Originally posted by EricTheRed
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The population exchange has been the primary goal of the neo-hellenic nationalist corners since Greek state invaded Aegean Macedonia in 1912. Venizelos and his supporters was thinking about doing population exchange with Turkey during WW-1 too but they were postponing this because they also had aims for the Anatolia back then. This is attested by several speeches of Venizelos in Greek and British newspapers back then.
Greek state failed to invade Anatolia and returned to Greece in 19.05.1919 and about a week laters, Venizelos started planning to propose population exchange to Turkey because Megali Idea was over anymore. After their loss in anatolia, they had a country with 20% Turkish muslim population, close to million slavic speaking Macedonians and what not in their hands. Their frustration and urgent need to import Anatolian christian to there is clearly evident in Greek newspapers because Venizelos was speaking about it to the Greek press. Venizelos and his British masters enforced Turkey to accept population exchange during Lausanne peace conference and this was the first time Turkish side ever heard about it.
The population exchange was some kind of necessity for Greece because after the inclusion of Aegean Macedonia, Greece had less than 4 million population and 650.000 of them was Turks. So, 20% of Greek population was Turks back then.
On the other hand Turkey had 12 million population but only 1 million of them was christians, around 7-8%. Already about half of them was Turkish christians, speaking pure Turkish, not a word of Greek. ~400.000 of them was central Anatolian christians named Karamanlides and ~70.000 of them was Gagauz christian Turks.
Originally posted by Stojacanec
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Didn't you read the speeches of Greek clergy and Venizelos in late 1920s, saying that they would never be able to keep Macedonia inside Greece if they would not import one million Anatolian christians to there? As far as i remember, TrueMacedonian posted these quotes too.
How come you can believe the Greek propaganda like "population exchange enforced them by Turks" while it`s a fact that they used Anatolian christians to depopulate Macedonia and alter it`s demographics?
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