MEN-AT-ARMS SERIESrmmMILITARY 269

THE OTTOMAN ARMY1914-18

IHYID :\"ICOLLE PIID IUFF\ELE RUiGERI

MEN-AT-ARMS SERIES

EDITOR: LEE JOHNSON

269

THE OTTOMAN ARMY1914-18

Text byDAVID NICOLLE PHD

Colour plates byRAFFAELE RUGGERI

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THE OTTOMAN ARMY 1914-18

INTRODUCTIONThe Ottoman Turkish Empire was one of the leadingprotagonists in the First World War of 19Q-18, andthe stolid courage of!.he individual Ouom:lR soldier­'Johnny Turk', as he was to his enemies, wasrecognized by 211. Yct the army in which JohnnyTurk served is, like the Ottoman Empire itself,generally little understood. The Empire had alreadybeen in existence for six centuries and was still aformidable force. Although it was app:uently totter­ing towards its fin.al collapse, it W:lS not, 2S is so oftenthought, :already finished.

O\'cr the four years of the 'Great War', theOttoman Army, Navy and two tiny air servicesfought on 6\-c major fronlS (GaUipoli, Sinai­Palestine, Arabia, Iraq and the Caucasus). Ottomantroops also sen'cd in many other war zones (Romania,Galicia, on the Eastern front, the Salonika front,Libya, Arabia, Yemen and Iran). In addition, Ott~man agents stirred up trouble for the Allies, muchfurther afield, in the French Saharan territories,Sudan, Ethiopia, Somalia, Oman, Afghanistan, Rus-

sian Central Asia and c\'en the East Indies - no smallfeal for an Empire which had been called the 'SickMan ofEurope' for almost a hundred years!

The Olloman Army of the Great War, is, like theOlloman Empire itself, oflen wrongly seen as beingentirely dominated by Imperial Germany. Mostworks on the Ottoman Army of the period werewritten by German officers and advisors; few Turkishaccounts have b«n translated into Western lan­guages and as a rcsult the Ottoman Army has toooften been seen as little more than an extension of theImperial Germa!:l Army. This was far from true: thefoundations of the Ottoman Army remained Turkishand Islamic, as did the attitudes and aspirations ofmost of its officers and men. Of course Germaninfluence was strong, especially after Germany won aconcession to build the famous 'Berlin to Baghdad'railway, but this aspect must not be allowed toobscure the important independent role that theOttoman Empire played in the Greal War. TheOttoman government maintained its own warpolicies which conflicted in many ways wilh those ofGermany.

The Ottoman Turks had recently been virtually

Cemal PaiR at hisheadquurlers on thePalestine front, conferringwith his ChicfofSwff,Colonel Ali FUaf Bey. Onfhe left is his AVC, a na,·alofficer, and a Cireassianbodxguard withtraditional cartridgepod:ets on the breast ofhisrunie and a long dagger inhis belt. (Imperial WarMuseum (h5JJ9J'

,I

,

OTTOMAN EMPIRE

1914

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- __. IIlflrnll'OIIl,1 front ..n____ Oilputld fronti.rl____ Turkilh fronll" I9H

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•

Russia; but this was denied, and the Young Turkshad to fall back on Germany. Russia's ambitions ineastern Anatolia were, howe\'er, opposed by the otherpowers. Naturally they were seen by the OttomangO\'ernment as the first steps towards the annexationof the eastern provinces. Ne\'ertheless, the OttomanArmy gained \'aluable experience in these troubledyears, particularly in defence of the Libyan coastagainst It<ilian naval att<ick - experience which was tobe put to good effect at Gallipoli four years later.

driven out of Europe in the First Balkan War(1912-13) fought against Serbia, Bulgaria andGreece. But the Empire still held huge territories inAsia including almost all of the Arab Middle EaSt,and these the Ottomans were determined to keep.They also had their eyes on the \'ast, ethnicallyTurkish lands in the Caucasus and Centrod Asia.Lying behind the apparently reckless Ottoman deci­sion to enter the Great War was a dream of imperialre\'ival - of a new pan-Turkish empire in the east tobe can'ed out at Russia's expense.

PRELUDE TO THEGREAT WAR

In 1908--() a revolution led by army officers overthrewSultan Abdiilhamit II, the last autocratic absoluteruler of the Ouoman dynasty, and although Ottomansultans remained on the throne for another 14 years,real power fell to the Committee of Union andProgress, the so-called 'Young Turks'. Rule wasshared betwcx:n Talat Pa~ as Minister of the Inter­ior, Enver Pafl as Minister of War and Chief of theGeneral Staff, and Ahmet Cemal Pafl as Minister ofMarine - a triumvirate which soon became:l sh2feddictatorship.

The 'Young Turk' revolution ignited a period ofviolent upheaval. At the same time reforms weremade in most aspects of the Ouom:ln state; these werebarely underway before the Ottoman Empire facedblatant aggression from Italy in Libya, followed bytwO Balkan Wars. The year t914 saw the Empireshorn of almost all its European territory, andeffectively reduced to Anatolia and the Arab pro­\'inces. Not only were large numbers of Balkanl\oluslims massacred in these wars but the nowshrunken Ottoman Empire had to absorb a massiveinflux of refugees fleeing \'arious spates of 'ethniccleansing' by Greeks, Serbians, MOnlencgrans andBulgarians. During these bitter years the new 'nat­ionalist' ideology of Pan-Turkism gained supponamong the Turkish majority population of theEmpire.

Immediately after the cat<istrophic Balkan Warsthe Ouoman government turned for suppon toBritain and the other entente powers, France and

Offlccrcoder, FeyV,Henguf. AfWN (rom thenewknlpak lamb's 111'001

hlH, the uniform worn byrndets seems ro be closerto thlH of,he Ortomlln

offlccrcorpstiS R wholebefore the chtlngcsintroduced by the Youngl'uri..s Revolution. (AskeriAljj~,'Si, Isranbul)

s

Army Reforms

During its decadent period in the 19th century, theOttoman Empire had often tried to reform its armedforces by hiring European officers. At the time of theCrimean War there had been strong French in­fluence, but by the late 19th century the Army wasmodelling itself almost entirely upon German lines.This was largely the resull of a number of Gennanmilitary missions, chiefly those of Von der Goltz(1886-1&)5) and Liman von Sanders (1913-1918).Abdiilhamit II fnoured Gennan advisors and Ger­man armaments for the simple reason that Germanyseemed to have fewer vested interests in the MiddleEaSt. The imporr:ance of these missions can hardly beoverestimated, especially in the education of a newclass of junior and middle ranking officers. bothTurkish and Arab, who would make their markduring the First World War.

