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Prof. Dr. Alpaslan Ceylan, Rector of KTMU, stated the following in his message on the occasion of August 30 Victory Day:

"August 30 is a great turning point where the Turkish nation's will for independence, carried throughout history, re-emerged powerfully in Anatolia. This date is the name of the day when a nation that never gave up on its homeland, freedom, and future personally shaped its own destiny.

The Great Offensive, conducted under the commander-in-chief Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, and the Battle of the Commander-in-Chief won in Dumlupınar on August 30, 1922, is a historic victory that brought the National Struggle to a decisive military conclusion. The determination of the Turkish army, the sacrifice of our nation, and the national will that united around the same ideal across Anatolia paved the way for the expulsion of the occupying forces from Anatolia.

This victory was won at a time when resources were limited but faith was immense. The Turkish nation refused to accept the fate attempted to be imposed upon it and demonstrated to the entire world that it would not compromise on its independence. The struggle fought in the mountains, plains, and fronts of Anatolia ultimately recorded in history that no imposition can endure before the will of a nation.

To understand the greatness of August 30, one must correctly interpret the will that created it. For nations sometimes join the flow of history, and sometimes display the power to change that flow. The Great Offensive is one of those moments when the Turkish nation altered the course of history. The victory that rose in Dumlupınar transcended the borders of Anatolia and became a powerful expression of the will to live independently, national sovereignty, and the right to self-determination.

In this regard, August 30 is one of the most vital thresholds on the historic path leading to the Republic of Türkiye. The military success achieved on the battlefield found its counterpart at the diplomacy table in the following process, paving the way for Türkiye to take its place in the international order as an independent and sovereign state. The Republic, rising after the victory, carried the political, legal, and social horizons of this great struggle into the future.

As Kyrgyz-Turkish Manas University, one of the shared sanctuaries of science and culture in the Turkic world, we find the historic heritage carried by August 30 particularly meaningful. Because independence is a nation's ability to speak its own language, keep its culture alive, produce its own science, and build its future through its own will. The duty of universities is to carry this will into the future through knowledge, thought, and the generations they nurture.

Today, our responsibility is to move beyond preserving this heritage—won at great cost—as a cherished memory of the past, and to comprehend the responsibility it imposes upon us. Raising generations strong in science, deeply rooted in their culture, free in thought, capable of reading the world, and producing value for humanity is one of the most precious manifestations of the ideal of independence in our era.

With each passing year since August 30, we are reminded once again of the truth that a nation's true strength lies as much in its loyalty to its homeland as in its will to build a shared future. That will ignited a torch of independence on the horizon of Anatolia a century ago, and today it continues to live in the values, institutions, science, culture of our Republic, and in the ideals of rising generations.

With these feelings and thoughts, I wholeheartedly congratulate the August 30 Victory Day; with mercy, gratitude, and respect, I commemorate Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the Commander-in-Chief of the Great Offensive, his comrades-in-arms, our cherished martyrs who sacrificed their lives for the homeland, and our heroic veterans.

I wish for the spirit of independence of August 30 to live forever in the Republic of Türkiye and across the vast geography of the Turkic world, and to empower our unity, solidarity, and ideal of a shared future."

Prof. Dr. Alpaslan Ceylan

Rector of Kyrgyz-Turkish Manas University