and the Middle East 263
(3) The Inter-War Period, 1921-39
In the Treaty of Lausanne of 1923 which established the inde-
pendence of nationalist Turkey and regulated her relations with
the Western Powers, she had to concede the demilitarization of
the Zone of the Straits: the warships of all nations, with slight
restrictions, were free to enter the Black Sea. This was obnoxious
not only to Turkey, as limiting her sovereignty, but also to Russia,
as exposing her Black Sea coast to the threat of an enemy navy; and
in 1925, while Turkey was involved in the acute dispute with
Britain and Iraq over the possession of the villayet of Mosul,
Russia concluded with her a new Treaty of Friendship and
Neutrality. Though official relations between Russia and Turkey
remained cordial and the Russians gave some technical help with
the industrialization of Turkey, there was little contact or cultural
interchange between the two peoples. The Turkish dictatorship
permitted the works of Marx and Lenin to be read, but imprisoned
active Communists under laws which forbade associations with
the purpose of propagating ideas of class distinction or of class con-
flict, or with internationalist intentions.1 In 1936, when Italy
had emerged as the aggressive naval power which threatened the
status quo in the Mediterranean, Turkey proposed to the signatories
of the Treaty of Lausanne that the regime of the Straits needed
revision, and obtained important concessions in the Montreux
Convention. She was now allowed to fortify the Straits, and in
time of war to close them to the warships of all Powers, unless
acting under the Covenant of the League of Nations. A com-
promise was thus reached between the Russian,claim for wide
discrimination in favour of Black Sea Powers, and the British argu-
ment that the Straits should be equally open or equally closed to
the warships of all Powers.2 In the early summer of 1939, when
Turkey entered into pacts with Britain and France directed primar-
ily against Fascist Italy, Izvestia welcomed them as 'links in the
chain which is the only sure means of preventing the extension of
aggression to new parts of Europe'.
In Persia Riza Shah, like Ataturk, followed a strongly nationalist
and anti-foreign policy, and his commercial relations with Russia
1 Arts. 66 and 69 of the People's Party Programme.
-Survey of International Affairs, 1936, Part IV (i).
S