Sultan Abdulhamit II (1876-1909) had taken akeen interest in his Annyand, in particular, had madegreat efforts to make conscription fairer: all Muslimmales became eligible except those from the tra­ditionally exempted areas of Istanbul, Albania, ajdand I-lijaz in Arabia, Tripoli and Benghazi in Libya,together with a number of nomad groups. Students inhigher education were also exempt for the term oftheir studies. Muslim refugees from European perse­cution now became an important source of educatedand highly motivated recruits. Under the new con-

6

Above: $cI"O:; Be)', CO of'.'fth Arm)' Corps inGa/icia photognlphcd onI' September 1916.Ottoman troops scm cosupport the Germans lindAustro-Hungurisln$ Oil thefllstern from >l"ercsOlllc/hing ofan elire.Thcirki/ >l"as, lit first, thebcst II vIIi/lIb/e. (AskeriMiizcsi, Istanbul)

Left: Turkish infantr),awaiting the first Alliedlandings on the GaJlipolipeninsu/a.IUost still lI'carrhe white summeruniforms that "'ere beingphased out as the GrcatWar bcg:an. Equall}'obvious is the lad: ofdefensil'e trenches in thissector.

iVesuninSlcr DrolfOOns.Museum Trust;phofQgrnph supplied bythe Niltionlil ArmyAluscum, London)

scription system a man served only three years onactive duty, much less than in the past, followed bysix years in the ihtiyot active reseTve, ninc in the redifinactive resen'c and two in the tnuslahfiz homc­guard.

However, improvements to the Onoman Armywere morc obvious in the European than in the Asianprovinces, which rcm:lincd somewhat backward andc,"en retrograde. Under the despotic rule of SultanAbdiilhamit II, energetic young officers were oftenobjects of suspicion. During the final years ofAbdiilhamit's reign reforms were neglected, and nolarge military manoeuvres were held. Consequentlythe Army lacked training and capable senior officersuntil the revolution of 1909.

After II}09 increasingly urgent efforts were madeto modernize the Army and the Navy, and much newequipment was ordered. A military advisory councildrew up new administrative systems and despite theopposition of a conservative bureaucracy, the Armyreserves were reorganized. Medical and veterinaryservices were created along with new training centres,the most effective being those for NCOs and infantryriflemen. More revolutionary were the new conscrip­tion laws which declared for the first time that all thesultan's subjects, including non-Muslims, were liablefor military service.

First Balkan War

Despite the Young Turks' best endeavours much ofthe Anny had yet to be trained to use its newequipment when four BaI.k:m st:ues turned on the

;.

OtfQm:1n infantr)'encnmpcd at Uccrshcbn inS()uthcrn Pll!csfine inOctober '9'7. Nr)lj: Ihemulti-rncifll nature ofthetroops. (Cop)'righl

Ottoman Empire, prompting the First Balkan War of1912-13. Despite minor success in regaining Edirnein the Second Balkan War of 1913, the previouso\'erwhelming defeat ofOnoman anns made the casefor military reform indisputable. German officeradvisors were now given greater scope, the oldImperial Arsenal in Istanbul was modernized andnew military factories established. I-Iundreds ofsenior officers were retired, and replaced by younger,German-trained men.

In December 191] the mOSt famous of allGerman advisors arri\'ed in Istanbul - Liman vonSanders, a member of a converted Prussian Jewishfamily, and a man who was to prove his military skillagainst the British in Gallipoli and Palestine. VonSanders and about 40 other Germans took service inthe Ouoman Army in the winter of 191]-14 tofurther reorganize and reform the Sultan's troops,but their efforts made little progress before the GreatWar engulfed the region.

The outbreak ofWorld War One

On 4 April 1914 Talat Pa~, Minister of the Interior,said !.hat Turkey was like a man attacked by robbersin a forest, Such a man, he said, would happily giveup his money, his goods, e"en his clothes if only hislife and perhaps his shirr was spared. Less than threemonths later a Serbian terrorist gunned down an

7

NeGs training with a large.."OOden p-enade-throwingollapuit. Naval illS ..-dl astlrmy personnd appear inanother photograph takenat the SliIme tinlc,indicating that part oftheOHoman Na1'Y ,,'IU'involw:d in coastaldefence. (Aslr.eri MiJ:u:si,Ismnbul)

Austrian archduke in Bosnia and the world wasdriven towards the worst war it had yet known. On 1August, even as the war clouds gathered, Germanand Ottoman representatives proposed rn:H theOttoman Empire muster an army of 120,000 men inThrace. rC2dy for a joint Ottoman-Bulgarian attackon southern Russia, with another force of 90,000

troops available a month laler. The following dayGermany and the Ottoman Empire signed a secretalliance, though this did not commit the OUomans todeclaring immediate war on Germany's enemies.Acutely aware of its military weakness, the OUomangovernment remained neutral for se,'eral monthsafter the outbrC2k of war, the only member of theruling 'Young Turk' triumvir:ue to favour actionbeing Enver Pa~. A Turkish colonel was also sent toSofia to discuss:l possible pact with Bulg:aria ag:ainst afeared Serbian-Greek alliance.

The narrow straits that linked the Aegean Sea tothe Black Sea - the Dardanelles in the south and theBosphorus in the north - were among the moststrategically important waterways in the world. Theyalso led directly to the Ottoman capital of Istanbul.

lot surprisingly, the Ottoman I avy laid a minefieldto prOtect the Dardanelles as earlY:ls 3 August.

