The Montreux Convention on the Straits Regime, or simply the Montreux Convention, is an international treaty that governs the Bosporus and Dardanelles Straits in Turkey
It was signed on July 20, 1936, in the Montreux Palace in Switzerland, and took effect on November 9, 1936, resolving the long-running Straits Question of who should manage the militarily important route between the Black and Mediterranean Seas.
Know What Is The Montreux Convention 1936 Turkey, Istanbul Canal, Black Sea And End Date
The Montreux Convention governs the Black Sea’s maritime trade. During peacetime, it grants “full freedom” of passage for all civilian vessels and allows Turkey to limit the movement of warships from outside the Black Sea. Military warships are restricted in terms of quantity, tonnage, and weaponry, with special rules limiting their arrival and stay. Warships must submit advance information to Turkish authorities, who must then notify the Convention’s parties.
The convention, grants free passage to ships under certain rules and is valid for 20 years.
The Montreux Convention has persisted as a “strong example of a rules-based international order” since most of its clauses are still observed, despite the fact that it was established for a specific geopolitical context[and has remained unchanged since its introduction. However, there have been significant disagreements about its application, most notably the proposed Kanal Istanbul, which would offer a second waterway connecting the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmara, potentially evading the Convention.
Background
The convention was one of a number of agreements reached in the 19th and 20th centuries to resolve the long-running Straits Question of who should manage the strategically important link between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. The Treaty of Lausanne demilitarised the Dardanelles and opened the Straits to unlimited civilian and military commerce in 1923, under the supervision of the League of Nations’ International Straits Commission.
With the development of Fascist Italy, which held the Greek-inhabited Dodecanese islands off the west coast of Turkey and built fortifications on Rhodes, Leros, and Kos by the late 1930s, the strategic position in the Mediterranean had changed. The Turks were concerned that Italy might try to get access to Anatolia and the Black Sea region. There were also fears of Bulgarian rearmament. Although Turkey was not permitted to refortify the Straits, it nonetheless did so discretely.
The Turkish government sent a lengthy diplomatic note to the Treaty of Lausanne signatories in April 1935, suggesting a conference to settle on a new Straits regime and requesting that the League of Nations authorise the repair of the Dardanelles forts. Turkish Foreign Minister Tevfik Rüştü Aras explained in the note that the international situation had drastically changed since 1923.
At the time, Europe was working toward disarmament and an international guarantee to protect the Straits. The Abyssinia Crisis of 1934–1935, Germany’s rejection of the Treaty of Versailles, and international rearmament efforts meant that “the one guarantee designed to guard against utter insecurity of the Straits has now vanished in turn.” Indeed, “the Powers Most Concerned” are “proclaiming the presence of a threat of general conflagration,” according to Aras.
The current regime’s main flaws were that the collective-guarantees mechanism was too slow and ineffectual, and there was no contingency for a broad threat of war and no plan for Turkey to defend itself. Turkey was thus ready to enter negotiations in the near future in order to reach an agreement on the Straits regime’s regulations under the conditions of security that are necessary for the inviolability of Turkey’s territory, as well as the continuous development of commercial navigation between the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, in the most liberal spirit.
The message drew a positive reaction from Australia, Bulgaria, France, Germany, Greece, Japan, Romania, the Soviet Union, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and Yugoslavia, who all joined the Montreux talks, which began on June 22, 1936. Two major nations were conspicuously absent: Italy, whose aggressively expansionist policies had caused the meeting, and the increasingly isolationist United States, which rejected even to send an observer.
Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union all made their own ideas, primarily to defend their own interests. The British preferred a more restrictive approach, the Turks preferred a more liberal regime that reasserted their control over the Straits, and the Soviets advocated a policy that guaranteed complete freedom of passage.
The British, with the help of France, attempted to keep the Soviet fleet out of the Mediterranean Sea, where it could jeopardise critical transport routes to India, Egypt, and the Far East. The British eventually gave in to some of their demands, but the Soviets were able to ensure that the Black Sea countries, including the Soviet Union, were exempted from the military limits imposed on them.
With the exception of Germany, which had not signed the Treaty of Lausanne, and with reservations from Japan, the agreement was adopted by all conference participants and entered into force on November 9, 1936; it was filed with the League of Nations Treaty Series on December 11, 1936.
Britain’s willingness to make concessions has been ascribed to a desire to prevent Turkey from being compelled to ally with or be influenced by Adolf Hitler or Benito Mussolini.
It was the first of a series of moves by Britain and France to ensure that, in the case of a future battle with the Axis, Turkey would either remain neutral or tilt toward the Western Allies.
Terms
The Convention, as stated in its preamble, revoked the previous Lausanne Treaty on the Straits, which stated the demilitarisation of the Greek islands of Lemnos and Samothrace, as well as the Dardanelles, the Sea of Marmara, and the Bosporus, as well as the Turkish islands of mroz, Bozcaada, and Tavşan.
