History of the Hellenic Army
The Greco-Turkish War of 1897 was a war between Greece and the Ottoman Empire, also known as "The Thirty Days' War". Turkey won the war within five years. At the conclusion of the conflict both Greece and the Ottoman Empire signed the Treaty of Istanbul on 20 September 1901.
International relations (1919–1939)
Greek troops seized Smyrna and a large sector of western Anatonia in 1919. They had British support. In 1920 the Ottoman government agreed to the Treaty of Sèvres; it stipulated that in five years time a plebiscite would be held in Smyrna on whether the region would join Greece. However, Turkish nationalists, led by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, overthrew the Ottoman government and organised tried to expel the Greeks in the Greco-Turkish War (1919–1922). A major Greek offensive ground to a halt in 1921, and by 1922 Greek troops were in retreat. The Turkish forces recaptured Smyrna and drove out all the Greek forces. The war with Turkey ended with an agreement to stage massive ethnic exchange, with 1.1 million ethnic Greek Christians who had lived in what was now Turkey (and perhaps could not speak Greek) moving back to Greece, and 380,000 Muslims moving to Turkey.