For sever:tl years the Ottoman go\'ernmenl hadbeen m:lking efforts to strengthen the ill-equippedand outgunned Ouom:ln 'avy. Two modern battle­ships, the Sultan Osman I and the R~sadjye partlypaid for by public subscriptions, had been orderedfrom British shipyards and were nearing completion

8

when the Great War started. The British Admiralty'sseizure of these ships for the Royal Navy had adevastating impact in Istanbul, even among pro­British groups. Within a few days two large Germanwarships, the cruisers Coden and Br~slau, arrived offthe Dardanelles seeking sanctuary from a pursuingBritish fleet. They were permitlcd 10 enter Otlomanwaters where they were soon tr:tnsferred, by afictitious sale, to thc Ottoman Navy, becoming thebaulecruiscr SlIllan Seti", Yavuz (normally short­ened to Yavuz) and the light cruiser Midilli. Theirerews put on Ottoman uniform and their comman­der, Admiral Souchon, became head of the Ottoman

avy.British \'essels patrolling offthe Dardanelles then

g:a\'e notiee that henceforth any warships venturinginto the Aegean Se:a would be regarded as hostile.The Ottoman Navy promptly closed the straits toforeign shipping and laid further mines. Even so theOttoman Empire remained neutral, until 29 October1914, when the Yavuz. Midi/li and other Ottomanwarships suddenly opened fire on Russian naval basesin the Black Sea.

Though it is unlikely that the Ottoman Empirc'sstrategically important position would have allowedit to remain neutral for long, the re:asons for the att:lCkon Russia are still a matter of debate. The mainresponsibility lay with Enver Pa~a, supported by apro-German faction within the ruling Committee ofUnion and Progress. But it is not e"en certain that theGermans wanted such precipitate action by a mili-

the hands of Envcr, Talat and Cerna!. Enver Pa$a ranthe Ottoman war effort almost single-handedly as amilitary dictator; Cernal Pa$a took comrol of Syriaand became its effective ruler; and Talat Pa$aconcentrated on civil maners in the capital. Pro­vincial governors ran their regions with differingdegrees of autonomy and apparently differing en­thusiasm for the war. In Izmir, for example, RahmiBey behaved almost as if his pro\!ince was a neutralzone between the warring states.

Finally, of course, the entire Ottoman state wasdefeated in 1918. This effectively signalled the end ofthe ancient Ottoman Empire though its last \'estigeswere not buried until the declaration of the TurkishRepublic in 1923.

tarily weak ally at such an early point in the war. Inthe end the bombardmems were made on theauthority of Enver Pa$a as Minister of War, withoutthe knowledge or consent of the Sultan's GrandVizier and most other government ministers. Yetdoubts remained almost to the last moment.

The German crews of the Yavuz (Coden) andA1idjl/i (8m/au) would naturally do what they wereordered, but would Turkish laval officers, many ofwhom had been trained by the British, take suchcontroversial orders from a German admiral? On 29October 1914the die was cast and the Ottoman I avyshelled se\'eral Russian Black Sea ports, following analmost certainly false claim that a Russian ship hadbeen caught trying to mine the entrance to theBosphorus. On 2 'ovember, Russia declared war onthe Ottoman Empire, followed three days later byBrirain and France. Even before this, British shipshad sunk an Ouoman minelayer in the Gulfof Izmirand bombarded Aqaba in the Red Sea. The shellingof the Dardanelles fortresses by an Angl~Freneh

fleet on 3 November merely confirmed that theOttomans were now at war with the world's threelargest empires.

A conference on I August between Ottoman andGerman representativcs had proposed that the On~mans adopt a strictly defensive posture toward theRussians on the Caucasus from while seizing navaldomination of the Black Sea. But all such plans wereacademic while the positions of Bulgaria andRomania remained undecided. MeanwhileGermany's Austr~Hungarian allies got into diffic­ulty on the Galician from and requested an urgemOttoman seaborne invasion of the Ukraine to divertthe Russians. The German High Command, how­ever, preferred an Ottoman strike against the SuezCanal to disrupt Britain's communications with itsIndian Empire. The Germans also promised theOttomans huge territories in the Russian-ruledCaucasus and Cemral Asia, not (0 mention neutralIran. In the event the plan to attack the Suez Canalwon the day and the invasion of the Ukraine wascalled off.

The outbreali: of war was greeted in Istanbul withdeep gloom. Cavit Pa$a, one of four ministers toresign in disgust at their country's entry into the war,declared: 'I t will be our ruin -even ifwe win.' For theremainder of the war, real power was rosray locked in

It Turkish$(}ldicronguurdin the snow ofthe EasrernFront, Galicia 19,6. Hewears the huge shuUY furcoat used by ellstern

AnRlQJian peasants sin« atleasr the 6th century. lIS...el/ lIS large fur ove....boots. (Askeri lUiizcsi,Istanbul)

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CHRONOLOGY Ouomans enter Tahriz in north-west Iranafter Russian withdrawal & attempt totake oil-fields in south-west Iran.Ouoman auempt to cross Suez Canalfails.Allied (British & French) Navies bom­bard Dardanelles.Allied marine landing on GaJlipoli Penin­sula driven off.Allied (British & French) lavies auemptto break through Dardanelles, driven offwith heavy loss.Russian Navy bombards Turkish pons inBlack Sea, further bombardments later inyear. Ottoman forces in Yemen inVlideBritish-ruled Aden Protectorate.Armenian rebels seize Van in easternAnatolia, British occupy oil-fields insouth-west Iran.Allied landings on Gallipoli Peninsula &Asiatic shore ofDardanelles.Russian ad\tancc in eastern Anatoliareaches Lake Van, reoccupy north-westIran. British begin advance up Tigris inIraq.Ottomans defeat British force outsideAden.Ottoman forces retake Van from Russians& Armenians.

August

18 Mar.

19 Feb.

2-3 Feb.

April

28 Mar.

" Mar.

May

July

1915January

The Ottoman Army fought on scveral fronts duringthe First World War. Events in one region naturallyaffected those elsewhere, but poor communicationswithin the Empire meant that the Turks were oftenfighting three or four separate wars.19142 Aug.II Aug.

Ottoman-German treaty ofalliance.German warships Gotbm & Brtslou reachTurkey.

September Russia seizes control of nonh-westInn.

26 Sept. Britain declares Ottoman warships out­side the D:udanclles hostile.

28-9 Oct. Ouom:m 2\'Y bombards Russian b2SCSin Black Sea.

November British Navy bombards Yemen coast.I Nov. Russian troops invade eastern Turkey.2-5 Noy. Russia, Britain & France dcdare war on

Ottoman Empire.q. 'ov. Sultan declares Jihad against Russia,

Britain & France.22. av. British occupy 8251"2 in southern Iraq.30 Nov. Ottomans invade British-occupied Egypt.Deeember Ouoman offensive against Russians on

Caucasus front results in disaster.Winter 1914-15 Britain occupies Aegean islands

outside Dardanelles. .

