HISTORY;

BEFORE THE REPUBLIC OF TURKEY :
Turks are the principal descendants of large bands of nomads who roamed in the Altai Mountains in nothern Mongolia and on the steppes of Cneteral Asia during the eary centuries of the Christian era. They established some great emperors such as Gokturk and Uigur. Later, Turks came to Anatolia in migration and established the Great Seljuk Empire. The Turks were the first people who invaded Anatolia completely. The previous invading peoples captured only parts of Anatolia. Although Persians and Romans invaded completely, they kept it under their political control rather than settling. Political unity in Anatolia was disrupted with the collapse of the Anatolian Seljuk state at the beginning of the 14C. As a result, some regions fell under the domination of Beyliks (Principalities) until the beginning of the 16C. The Ottoman Empire is an extension of one of these principalities.
The Ottoman Empire was a Moslem Turkish state that encompassed Anatolia, Southeastern Europe, the Arab Middle East and North Africa from the 14C to the early 20C. At the end of the 13C, Osman I (from whom the name Ottoman is derived) asserted the independence of his small principality in Sogut near Bursa, which adjoined the decadent Byzantine Empire. In 1453, Mehmet II conquered Constantinople, the last Byzantine stronghold. The empire reached its peak in the 16C. Sultan Selim I (r. 1512-20) conquered Egypt and Syria, gained control of the Arabian Peninsula and beat back the Safavid rulers of Iran at the Battle of Caldiran (1514). He was succeeded by Suleyman I (the Magnificent, r. 1520-66), who took Iraq, Hungary and Albania and established Ottoman naval supremacy in the Mediterranean. The decline of the empire began late in the 16C. During the next centuries, Ottoman’s regression continued and finally European diplomacy focused on the so-called Eastern Question how to dispose of the rest of the Empire. In this period Sultans attempted reforms, however they were not enough to rescue the Empire. In 1876, Sultan Abdulhamit II granted a constitution and parliament, but he soon abondoned them and ruled autocratically. He became so despotic that liberal opposition arose under the leadership of the Young Turks, many of whom had to leave the country from Abdulhamit's police. In 1908 a revolution led by the Young Turks forced Abdulhamit to restore the parliament and constitution. After a few months of constitutional rule, however, a counterrevolutionary effort to restore the sultan's autocracy led the Young Turks to dethrone Abdulhamit completely in 1909. He was replaced by Mehmet (Resit) V (r. 1909-18), who was only a puppet of those controlling the government.Rapid modernization continued during the Young Turk era (1908-18), with particular attention given to urbanization, agriculture, industry, communications, secularization of the state and the emancipation of women. The empire was involved in World War I to take sides with Germany and Austria-Hungary. The defeat of these Central Powers led to the breakup and foreign occupation of the Ottoman Empire.

ESTABLISHMENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF TURKEY
The attempt of the victorious Allies to control the Anatolian territory led to the Turkish War of Independence (1918-23). The sultan was kept in the custody of the Allies to ensure the cooperation of an Ottoman administration, which had effective jurisdiction only in Istanbul and part of northern Anatolia, while they disposed of the rest of his empire. At the same time, a Turkish nationalist movement was organized under Atatürk's leadership to resist the dismemberment of Turkish-speaking areas. Atatürk had been sent to eastern Anatolia as inspector general, ostensibly to supervise the demobilization of Ottoman forces and the disposition of supplies, but more particularly to remove him from the capital after he had expressed opposition to the Allied occupation there. Upon his arrival at Samsun in May 1919, Atatürk proceeded to rally support for the nationalist cause and to recruit a nationalist army. In July 1919, a nationalist congress met at Erzurum with Atatürk presiding to endorse a protocol calling for an independent Turkish state. In September the congress reconvened at Sivas. Negotiations continued between the nationalist congress and the Ottoman government, but to no avail. Atatürk resigned from the army when relieved of his duties.
During the summer and fall of 1919, with authorization from the Supreme Allied War Council, the Greeks occupied Edirne, Bursa, and Izmir and they soon moved as far as Usak, 175 kilometers inland from Izmir. Military action between Turks and Greeks in Anatolia in 1920 was inconclusive, but the nationalist cause was strengthened the next year by a series of important victories. In January and again in April, Ismet Pasha defeated the Greek army at Inönü, blocking its advance into the interior of Anatolia. In July, in the face of a third offensive, the Turkish forces fell back in good order to the Sakarya River, eighty kilometers from Ankara, where Atatürk took personal command and decisively defeated the Greeks in a twenty-day battle.
An improvement in Turkey's diplomatic situation accompanied its military success. Impressed by the viability of the nationalist forces, both France and Italy withdrew from Anatolia by October 1921. Treaties were signed that year with Soviet Russia, the first European power to recognize the nationalists, establishing the boundary between the two countries. The final drive against the Greeks began in August 1922.
At the end of October 1922, the Allies invited the nationalist and Ottoman governments to a conference at Lausanne, Switzerland, but Atatürk was determined that the nationalist government should be Turkey's sole representative. In November 1922, the Grand National Assembly separated the offices of sultan and caliph and abolished the former. With the Treaty of Lausanne, concluded in July 1923, the Allies recognized the present-day territory of Turkey and the new boundaries are created.
On October 29, 1923, the Grand National Assembly proclaimed the Republic of Turkey. Atatürk was named its president and Ankara its capital, and the modern state of Turkey was born.

