UNIT 3: NATIONALISM
SPREADS TO THE
MIDDLE EAST, ASIA,
AFRICA, AND LATIN
AMERICA
Chapter 25
Essential Questions
• What causes people to develop feelings of nationalism?
• Is seeking divisions/enemies/others an inevitable part of human
nature?
• Is it possible for humans to define who they are without comparing
themselves to who they are not?
• What are the pros and cons of nationalism?
• What are the modern-day implications of decisions made during this
time period around the world?
Ottoman Empire During WWI
• Background
• Ottoman Empire founded in the 1300’s
• At its height controlled most of the Middle East, North Africa, large parts of
Europe
• By WWI much weaker, “Sick man of Europe”
• Sided with the Germans/Central Powers in WWI, was defeated by the Allies
• Nationalism in the Ottoman Empire Before/During WWI
• Nationalism appealed to a small elite (ex. Young Turks) but not to most
people before WWI
• During WWI, extreme nationalists took control of Ottoman Government
• Ottoman Empire was culturally and ethnically very diverse, lots of religions,
lots of ethnic minorities, why would that be a problem for ultranationalists?
• Result: Armenian Genocide, 1 to 1.5 million people killed
Decline of Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire becomes Turkish Republic
• Treaty of Sevres
• Treaty signed by Turkey after the end of WWI (Turkey’s version of the
Versailles Treaty)
• Turkey lost all its possessions in the Middle East
• Allied countries occupied large chunks of Turkey
• Britain/France—southeast corner
• Greece—western coast
• Italy—southwestern coast
• International Zone—northwest corner
• Ottoman Sultan unable to do anything to repel the foreign invaders
• Sultan overthrown by the military, Mustafa Kemal
• Mustafa Kemal pushed all foreigners off of Turkish land
• Republic of Turkey established, Mustafa Kemal became first president
Modern Turkey under Ataturk
• Modernizing Turkey: Mustafa Kemal wanted Turkey to become
more like the West
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Last names: Mustafa Kemal Ataturk (father of the Turks)
Arabic alphabet replaced with Roman alphabet
5 year plan to encourage industrialization
Secularization: outward signs of religion banned (no veils for women),
religious toleration instituted
• Western styles of dress: no fez hats for men
• Education: free public school established
• Women’s rights: legal equality for women, women encouraged to go to
school and work outside the home, voting rights for women (1934)
Ataturk Introducing the New Alphabet to a
Turkish Village
Ataturk’s Legacy Today
• Ataturk’s ideas still are very influential in Turkey
• Nationalism
• Secularism
• Republicanism
• Problem: Turkey was/is a very religious place, lots of people didn’t like
Ataturk’s reforms
• Ataturk hand-picked candidates for the Turkish Parliament, only his political
party was allowed, all other political parties were banned
• Since Ataturk’s death the military and the courts have seen themselves as the
guardians of his legacy
• Often elections would put very religious politicians into power, who wanted to
dismantle some of Ataturk’s reforms, the military would overthrow those
elected politicians. (1960, 71, 80, 97) Is that right?
• Since 2002 Turkey has become more democratic, the current Prime
Minister has slowly allowed religion to become more prominent in Turkish
society, is this good, bad, something else?
• What caused the Turks to become nationalistic and rally around Ataturk?