Flag Tllwal$ ceremony af

Mwina in the Hijaz, '9'7.The long ribbons beingriw to the top ortheflag­pole represenr plJantryaWJfrds given to the unir liS

a whole. (Askcri MUzesi,Istanbul)

10

GJvalry recruited from theTurkish parts oftheOttom.lln Empire ridingthrough Tkersheba ontheir ....y to the southCfTIPalestine front in April'9'7. The men "'carassortedkabalak hats"'hile theirofticer has anaJrO€ether fincr unifOnD.But all ride small horses orponies. (Imperial WarM~um Q;~744)

•

July

14 Jan.

4 Aug.

6 Aug.

6 Sep.

31 Oct.

25 Jun.

19 Apr.

April

8 Dec.18 Dec.

1917Winter25 Feb.March

18 Sept. & 3 Nov. Ottoman naval raids agamstGreek. 'pirate' islands off Aegean &Mediterranean coasts.

Outbreak of typhus on Caucasus front.British retake Kut in Iraq.Russian Revolution, Russian Army ceasesoffensive operations.

10-11 Mar. British occupy Baghdad.26---'27 Mar. Ottomans defeat British at First Battle

ofGaza.Russian Army starts retreat from easternAnatolia.Ottomans defeaf British at Second BattleofGaza.Last Ottoman-Russian naval clash in theBlack Sea.

Summer Creation of new Y.ldmm Army intendedto reconquer Iraq from British.Huge explosion in Istanbul destroysmuch ofYlldlTlm Army's equipment.British defeat Ottomans at Third Battle ofGaza.

December Ottoman & German naval blockadeimposed on Russian Black Sea coast.British occupy Jerusalem.Ceasefire agreed between Ottomans &newly independent TranscauC2sian Re-public (Armenia, Azarbayjan & Georgia).

28 Dec. Armistice signed at Brcst-Litovsk endsfighting between Ottoman & Russianforces.

Final Allied withdra.....al from GallipoLiPeninsula.Sun of large Russian offensive on Cauca­sus front.Fall of Erzerum to Russians.Russians seize Trabzon on Black Seacoast.British surrender at Kut.Ottoman combined operation retakesUzun island in Aegean from British.

May-June Ottoman counter-Qffensive in easternAnatolia.Arab Revolt against Ottoman Empireproclaimed in western Arabia.Renewed Russian offensive in easternAnatolia.Small Ottoman counter-Qffensive in east­ern Anatolia.Ottoman thrust aeross Sinai Pensinuladefeated at Romani.

Summer Ottoman Expeditionary Force is sent tohelp Germans, Austr()-Hungarians &Bulgarians in the Balkans & on the East­ern Front.

August

27 Jun.

29 Apr.6May

15 Feb.18 Apr.

7 Dec.19 168Jan.

Additional Allied landings on GallipoliPeninsula.

29 Sept. British occupy Kut in Iraq.22-25 Nov. Ottomans defeat British at battle of

Ctesiphon in Iraq, British retreat towardsKut.Ottomans besiege British in Kul.

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Ottom/In ArnbCHvalryonthcir WRy to R militaryrel'icw in Damascus, April191].OthcrphQtogruphstnkcn on rhc samc (J(Xasionshow rhrlf rhc)' wcre"ru:c:omprlnicd by a'dcrvish' band. (ImperialWar Museum Qlo]p6)

Ottoman garrison in Medin.a fin..aJly sur­renders to forces of Ar.lb Revolt.Beginning ofTurkish 'War of Liber.ltion'against Allied armies of occupation inAnatolia.

THE ARMY

19 19January

The OUoman Army was mobilized in August 1914,immcdiately after war broke out in Europe, and threeArmics were cstablished. The First and Second werebased west and east of the capital Istanbul, while theThird faced the Russian frontier in the Caucasus. InNovember '914, after the Ottomans entered the war,a Fourth Army was crcated in Syria. A Fifth Armywas cstablishcd in the spring of '9'5 to defend thesouthern approaches to Istanbul; and the Sixth,Seventh, Eighth and Ninth Armics were set upduring the course of the conflict.

The scalc of mobilization was very large inproportion to the size of the Ottoman Empire'spopulation. Losses, too, were high compared to otherstatcs-some 4,500,000 Turks alone dying during theconflict from war-action, disease, st2r\'ation andmassacre. E"en before entering the war there was amassive call-up of reserves which put a great strain onresources. The harvest was severely disrupted and

April

Republic fragmcnts(Armenia, Georgia,

14 Sep.

19 Sep.

August

28Jun.

17 Scpo

1 Ocl.25 Oct.30 Oct.

191820 Jan. urge Ottoman navOII r.lid mto Aegean

from Dardanelles.:11 feb. British occupy Jericho.26-31 Mar. Ottomans defeat British in first Battle

ofAmman.26 Apr. Ottomans retakc Kars on Caucasus front.30 Apr-3 May. Ottomans defeat British in Second

Battle ofAmman.May-June Transcaucasian

into three statesAzarbayjan)Death of Sultan Mehmct V, succeeded byMehmCI VI.British occupy Baku oil-fields on Caspiancoast.Onomans & Azarbayjan forces drive Brit­ish from Baku oil-fields.Troops of Arab Revoh scvcr Ottomancommunications on Palestine front.British break through Ottoman front inPalestine.Troops ofArab Revoh occupy Damascus.British occupy Aleppo.Ottoman government signs Armisticewith Allies at Mudros. Followed byoccupation of most of Anatolia & Thr.lceby British, French, Italian & Greekforces.

12

this caused a ncar famine. Ne\'ertheless several newArmies were established following massive troopmovements across huge distances; the 6th ArmyCorps ncar Aleppo in Syria, for example, joining theFirst Army outside Istanbul.

Foreign observers were impressed by the qualityof the First Army outside the capital although moredistant Armies had lower efficiency with some infan­try companies consisting of no more than 20 ill­equipped men. The First Army was based in theremnants of the Empire's European provinces (East­ern Thrace), the Second on the Asiatic side of theBosphorus, nOt far from Isunbul, and the Third atErzerum in eastern Turkey, By the end of the warnine numbered armies were in existence throughoutthe Empire. plus the special Yddlnm Army andseveral separate corps serving in Europe. The largenumber of these armies W:l:S criticized by Germanad\'isors who believed they required too many staffand support facilities which could have been betterused:lt the front.