THE REPUBLIC OF TURKEY
Atatürk’s Life and Reforms :
He was born in Salonika in 1881 and named Mustafa. Kemal was a nickname meaning "perfection" given by a tutor. He was a good student and did well at the military academy.
He was one of the early members of the Young Turks movement and a front-runner in the revolution which demanded a constitutional government for the Ottoman Empire.
During the First World War, he fought on many fronts. In 1915, then a Lieutenant Colonel, Mustafa Kemal was commanding a division of troops on the Gallipoli Peninsula. His actions in the Dardanelles as a soldier of determination, bravery and brilliance gave him great standing amongst the soldiers. His successes against the Allies were well received by the civilian population and he was acclaimed as the "Hero of Gallipoli".
This man, a military genius, soon showed himself as a great statesman too. After calling national congresses, he was elected President of the Turkish Grand National Assembly in April 1920. From then until his death in 1938, he remained in power in Turkey.
In 1934 everyone had to take a surname and Mustafa Kemal received the surname ATATURK which means "Father of the Turks". With all that he did for his country, he really deserved this title.

Atatürk initiated a series of radical reforms of the country's political, social, and economic life that were aimed at rapidly transforming Turkey into a modern state. A secular legal code, modeled along European lines, was introduced that completely altered laws affecting women, marriage, and family relations. In 1924 the Grand National Assembly adopted a new constitution to replace the 1876 document that had continued to serve as the legal framework of the republican government. The 1924 constitution vested sovereign power in the Grand National Assembly as representative of the people, to whom it also guaranteed basic civil rights. Under the new document, the assembly would be a unicameral body elected to a four-year term by universal suffrage. Its legislative authority would include responsibility for approving the budget, ratifying treaties, and declaring war. The president of the republic would be elected to a four-year term by the assembly, and he in turn would appoint the prime minister, who was expected to enjoy the confidence of the assembly. Throughout his presidency, repeatedly extended by the assembly, Atatürk governed Turkey essentially by personal rule in a one-party state. He founded the Republican People's Party (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi--CHP) in 1923 to represent the nationalist movement in elections and to serve as a vanguard party in support of the Kemalist reform program.

Mustafa Kemal Ataturk's reforms can be summarized as follows:
- Abolition of the Sultanate and Caliphate; establishment of the Republic.
- Implementation of secularism nationwide.
- Abolition of the religious courts.
- Suppression of religious brotherhoods; closing of sacred tombs as places of worship.
- Replacement of traditional clothing by Western styles; abolition of the fez.
- Abolition of Medreses, unification of education, renovations of school programs according to contemporary and national needs, opening of new universities.
- Adoption of new Civil Law code.
- Adoption of the solar calendar and changing of the Moslem holy day of the week, Friday, into a weekday with Sunday becoming the official day of rest.
- Introduction of Latin alphabet.
- Purification of Turkish language from foreign words.
- Implementation of "Peace at home, Peace in the world" as Turkish foreign policy.
Inonu, who is known “The Second Man”, had an important mission during the strugle of independence. He also was the Turkish representative at the Lausanne Conference which overturned the wartime settlement and established the Turkish Republic in 1923.
He was twice prime minister during Ataturk's presidency. As the second president (1938-50), Inonu kept Turkey neutral during World War II and prepared the country for democratic elections, which resulted in the removal of his Republican People's party from power (1950). He then led the opposition to the Democratic party's regime until its overthrow by a coup in 1960. After the coup, the new constitution was proclaimed in 1961 and after the another coup in 1980, the last constitution was proclaimed in 1982.

Today, with a lot of political parties and civil society organizations; democratic elections and the Grand National Assembly, Turkish people have adopted the system and reforms.