Nationalism in the Middle East: Syria, Iraq,
Lebanon, Jordan, and Palestine
• Ottoman Empire during WWI
• British and French vs. Ottomans
• War not going well for the British/French, needed the Arabs to join their
side
• Hussein-McMahon Correspondence
• British ambassador (McMahon) promised the Sharif of Mecca (Hussein)
that the British would support Arab independence if the Arabs revolted
against the Ottoman Turks
• Arabs joined the British
• Fighting against the Ottoman Turks helped build Arab nationalism and
desire for an independent Arab state after the war
Things Get Messy: End of WWI
• Contradictory Promises
• Hussein-McMahon—British promised the Arabs independence
• Balfour Declaration—British promised Jewish Zionists support for a Jewish
homeland in Palestine
• Sykes-Picot Agreement—British and French promised each other that they
would divide and colonize the Middle East after WWI
• Contradictions were settled at the Paris Peace Conference
• Britain gained control of Mesopotamia (split into two and renamed Iraq
and Trans-Jordan) as well as Palestine (open to Jewish immigration)
• France gained control of Syria (split into Syria and Lebanon)
• Arabs gained independence only in the territory around Mecca and Medina
in the Arabian Peninsula (Hejaz)
• Arabs tried to establish an independent state in Syria/Iraq but were forced
out by the French military
Sykes-Picot Agreement 1916
Eventual Partition of the Middle East
Recap
• Arabs Promised—Independent Arab state in the Middle East
• Arabs Got
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Syria—French Mandate
Lebanon—French Mandate
Palestine—British Mandate, with Jewish migration
Transjordan—British Mandate with Arab King (Abdullah I)
Iraq—British Mandate with Arab King (Faisal)
Hejaz—Independent Arab state with Arab King (Sharif Hussein)
• Hejaz conquered by Ibn Saud, became part of Saudi Arabia 1930’s
Problems In the Middle East
• Arbitrary Borders
• Britain/France drew lines on a map, didn’t correspond with who actually
lived in those places
• Different ethnic/religious groups lumped into the same country
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Ex. Kurds and Sunni and Shiite Arabs in Iraq
Ex. Alawites, Sunni and Shiite Arabs, and Christians in Syria
Ex. Christians, Druze, and Sunni and Shiite Arabs in Lebanon
Ex. European Jews, Arab Jews, and Arab Muslims in Palestine
Ethnic and Religious Composition of Iraq
Ethnic and religious Composition of Syria
Religious Composition of LLebanon
Modern-Day Legacy in the Middle East
• Palestine
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Balfour Declaration=increased Jewish migration
Plans to split Palestine into an Arab and Jewish state after WWII failed
1948 war broke out between Jewish and Arab Palestinians
1948 Jewish Palestinians won, Israel created
Unresolved issues between Israelis and Palestinian Arabs till this day
• Lebanon
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Christian majority given most of the power by the French
By 1980s Christians no longer a majority still had the majority of the power
Civil war broke out in the 1980s
Shiite militant group, Hezbollah, gained power
Uneasy peace between Hezbollah, Christians, and Sunni Arabs today
Modern-Day Legacy in the Middle East
• Iraq
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King Faisal’s descendants overthrown
Baath Party representing Sunni Arabs took control in the 1960’s
Sunnis were a minority in Iraq
Saddam Hussein, Sunni Baath Party member, became dictator, brutally
repressed Kurdish and Shiite rebellions
• After US invasion in 2003 Saddam overthrown, Shiites in power
• Ethnic tension between Sunnis and Shiites still remains today
• Syria
• Military dictatorship took control in the 1960s
• Civil War broke out in 2011
• Minority ethnic groups: Alawites, Shiites vs. Sunnis and Kurds
• Jordan
• Abdullah’s descendants still on the throne (Abdullah II)
• Slowly making democratic reforms
Nationalism in Africa
• Nationalism in Africa = Desire For Independence
• Factors that caused a rise in nationalism in Africa after WWI
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Africans sent to Europe to fight in WWI
Woodrow Wilson’s 14 Points
Tired of European Imperialism
Young Africans educated in Europe coming back to Africa
• Effect of Nationalism in Africa
• Rise in desire for independence
• Increase in rebellions against European rule
• No independence (not until after WWII)
Nationalism in Asia
• French Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia)
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Wanted independence from France
Ho Chi Minh = the leader of the Vietnamese movement for independence
Vietnamese heavily influenced by communism, ideas of Lenin and the USSR
No independence until after WWII
Vietnamese defeated the French in 1954 gained independence
• Japan
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1920’s and 1930’s Japan was a liberal democracy
Heavily industrialized economy
Problems: Japan had a lot of people but not many natural resources
Late 1920’s the economy began to decline many turned away from
liberalism and towards militant nationalism
• Nationalists saw the military as the solution to Japan’s economic problems
Japanese Military and Extreme Nationalism
• 1931 Invasion of Manchuria
• Mukden Incident—Japanese military destroyed their own railroad in
Chinese Manchuria
• Japan gained control of Manchuria
• 1937 Invasion of China
• Japanese military blamed Chinese nationalists for attacking Japanese
soldiers in Beijing
• Japan responded by invading China
• Japan vs. China 1937-1945 (end of WWII)
• Military in Control
• Military used the war in China as an excuse to take over total control of
Japanese society, government, culture
• Question: What explains the rise of the military/nationalism in
Japan?
