eastern, and Soviet ports; and European and colonial soldiers stationed in Istanbul, who counterintuitively contributed to these connections
Michael Goebel points out this curiosity when he states that “ironically, as historians have become more interested in globalisation in recent decades, their curiosity in communism and in the Comintern, an internationalist organisation if ever there was one, has receded.”1 Addressing this issue and drawing upon the emerging interest in the Communist International during the last years, this text offers a case study of the transnational and interconnected world of the Communist International

Summary

Occupied Istanbul as a Cominternian

Between 1918 and 1923, Istanbul was the capital of a defeated empire and occupied by the “interallied” forces composed of Britain, France, and Italy. Some felt the need to be there as their responsibility to the emerging working class in the city, but they worked as the partisans of the new revolutionary capital within the captive imperial centre This simultaneous existence of the variety of communist actors with different reasons to be there and with different relationships with the city’s political scene makes occupied Istanbul an apt location to see the post–World War I Cominternian habitus in microcosm. Interwar communism has been conceived as the mere sum of different communist parties Cases such as occupied Istanbul, where the variety of communist actors makes the interconnectedness of the world communist movement easier to discern, are useful as an alternative historical glance, providing a glimpse of the transnational and interwoven nature of the early Cominternian world

Setting the Transnational Communist Scene in Istanbul

Sailors as a Communist Hyphen

Conclusion