Pan-Turkism in Action? Turkic Nationalists, Nazi Germany and Turkey During World War ii

For Pan-Turkists, the Nazi German attack on the Soviet Union in June 1941 seemed to offer a chance for the liberation of Turkic peoples from Soviet domination. Consequently, they attempted to win over both the Turkish and the Nazi German governments to support their aims. Although active Pan-Turkist policies—entailing entry into the war on the German side—were intensively debated during 1941 and 1942, Turkey ultimately suppressed the Pan-Turkist movement for fear of alienating the Soviet neighbour and provoking Soviet retaliation. The Germans saw themselves confronted with collaboration offers by Pan-Turkist activists from the Soviet Union. Such collaboration provided the increasingly hard-pressed Germans with large numbers of volunteers, but indecision and the clashes of racist and imperialist Nazi ideologies with the interests of the peoples living under Soviet authority ultimately rendered this cooperation ineffective.