During the months of Ottoman neutrality Tur­kish W:l:f :lims changed significa.ntly, the westwud:lmbitions being abandoned in fnour oflibcrating ofthe Muslim-Turkish peoples of the Cauca.sus andCentr.11 Asi:l: from Armenian and Russi:ln domin­ation. More immediately, Enver Pa~'s first plan wasa compromise between Ottom:l:n 2nd Germ2n prior­itics, with the pre-emptive strike 2gainst the RussianBlack Sea fleet followed by defensivc operations inthe Cauca.sus and 2n offensive against the British­held Suez Canal while the bulk of the Army stoodready for possible aclion in the Ukr2ine.

Soon, the drcam of liberating eastern Turkishpeoples developed into an obsession. Enver drew upan extraordinary plan for a winter offensive againstRussian forces in the Caucasus, a plan that Limanvon Sanders considered impossible and which endedin disaster in January 1915" The defeat deprived theOttomans of reserves of trained troops badly neededon other fronts. Such Pan-Turkish dreams divertedattention away from the Ottoman Empire's Arabprovinces and evcntually ca.used the Empire's undo-

ing. Onl}' in the summer of 1917, with the proposedYldlflm camp2ign, were these southern fronts ukenseriously, but by then it was too latc.

Morale

Amazingly, the morale of what cven the mostsympathetic modern military historian has called the'rugged hut gimcrack Ottoman Army' remaincd highalmost to the end. Thc dedica.tion of Turkish unitslike the 57th Infantry Regiment, whieh was almostwiped out while stopping an Australian advance fromANZAC Cove during the Gallipoli campaign, isknown, but not widely. Whal is Icss remembered is

The reMr-I'ielf' orthekabalak orthe man on theri,hr sholf"5 how the clod!co,'cringorthis headgearwas normally lfv~lnd.

(Askcri Muzcs;, lsranbul)

Ottoman Turldsh fieldarrillery on rhe Gallipolirront in '9t5. ThelQIJdcrscollar has the Arabicnumber; (a small V)indicating his regiment,

officcrs ha l'e disti"ctiw'hats !hat lool.· like deep-seafishermen s 'soU'lf·cstcr:s'.(Imperial War MuseumQUJ5J)

Turkish officers capturedby the 5th Auslralia" LightHorse during the rail orDamascus, JO St'prembcr1916. Mosr If"nlr the lambsrur kalpak but nnj ClH"alry

Il

()(ll'111.111 \nll~ (h~.llll....lIl"ll IlJr~ IIJIS

1917 Cilicia, Syria, Pakstinc: &: A",bia

Formcd7!kPC·19'4SlIQ Canal Expecl. Formed lale 19'4Part ofCanal Erpc:d. Force 10 Gallipotiarl)' 1915 Hiju Exped.Southern put ofHiju. Expcd. Foret"'ithdl'lllO'n imo Madina May (rccmainto Jan, '9'9), nonhern pari innQl'\hern Hiiu &: $(lutll/:rn Jordan(unlil '9,8). Sennlh Corps (in Asir,Yernt:n &: Aden) i§olalCd (rom FourlhArmy aflu Al'lIb Revoll.Disbanded 16 Sepl. '917Sevenlh Corps (in Asir. Ytrntn &<Adm) isolated from Founh Army

FOl'1I'ltd 5 Aug. 19'4

Formed 5 Aug. '9'41St Exped. Force sem 10 norlh-IO·tslcrnIran late '9'451h F..llped. Iioo:e sent 10 soulh-easlAnnolia earl)' 1915Combined ..-ilh Second Army asCauo;aa... Army GroupPart ofCaua~usArmyGroupPm ofCauaosus Arm~' GroupIlTl'JIIlar Wid)' Azeri 'IslamicArmy' altadlcd.~ 15 NO\'. 1918

1\"0 Corps liCnllO norlhern S)'ria;therafter link morcc lhan 'name-pl.le'LillIe more than 'name-piaIe'Disban<kd 17 Feb. 1918Reformed 1.4 Scpc. 1918Disban<kd II Oct. 19,8

Fonnal 5 Alii, '9L.Disbanded ,8N"... ")'4Reformed 5 Dco;. '9'4

Mon:d elSl Ap.-Aug. combined ..-ilhJrd Ami}' IS Caucasus Army GroupPart of CaUCII"US Arm)' Group (oneCorps !"C'!\Irnc:d 10 Istanbul, rf5I of IhisCor""altaehed 10Sixth Arm,.)Pan ofCaua....... Army Group (onl)'$C'-en ban. lions).Di~banded 15 Dec:. 1918

41h Sq., Jrd Sq. &: JOQlh Pa~

(German) Sq.

Danu.scus Aircraft Park, Jrd Sq., 4thSq., '41h Sq., JOOIh, JOIA. Joznd,lOyd &: lCl.flh~ (Gn-man) Sqs.

71h Sq. &: 8th Sq. (namc:-plaleonly)

ph Sq. &: 8th Sq.(I« under Seoond Anny)

loth Sq. (from Alii.)

,oth Sq.

'51h Sq.

71h Sq.• 8th Sq., ,Oth Sq., Imh Sq.,lnl N..,.l Sq. &: 171h Sq. (name-plaleonly)

znd Na...1Sq. &: Gern\lln ",""plane uni!(as Slraits IXfeocc: Comnu.nd)~noJ Na.-al Sq. &: German Kaplan\" unil(as Slr.lilS IXfcna: Command)

AjrSupt-T

SClIlIh-c:aslall Analolia, Q'lO\"«! elSlafltt Russian Ruolulion

IstanbulIstanbulIg:anbul

CauaSU5 &: norlh-"'tsl Iran

Thraee

Eastern ihoraofStraiISSoulh<aslern Anaullia

IstanbulIstanbul

Loarjon

10=Wtilern iho~OfSlrailSThratc:Th",tc:

N~ThirdAnnybeina formed inThraa:. Sooft'only, '~le'

Fourth Army1914 S)"ria. Palalint &< Arabia (Hiju&<

Ytrntn)19' 5 S)'ria, P.le5line &< Anbia (Hijaz&<

Ycmtn)'9,6 Cilicia, S)'ria, Paleslin\" &: .o\nbia

Third Army11)14 Nonh-tllSl AnOloli.

