16 SEPTEMBER 1922, Page 1

It is stated that the occupation of Smyrna was accompanied

by little looting and few disturbances. There is, however, an unpleasant and too familiar ring about the message sent to the League of Nations by the Turkish command, stating that, owing to the alleged excesses committed by the Greeks during their retirement, no responsibility could be accepted for any acts of retaliation on the part of Kemalist sympathizers. This sounds like getting up the scaffolding for massacres which may be classed as reprisals. But we trust that Kemal Pasha is sufficiently alive to the feelings with which the Allies would regard such a Turkish contempt for humanity as to keep his victorious troops well in hand. After all, there is the precedent of 1897 to show that with a well-disciplined army, such as ho evidently controls, the thing is not impossible.