Nationalism and Communism in China
• Questions to think about:
• What things caused nationalism in China in the early 1900s?
• What happened to unity within the Chinese nationalist movement as time
went on?
• Background: China in the early 1900s
• China was once the most powerful/advanced country in the world
• During the late 1800s imperialized by European powers, “spheres of
influence”
• Chinese government lost control of most of the country to either European
powers or local warlords who did whatever they wanted
• Sun Yat-sen founded the Chinese Nationalist party to fight against
European Imperialism and Chinese warlords
• Paris Peace Conference: many in China hoped that the major powers would
support Chinese independence, no more imperialism in China, that didn’t
happen, led to a major upsurge in Chinese nationalism
Nationalists and Communists in China
• Chinese Nationalist Party
• Led by Sun Yat-sen and Chiang Kai Shek
• Mostly a middle and upper class movement, popular in cities
• Wanted to make China an independent Republic (like the US or Great
Britain)
• Wanted to kick imperialists and Chinese warlords out of China
• Chinese Communist
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Led by Mao Tse Tung (Mao Zedong)
Mostly a lower class movement, popular in the countryside
Wanted to make China an independent communist state (like USSR)
Wanted to kick imperialists and Chinese warlords out of China
• Nationalists and Communists wanted mostly the same things, so
they united together in the early 1920s to achieve their shared goals
Nationalists and Communist Success and
Problems
• Great Northern Expedition 1926-1928
• Nationalists and Communists recaptured most of China and defeated most
warlords and took back large chunks of the country from foreign imperialist
control
• Nationalist-Communist Split
• Chiang Kai-Shek distrusted the communists
• 1927 Shanghai massacre, Kai-Shek killed most of the Communist leadership in
Shanghai
• Republic of China
• Nationalist made a new Republic of China led by Chiang Kai-Shek
• Problems
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Not very democratic
Ignored the wishes of the poor, especially in the countryside
Communists not totally defeated, still active in some parts of China
Nationalist government was very weak, only barely controlled large parts of
China
Nationalist vs. Communist Civil War
• The Long March 1934-1935
• Chiang Kai-Shek launched an expedition to finally destroy the Communists
in 1934
• Mao Tse Tung fled from the Nationalists, 6,000 miles
• Eventually reached safety outside of area controlled by Nationalists
• WWII
• Nationalists and Communists worked together from 1937 to 1945 to fight
the Japanese
• After WWII to Today
• After WWII the Chinese communists were much stronger than the
Nationalists
• Civil War started up again, Communists won in 1949
• Mainland China became a communist country People’s Republic of China
• Chiang Kai Shek and his Nationalist supports fled to the island of Taiwan
and crated the Republic of China (Taiwan)
China Today
Nationalism In Central and South America
• What were things like in Central and South America during the early
1900s?
• Economically?
• Politically?
• Foreign countries had a lot of influence and control over Central
and South American affairs—especially US
• Examples (political): US military occupation of Haiti, Cuba, Nicaragua,
Dominican Republic, etc.
• Examples (economic): Central/South American economies dependent upon
exports to make money, and on imports to supply themselves with
industrial goods
• What kind of feelings would political and economic dependence
cause people in Central/South America to have toward the US and
other European countries? How would this help cause feelings of
nationalism?
Nationalism in Central and South America
• Great Depression
• exposed problems with the economies of Central/South America, caused
economic hardship
• Led to calls for political and economic independence/self sufficiency
• Good Neighbor Policy
• US agreed not to use its military to invade other countries in Central/South
America
• Import Substitute Industrialization
• Central/South American countries began to build their own industry so
they wouldn’t have to import goods from abroad
• Rise of populist political leaders
• People began to support political leaders who looked out for the interests
of the poor
• Examples: Vargas in Brazil, Peron in Argentina, Cardenas in Mexico
Nationalization of the Oil Industry in Mexico
• Nationalization=when a government takes over privately owned
property and makes it the property of the people of the country or
nation
• Mexican government expropriated (took over) foreign owned oil
wells and refineries in Mexico 1938
• Why?
• How an example of nationalism?
Diego Rivera