1915 Norlh-nSl Analolia

1916 Nonh-<ul Analolia

.•.I Unlnl &< north-c:asl A...loIia19' Nonh-<ul Anatola..loGcorFa

(Bo.rum) &: Aurbaypn (Bolli)

0...

GHQ.19 1419151916

19171918

Finn Anny19 1419' S11),6'917

that a regiment of Arab reinforcements then drovethe Australians back to the coast. Only later in the wardid the morale of such non-Turkish units declinewith the spread of the Arab Re\'olt. Victory in theGaUipoli campaign also boosted morale, this being

the firsl time in li\'ingmemory thai an Otloman Armyhad defeated a major European power.

As Mustafa Kemal Ataturk laler wrote, thegreatest monument (0 such successes was theMdmel(ik himself - the affectionate nickname given

0.«Fif,h Arm)'191519 16

I-O.:"t;01I

Slrll'lS (lJoiphoru' & I)nd.Ml1l$)Slro,lS (lklsphoru, & I)...bndle'§), .nd"-e'§lem An.,ol"We'§tCTn & SOUlh.,,<'SICTII Ana,oIi., &CiliciaSlrailS (Bmphorus & Dnd.ncUe'§). .nd"-o;tCTII Anatalia

AirSupporr

'Si Sq. (from Jul),)lSI Sq., 6th Sq_, 5th Sq. & tSI N.,·.ISq.lSI Sq., 6th Sq., 5th Sq., 11th Sq. &1M NlI."&I Sq.1st Sq., W. Sq., 3th Sq., 12th Sq., 1st1'1.'"'11 Sq., & lSI:, 2nd, Jrd BolloonS«<....

Commcnt...

Only rilht "'cok di.-wonsDisbanded 11 No... 1918

Sixlh Ann)''9'5 Iraq

"16 lroq

I'll Ccn'ral&nonhcmlnq

"18 Nonhern Iraq

Sc:"enth Arm)·1"1 G1icio

"18 P.lcIline & S}'rio

Eilhth Ann)'1'16 Pak:$tineI'll Pak:$tine1'18 Palc:Rinc&S)rio

Ninth Anny1818 &Ibns

Ylld,r,m Arm)' Group1'17 Northern S)rio & nonhcTn Iraq

European Front":Rumdi Field r>.:1""hment''I' 5 Throce'9,6 W(Slern Mo«donio1917 \\'alern Mo«doni~

1918 We'§lcrn Mo«doni~

61h Army Corps'9,6 G~lici.

'9'7 G.lici.",8 G.lici.151h Army Corp"'9,6 WllIlKhi.& Dobruj~

'ljl1 WlIlIKhi~& Dubrujawth Army Corp""'1 F..as,crn ~hc:edoni~

2nd Sq. & I1lh (bier rnlIlOCd '3Ih)Sq.Ibghcbd Aircrafl Pork (IOO\"N 10Samarn & bier MowIl, Ind Sq.. luhSq.. IJlh Sq. & 1St Balloon Sq. (non­opmIrionIl)M05U1 AilUlfi Port., 2nd & IJlh Sq.

(see ur>dCT Ytld1rltt'l Anny Group)

(I« under Ylldlnm Anny Group)

3rd Sq.,.fth Sq., 14th Sq. & JOOlh,301Sl, j02nd, JOJrd. J04lh, J051h(rnunc..pblc only) PliP Sqs.• IndGcnnon JISlI IF

Formed 5 Sep'. 1915 from unilSIlrcad)' in lnoqMowl Group formed Jul)' to COUnterRuSiion mrelilo MosulSc:paratc Euphr:IlCI &TiFis Groupsformed bc:ause ofdillku.11oommUNo:alionJ

Still """ttl )In, 19"

Formed 11 AlIJ. 1911. Inlcnckd fOifInq fronl, di,-cnnllo Pak:$tincUnda- Ylldlnm Ann)'Groupt'OOUIUnd, Disbanded IJ N~. 1918

Formed 2 Oa. "16{doIC 1lftC'I:fUin)

Indudinl GnTnan Mia CorpsUIMJa Ylld.nm Anny Groupoonunand. Disbondnl 1-4 N~. "18)

Formed 'June 1'18 (flall>l>pbl~only)incorponoli.. Rumeli FieldDmchmmt (I« European Franu)51ill nisIN Jan. 1'19

Slalffonnnl Ql"ly 1'17 (IhromicallyinwtjHK.1inl Fourlh, Sc:"mlh &Eilhlh Annica. Ind German Asia

"""'"Inrorpuruillf Ammon Expnl. FOf"c:e(fomKd Mlrch incorponlillf 1\1o'.nExpnl. FOf"c:e pre~iousI)' rtprdtd 15pari ulHijn t:xptd.. Fora)

l71th Inf. R"l' onlyFormc:d Jo'c '915Sent 10 Ililol~ corl)' 19,6

lororporotcd imo N,mh AmlY earl)''918Three Dj,-isionsUndcr comn"nd ofGcrman Gen_ VonMackcnsc:n

T,,-o Di.-isi~

AUlched to Ilulg.ri.n 2nd Army onSuumo fronl

to the bra \'e but unpretentious Turkish infantryman,The courage of A1~ltm~/(ik was recognized by alliesand foes alike. In the Middle East, where the Arabpeoples have little reason to be nostalgic aboutOnoman rule, the Turkish soldieroflhe Great War is

still remembefed as Abu Shuja'a, the 'Father ofCourage', while his British opponent is rememberedas Abu AifAfiJfah, the 'Father ofa Thousand Guns',On the other hand most observers recognized that theuneducated Onoman ordinary soldier was lost with-

IS

out good leadership and that any breakdown ofcommand weakened his morale. At Gallipoli leaderslike Mustafa Kemal understood the capabilities ofsuch troops when well commanded by officers wholed by personal example. There were many examplesof silent pre-dawn attacks in which officers withdrawn swords wen! ahead of men who were ordered[0 charge only when they saw their officers raise theirwhips and only to shout their banle-cry of AllahuAkbar when they had actually reached the enemy'strenches. The close relationship between officers andmen was, however, gradually undermined. By theend of 1917 a frequent reshuffling of Armies, thebre2.L:ing up and re-forming of units, meant thatofficers hardly knew their men, let alone had time toearn their respect.

