ABSTRACT
The defeat of the Ottoman Empire in the First World War and the expulsion of Ottoman forces from Transcaucasia and the Arab provinces which followed marked the effective end of the empire as a multi-national state, spanning vast territories and incorporating a variety of disparate peoples and cultures. In December 1917 the newly installed Bolshevik government in St Petersburg, determined to expose the wicked machinations of the imperial powers, had revealed to the world the contents of the secret treaties and agreements concluded by the Entente Powers in the course of the war. The humiliating provisions contained in the Treaty of Sevres did not complete the catalogue of injuries which the Entente Powers intended to inflict on the Ottoman Empire. Historians have generally accepted Mustafa Kemal's assertion that he had, from the beginning of the national struggle, and even before, contemplated the abolition of the sultanate and the caliphate.
