The Activities of the Greeks Occupying Anatolia to Change the Demographic Structure: Exile and Settlement

The Greeks living under the Ottoman Empire were introduced to separatist ideas shaped by the influence of imperial states, first according to the desires of Russia and later by the French Revolution. The Greek revolts, which were initiated with the support of Russia and Western states, evolved into an independence movement over time. During the Greek independence process (1821-1832), Russia's increasing influence and the possibility of increasing its influence and effectiveness in the Mediterranean led Britain to change its policies and support the Greeks more prominently. France also sided with the Greeks with a similar political preference. Greece, which received the support of Western states, continued its territorial gains in line with the Megali Idea since its foundation; it almost doubled its territory by acquiring the Seven Islands in 1864, Thessaly in 1881 and Crete in 1912. In Greek irredentist politics, relocation has often been used as an effective method to dominate a territory and create a demographic structure that is identical in its favor. From the first Greek revolts to the occupation of İzmir, Greece, which practiced similar practices, considered relocation as a key to demographic legitimacy and tried to benefit from it. Having received the approval to realize his demands at the Paris Peace Conference, Venizelos landed troops in İzmir on May 15, 1919, starting a process that would lead to the occupation of Anatolia and thus the beginning of new relocations. There are many serious works on the Greek invasion of Anatolia, and this study has benefited greatly from these pioneering publications. However, in the existing works, it has been observed that the subject is usually brought up as a detail of the main research or as a sub-section title and that it is not evaluated within the integrity of a demographic project as it is tried to be handled. In this sense, the aims, methods, dimensions, results and consequences of the relocation of Greek/Greek immigrants and the resettlement of Greek/Greek immigrants, which were carried out by the Greeks who occupied Anatolia in order to transform the demographic structure in their favor, form the scope of this research. In the preparation of this study, efforts have been made to utilize original sources such as archival documents, official reports and memoirs, and the data obtained have been tried to be presented in a way that emphasizes interpretation and evaluation rather than a narrative approach, taking into account the integrity of the subject and chronological consistency.

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