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nently enthralling issue: the insertion of Turkey in the modern vvorld; althoughcontemplated now not in the identical terms Mr. Emilio had ab initioreflected on the signifıcance of the historical breakavvay that the1923-24 Kemalist revolution introduced in the course of the OttomanEmpire.I do not resist the temptation to reproduce anew an already classicpassage where Garcıa Gömez depicts the Turkish-national revolution of"the Father of the motherland", by repelling both the Anglo-Greek siege(1920-22) to Anatolia as vvell as by laying the foundations of the constructionof the future Turkish Republic on the principle of secularisationof the national sovereignty, that vve have been getting accustomed vvithöver the 75 years of its hazardous existence:"With Atatürk, Turkey made in a single stroke vvhat Spain had donein two phases, vvith a time-span of almost a century mediating betvveenthem: the independence War and the 98 movement. As a military offıcer,Atatürk liberated the motherland, almost turning it from vanquished tovictor. As a cultural renevver he shovved unprecedented and remarkablecourage. Turkey, in his hands, ceased to be Asia to become part of Europeand vvas turned from the site of the Caliphate of islam into a secularrepublic; cosmopolitanism became Turkism vvith arguable Hittite roots;the language, svvept by a tornado, lost one by one almost every Arab andPersian vvord, strengthening instead the language's Ural-Altaic roots; theelaborate attires came out of use vvhile European costumes became fashionable(the Pashas svvapped their seven-tails govvns for tvvo-piece suitsand their turbans for hats or caps); the Arab alphabet; the Aziyades ofLoti- vvere the Aziyades of Loti indeed Aziyades, vvhich seems they vverenot- got rid of their veils and started dancing the foxtrot in dancing-hallsand delivering speeches in Parliament; every Turkish citizen changed hissurname; religious brotherhoods vvere banned; codes, calendars, measuringsystems, lavv, habits and customs vvere changed. Everything. Not asingle thing vvas left untouched. I sincerely believe that no nation has everundergone a modifıcation of such proportions, carried out by a memberof this same nation in the blink of an eye, ever since the vvorld exists'" 4 .The final remark to the previous commentary is, conversely, morearguable. The plight of the political and social life of Turkey in the nineties,vvith the upsurge of the fundamentalist movement led by Mehtin Erbakan'sWelfare Party, and the uncertainty prevailing över the precisecourse to steer a nation so geostrategically complex as Turkey, follovvingthe dismemberment of the neighbouring Soviet empire, and the onerousmarch of the Turkish Governments in the path tovvards the insertion ofthe Republic in the list of official candidates for integration in the Euro-14. In the "Forevvord" at supra, p. XV-XVI.718