ah, ataturk, the man who had a cosmopolitan city (smyrni, or "izmir" if you can't pronounce smyrni, which had been founded by greek people and occupied by greek people since ANCIENT times) burnt to the ground, the civilians massacred, and forced the rest to jump into the sea (just some of his many accomplishments), all while the great powers sat back and watched like the self-interested pusses that they are. they saw who was emerging as the most powerful in the region and sided with him, right or wrong.

blind nationalists the whole lot. ah, the virtues of secularism. what a great way to give birth to the turkish state.

i love common turks just as i love all people but i can't say that i like ataturk. i will never blame common people for the atrocities of their leaders or governments but please learn some history before you form an opinion. the man was not great. at least, i do not call a nationalistic murderer "great." he was a nationalist with no regard for non-turks who had inhabited the so-called "turkish heartland" for millennia before turks even appeared there. no better than the US government and how they treated the native americans. (which i am surprised that more people do not find so shameful.)

some of you here, keep going around saying "fuck religion" all you want, but you're deluding yourself. ataturk was not a hero for being a secularist, and wherever you blame religion as a cause for war, you will see even stronger nationalist or power/economic motivations. the best killers the world ever saw (hitler, stalin, mao, khmers rouges, and plenty more) were all secular/atheist. wake up.

you can only compare ataturk to george washington if you do not forget to draw the parallel with how US government treated the native americans as the country expanded, as that is exactly how the "young turks" treated people who had been living in "turkish heartland" long before turks ever appeared in anatolia, having emerged from central asia. but history is written by the victors.