Not surprisingly Arab units were the first to showsigns of decay. Turkish (essentially anti-Arab) na­tionalism grew quickly within the Ottoman Armyand had undermined the morale of many Arabofficers e,·en before the war began. According to

Liman ,'on Sanders the Arab was JUSt as good asoldier as the Turk - when treated fairly - but byt917 this was no longer the casco By 1918 most Arabtroops were held back as an unreliable reserve.

Islam

Competing nationalisms may have influenced theOttoman Army's officer corps but it was the Muslimfaith which underpinned the morafe of the ordinaryOttoman soldier. It also had a powerful influence on

some senior commanders. Fahri Pa~a, the OttomanCommander in the Muslim Holy Cily of Medina forexample, had becn CUI off from support for years andonly surrendered in 1919 after receiving specificorders from the Ouoman sultan. He then left hissword on the Prophet Muhammad's grave andretired as a hero to Turk.ish Muslims. Throughoutthe Ottoman Army Muslim imams served much asChristian chaplains did in European armies. They arerecorded reading the Qur'an 10 soldiers as they servedtheir guns under na,·al bombardment al Gallipoli andlater reportedly took. over the leadership of some

16

-...-/tool'C: Turkish anti­airernn gun camouflagedto 'OQ'" /ikc II smll// bush.Thc offiecrs in frominclude bf}/h Turks andGermans. (Cross &CocliRde lntcrmuional)

Gunners with a tOS mmhowirzcr, in action /918.Thc gun was II standardGerm/III field piece. Whiteuniforms In~reofrcn lI"ornby artillcr)'mcn in hotM'cluhcr, but less usual arcthe mcn S Slllldals. Oncespin their officer M'ears II

quite distinctil·c uniform.(Imperial War,UuseumQsnp)

infantry platoons after all the officers had been killed.The Bektasi dervish organization had a particularlyclose connection with the Ottoman Army that wentright back to the founding of the state. Supposedlysuppressed in 1826, it had enjoyed a revh'al in theearly 20th century and during the Great War playedits traditional religious role, supporting the men'smorale. Being regarded by Europeans as the mostreformist ofsuch dervish 'sects', the Bekusi went onto support Mustafa Kemal's Turkish Nationalistsagainst the Ottoman Sulun after the war. Volunteermilitary units were also recruited from other dervishsects such as the Mevle\'i (Whirling Dervishes) andthe Qadariya (Faulist) orders.

Morale was one thing, standards of training quiteanother, and it was clear that these \'2ried betweenArmies in different parts of the Empire. In GallipoliOttoman marksmanship, particularly that of sharp­shooters, was generally superior to that of theinvaders. Standards declined considerably towardsthe end of the war but even as late as April and May1918, in what is now Jordan, pony-mounted Turkishcavalr}' succeeded in driving back larger numbers ofsuperbly mounted troopers from the AustralianMounted Division.

To compound these problems, the lure of east­ward expansion led 10 some extraordinary schemes inthe War Ministry back in Istanbul. One of Enver

Pa~a's more fanciful plans was to send three regi­ments through nemrallran to slir up an anti-Britishrevoir in India. In 1917, as British pressure mountedin both Iraq and Palestine, Turkish officers were stillbeing offered promolion and increased pay if theyvolunteered for service on the Caucasus front. E\'enas late as 1918, in the very closing stages of the war,Turkish trOOps and senior officers were still beingwithdrawn from Syria to reinforce a thrust throughthe Caucasus. Meanwhile entire battalions of unwil­ling Arab conscripts were deserting before they e\'enreached the fronts. The Onoman High Command'sdecision to send many of its best units to variousEuropean fronts was, however, a purely politicaldecision to show solidarity with Germany, Austria­Hungary and Bulgaria. Liman \·on Sanders consi­dered it correct to send such troops against Romania,which could ha\'e threatened Ottoman Thrace, but amistake to send others to Galicia or to the Bulgarianfront in nonhern Greece.

Desertion

By 1918 desertion had become a serious problem. Atthe beginning of the war many Armenian soldiersdeserted to the Russians, and then re-enlisted asfanatically anti-Turkish volunteers. As a result mostof the remaining Armenian troops in the OttomanArmy were disarmed and converted into poorly fed,

,\lachinegunners in action,Palestine front. Theofficers ha\"C~pc)' collarson their tunics while themcn's uniforms carry nodistinguishing marJ.:s.(Imperial War MuseumQs664,)

17

• Section from II mounredmllch;n~undetachment;n action II t B«rsheba.Such units up;n rcflC1:tedthe morc mobile charllcterofthe GraH War in theMiddle East. (CoPJrightlVesuninstcr DrIlgoonsMuseum Trust;photograph supplied bythe Natiomll ArmyMuseum, London)

harshly treated labour batulions. Troops of Araborigin were me next to start deserting in somenumbers, but by late 1917 when rations on theCaucasus, Syrian and -Iraqi fronts had deteriorated toalmost below subsistence level, even Turks weredoing so. Frequem amnesties were announced fromthe Sultan's palace in attempts to bring troops back to

the I1inks, much to the disgust of German advisorswho argued in favour of salutary executions to

discouI1ige further desertion.Even in 1914some Ottoman Armies had not been

up to full strength and as the WOlr dragged on severalof those in quiet areas were reduced to little morethan 'number-plates'. The Fifth Army in westernAnatolia had, after the end of the GOllLipoli campaign,only about one-mird of its proper artillery, virtuallyno transport, and almost no machine-guns; some ofits troops e\'en lacked rifles. By 1917 most militaryfoonations were only at one-fifth paper strength, andeven me best units were losing half their new recruitsmrough desertion or sickness before they reachedtheir regiments. Most of the remaining troops wetCraw recruits conscripted as young as 16 years of age.In isolated locations such as the scattered garrisonsdefending the Hijaz I1iilways, however, numberswere actually above the official strengths as 'unlisted',unpaid stI1igglers were attI1icted by the chance offood.

The morale of the civilian population, parti­cularly in Istanbul, endured remarkably well. Everystudent of modern Turkish history knows howMustafa Kemal Atatiirk forced 'modernization' and'Westernization' on his people after the First WorldWOlf. Yet the war irselfhad already seen considerablelibeI1iJization. These were most obvious in the role of

18

women and, unlike some ideas subsequently forcedon the people by Atatiirk, this earlier relaxationgeneI1illy remained within Islamic codes ofbehaviour. During the war, for example, manyTurkish women in Istanbul discarded the veil inpublic - to the horror of ultI1i-traditionalists. Yetmey almost invariably retained the headscarf, thisbeing all that the Prophet Muhammad had originallyinsisted upon. More importantly, Ottoman womenplayed a prominent role in offices, factories, relief andmedical work just as women did in other countriescaught up in the Great War.

