İsmet İnönü

Mustafa İsmet İnönü was born on 24 September 1884 and rose as a military officer, his friendship with Atatürk forged during the Caucasus campaign. He commanded Turkish forces in the First and Second Battles of İnönü during the 1919-1922 war against Greece, victories that earned him both his surname and his role as chief negotiator at Lausanne, where he secured the Treaty of Lausanne in place of the punishing Treaty of Sèvres. As prime minister through most of Atatürk's presidency, from 1923 to 1937, he executed the modernizing reforms that remade Turkey. When Atatürk died in 1938, İnönü became president and "National Chief," keeping Turkey neutral through World War II and annexing Hatay in 1939. Factionalism in his Republican People's Party led to the creation of the Democrat Party in 1946; İnönü held the first multiparty elections that year, and in 1950 he lost and stepped aside, the first peaceful transfer of power in the republic. He returned as prime minister after the 1960 coup, shifted the CHP leftward through the 1960s, and lost the party leadership to Bülent Ecevit in 1972. He died of a heart attack on 25 December 1973, at 89, and is buried opposite Atat