mined to
use his position as caliph for far-reaching political ends. Emphasizing
his spiritual headship of the Mohammedan world rather than his political
headship of the Turkish state, he endeavoured to win the active support
of all Moslems and, by that support, to intimidate European Powers who
might be formulating aggressive measures against the Ottoman Empire.
Before long Abdul Hamid had built up an elaborate Pan-Islamic propaganda
organization, working mainly by secretive, tortuous methods.
Constantinople became the Mecca of all the fanatics and anti-Western
agitators like Djemal-ed-Din. And from Constantinople there went forth
swarms of picked emissaries, bearing to the most distant parts of Islam
the Caliph's message of hope and impending deliverance from the menace
of infidel rule.

Abdul Hamid's Pan-Islamic propaganda went on uninterruptedly for nearly
thirty years. Precisely what this propaganda accomplished is very
difficult to estimate. In the first place, it was cut short, and to some
extent reversed, by the Young-Turk resolution of 1908 which drove Abdul
Hamid from the throne. It certainly was never put to the test of a war
between Turkey and a first-class European Power. This is what renders
any theoretical appraisal so inconclusive. Abdul Hamid did succeed in
gaining the respectful acknowledgment of his spiritual authority by most
Moslem princes and notables, and he certainly won the pious veneration
of the Moslem masses. In the most distant regions men came to regard the
mighty Caliph in Stambul as, in very truth, the Defender of the Faith,
and to consider his empire as the bulwark of Islam. On the other hand,
it is a far cry from pious enthusiasm to practical performance.
Furthermore, Abdul Hamid did not succeed in winning over powerful
Pan-Islamic leaders like El Sennussi, who suspected his motives and
questioned his judgment; while Moslem liberals everywhere disliked him
for his despotic, reactionary, inefficient rule. It is thus a very
debatable question whether, if Abdul Hamid had ever called upon the
Moslem world for armed assistance in a "holy war," he would have been
generally supported.

Yet Abdul Hamid undoubtedly furthered the general spread of Pan-Islamic
sentiment throughout the Moslem world. In this larger sense he
succeeded; albeit not so much from his position as caliph as because he
incarnated the growing fear and hatred of the West. Thus we may conclude
that Abdul Hamid's Pan-Islamic