There are 29 articles in the Convention, four annexes, and one protocol. The voyage of commerce ships is discussed in articles 2–7. The transit of war vessels is discussed in Articles 8–22. Articles 1 and 2 state the fundamental concept of freedom of passage and navigation. “The High Contracting Parties recognise and affirm the concept of freedom of passage and navigation by sea in the Straits,” according to Article 1. “In times of peace, merchant vessels should have complete freedom of passage and navigation in the Straits, by day and night, under any flag with any kind of cargo,” according to Article 2.
The International Straits Commission was abolished, allowing Turkish military control of the Straits to be fully restored and the Dardanelles to be refortified. During a conflict or when it is threatened by attack, Turkey has the authority to seal the Straits to all foreign warships. Turkey was also given the authority to refuse transit to merchant ships from countries at war with it.
There are a lot of very specific limits on the kind of warships that can pass through. Non-Black Sea powers must tell Turkey 15 days in advance of their intended transit, while Black Sea states must notify within 8 days of passage. At any given time, no more than nine foreign warships with a combined tonnage of 15,000 tonnes may pass.
Furthermore, no ship weighing more than 10,000 tonnes is allowed to pass. All non-Black Sea warships in the Black Sea must have a combined tonnage of no more than 45,000 tonnes, with no one nation surpassing 30,000 tonnes at any given moment, and they are only allowed to stay for 21 days. Only Black Sea states are allowed to pass through and Capital ships of any tonnage must be accompanied by at maximum two destroyers.
Article 12 allows Black Sea governments to deploy submarines across the Straits without prior notice if the vessels were built, purchased, or sent for maintenance outside of the Black Sea. The less restrictive standards for Black Sea states were established as a concession to the Soviet Union, which is the only Black Sea state possessing a large number of capital ships or submarines, except from Turkey. Civil planes are only allowed to fly between the Mediterranean and the Black Seas on routes approved by the Turkish government.
Implementation
The wording of the Convention reflected the world situation in the mid-1930s to a great extent. They primarily benefited Turkish and Soviet objectives by allowing Turkey to reclaim military control of the Straits and ensuring Soviet control of the Black Sea. While the Convention limited the access of naval forces of Soviet Union into the Mediterranean Sea, it also ensured that outside powers could not use the Straits to threaten the Soviet Union, which alleviated British concerns about Soviet intrusion into what was considered a British sphere of influence.
During World War II, the Montreux rule prohibited the Axis countries from moving naval troops through the Straits of Hormuz to attack the Soviet Union, which had important ramifications. In their Black Sea battles, the Axis powers were thus severely limited in naval capability, relying primarily on small warships transported overland via rail and canal networks.
Auxiliary warships and armed commerce ships, on the other hand, occupied a grey area, and their transit through the straits caused conflict between the Allies and Turkey. Following repeated warnings from Moscow and London, the Turkish government banned the movement of “suspect” Axis ships with effect from June 1944, following the passage of a number of German auxiliary ships through the Straits.
Aircraft Carriers
Although the Turkish government cites the Montreux Convention as barring aircraft carriers from passing the Straits, the treaty does not expressly prohibit aircraft carriers. Contemporary aircraft carriers, on the other hand, are heavier than the 15,000-ton restriction imposed on warships, making transit of modern aircraft carriers across the Straits unfeasible for non-Black Sea states.
Article 11 allows Black Sea governments to transit capital ships of any tonnage via the straits, although aircraft carriers are specifically excluded from the definition of capital ship in Annex II. Battleships frequently carried observation aircraft in 1936. As a result, aircraft carriers are ships that are “mainly intended or converted for the purpose of carrying and operating aircraft at sea.” The presence of planes on any other ship does not make it an aircraft carrier.
Because the ships were armed with P-500 and P-700 cruise missiles, which are also the main armament of the Slava-class cruiser and the Kirov-class battlecruiser, the Soviet Union labelled the Kiev-class and Kuznetsov-class ships as “aircraft-carrying cruisers.” As a result, the Soviet Navy was able to transport its aircraft-carrying cruisers through the Straits in accordance with the Convention, while NATO aircraft carriers that surpassed the 15,000-ton limit were denied access.
Turkey chose to accept the designation of Soviet aircraft carrying cruisers as aircraft cruisers because any revision to the Convention could result in Turkey losing control of the Straits, and the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea had established a more liberal passage through different straits. Turkey might keep the more restrictive Montreux Convention in place by allowing Soviet cruisers to traverse the Straits.
Controversies
Russia-Ukraine War
Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, the Ukrainian government requested that Turkey use its authority under the Montreux Convention to restrict Russian warship movement from the Mediterranean to the Black Sea. In February, at least six Russian warships and a submarine passed the Turkish straits.
After some hesitation, attributed to the country’s close ties with both belligerents, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt avuşolu announced on February 27 that his government would legally recognise the Russian invasion as a “war,” allowing the Convention to be implemented with regard to military vessels. However, avuşolu emphasised that Turkey cannot prevent Russian vessels from returning to their registered base under the rules of the agreement.
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