Collapse and partition of the Ottoman Empire

Date

1918 to 1920 (San Remo April 1920; Sèvres 10 August 1920)

Category

Politics & governance

Region

Middle East / Anatolia (Ottoman Empire)

Era

Modern

Significance

The defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I ended an imperial state that had endured for over six centuries.

Following the Armistice of Mudros (30 October 1918) and the Allied occupation of Constantinople, the Empire's Arab provinces were divided among Britain and France, drawing on the secret wartime Sykes-Picot Agreement (1916). The San Remo Conference (April 1920) allocated League of Nations mandates: Syria and Lebanon to France, and Mesopotamia (Iraq), Palestine, and Transjordan to Britain. The Treaty of Sèvres, signed on 10 August 1920, would have partitioned Anatolia itself among the Allies, Greece, and a proposed Armenian and Kurdish state. Sèvres was never ratified and was overtaken by the Turkish War of Independence, leading to the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne and the Republic of Turkey. The partition created the modern state system of the Middle East, with borders that frequently ignored ethnic, religious, and communal realities and seeded lasting regional conflicts.

Empires active in 1918 to 1920 (San Remo April 1920; Sèvres 10 August 1920)

• Empire of Japan
  1868 CE to 1947 CE
• French Colonial Empire (Second)
  1830 CE to 1962 CE
• German Empire
  1871 CE to 1918 CE
• British Empire
  1583 CE to 1997 CE
• Spanish Empire
  1492 CE to 1976 CE
• Portuguese Empire
  1415 CE to 1999 CE

Related politics & governance events

• Russian Revolutions of 1917
  March & November 1917 (February & October Revolutions, O.S.)
• Treaty of Versailles and the founding of the League of Nations
  28 June 1919 (in force 10 January 1920)
• Sykes-Picot Agreement partitions the Ottoman Middle East
  16 May 1916
• The Xinhai Revolution and the fall of the Qing
  1911 to 1912 (Wuchang Uprising 10 October 1911; abdication 12 February 1912)
• Hitler's appointment and Nazi consolidation of power
  30 January 1933 to August 1934
• Stalin's Great Purge (Great Terror)
  1936 to 1938

Also relevant

• Balfour Declaration
  2 November 1917

Essential reading

• Haber-Bosch Process Industrialises Synthetic Nitrogen Fertiliser
  September 1913
• 1931 Central China Floods
  June to August 1931
• The Dust Bowl
  1930 to 1940 (peak 1934 to 1936)
• Cárdenas Nationalises Mexico's Oil
  1938

Further reading

Osman's Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire

The wider story

Osman's Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire

Caroline Finkel

The standard readable single-volume Ottoman history.

Get it on Amazon →

As an Amazon Associate, Human Saga earns from qualifying purchases.