UNIFORMSAND EQUIPMENTOne of the most visible results of the Young TurkRevolution of I~ was in Ottoman Army uni­forms, although these reforms took seveI1i1 years tocomplete. During the previous hundred years theOttoman Empire had often tried to modernize theappearance as wen as the organization of its armedforces. At the time of the Crimean War there hadbeen a strong French influence but by the late 19thcentury the Army was modelling itsclfalmost entirelyupon German fashions.

A basic khaki uniform was introduced in 11)09 toreplace the old dark blue, although mese remainedfor an officer's full-dress uniform. The red larhush or'fez' with its dark blue taSsel, the tI1idemark of theTurkish soldier for almost Ol century, "i'as replaced bythe /tuba/alt. This unique form of military headgearconsisted of a long c10m wound around a wickerwork

base and resembling a solar topee or sun-helmer. Thekabo/d had apparently been devised by Enver Pa~a

himself and was often known as an Enveri)'e. Officerswore the sheepskin ka/pok but this was normallyreplaced by a kob%k on active service. Later in !.hewar a simplified form of kabo/ok was introduced forofficers, with a plain khaki covering and a single stripof cloth wound once around the helmet. Troops ofArab origin generally wore their traditional kufi),oheadcloths.

The quality of uniforms worn by officers andother ranks seems to have differed el'en more in theOttoman Anny than elscwhere. M:my officers, parti­cularly those ofsenior rank, had their dress as well as!.heir personal weapons made in Germany. Someordinary soldiers' kit was also manufactured by theOttoman Empire's central Europe:m allies but thebulk of uniforms sccm to hne been made in Turkeyitself. Towards the end of the war the quality ofthcseranged from moderately good to simply appalling.Colours as well as quality of cloth varied consider­ably. The same applied to boots and other leatherItems.

" unit ofmcvlavi dervish,·oluntet.,rs in ISfanbul,t9t5. They IJrc led bydrummers IJnd aredistinguished by II specialform offJat-roppcd capwith a smlllJ turblln 'ot-oundllroundit.Oneofthemenstanding guard also carries

II longdouble-billded axe,a weapon associared withthc Ouoman Empire'sfllnlQusjaniSSSlry infll.ntryand sriJl uM:d as a mart ofnmt by dervish 'Volunteerunits during World lV.lIIrOne, (AsKeri Miizesi,Isranbul)

On campaign equipmenl could often not bereplaced so that soldiers were secn with their feetbound in cloth and their worn leather equipment heldtogether with string. During the appalling weather ofNm'embcr '9'5 Ottoman troops at GaUipoli werealso supplied with a strange assortment of warmclothing donated by the people of Istanbul, includingunsuitably fashionable underwear and gentlemen'slightweight shoes. Footwear was to become a realproblem for the Olloman Army and by the summerof t9'7 eycn some officcrs had not got proper boots.

On the other hand certain details of insignia had a

"

long pedigree and an still be seen in the TurkishArmy of today. Br:mches ofservice were indicated bycoloured collars for officers, collar patches for otherranks, repeated in the edging of officers' kalabakcovering; infantry - olive green, machine--gun com­panies - grass green, avalry - ligh.t grey, artillery­dark blue, engineers - mid-blue, railway troops- skyblue, gendarmerie - scarlet. In 1915 the Ottoman AirService was sepaf3ted from the Engineers andchanged from blue collar patches to red. Officer andwarf3nt-offieer ranks were, as in most armies, indi-

cated by the number of pips and the degree ofbf3iding on shoulder-boards; NCO ranks by simplestripes around the sleeve.

At about the same time as the simpler form ofofficer's kabalok was being introduced for the Army,the Ouoman Navy brought in new headgear reflect­ing German influence. This was essentially a normalEuropean naval ap, but it lacked a peak in deferenceto Islamic tradition, so that a man might touch hisforehead to the ground while making his salOL orritual prayer without removing his hat. This was anextremely importam consideration: only a few yearslater Turkey's fanarial1y secular new lcader, KemalAtariirk, insisted that men wcar European peaked'flat caps' as a direct challenge to Islamic tradition - alarge number of people were killed in the ensuingnots.

reillSOn:M ble equiprncnr./rnosr to the end oftheGreiff W.r. (Imperi:MI W:MrMuseum, Q60J~J)

Turl&ish nservisls ~inKad/ed ro the cololJT$ inAntHOJi:M, Af:Mrch '9'7. TheOrrorniIUI tinny was .bJe toprovide irs reservisrs with

Logistics

The Ottoman Empire was ill-prepared for a pr~

longed war effort, with almost no munitions indus­tries ofits own. Huge armies and their material wouldhave to be mo\'ed along tarth roads, tracks andincomplete single-line railways O\'er vast distancesthrough exceptionally difficult terrain and extremeclimatic conditions. The Ottoman Armies remainedhcavily dependem on supplies from their Germanand Austr~Hungarian allies throughout the war.

Stockpiles ofmunitions had largely been used upduring the Balkan Wars; in 1914 the most pressingshortages were of artillery shells and naval mines.Within a few days of signing the secret treaty withGermany, Enver Pa~ told his new allies that heneeded 500,000 shells and 2.00,000 rifles, Late Augustand carly September saw further requests for 200

mines, then howitzers, trucks, electrical equipment,tools, uniforms, boots, blankets and canned food,Only a fraction of this materiel arrived before theOttoman Empire entered the war, whereupon ship­ments through neutral Bulgaria and Romania becamealmost impossible. Once Bulgaria joined the Germanalliance, followed by the conquest of Serbia andRomania however, the shipment of supplies became

hIlS his slain f.ther's rifk.ndhis medal. (AskeriMilzesi, Istanbul)

The CallCll$ll$ front in'9'7. A sr.l1'otIicrr ispholopllphed with a 1m­)-cu-oJd boysoldier who

20

Small arms

The personal equipment of the Ottoman soldier wasessen(ially German in design, though reduced to thebarest essentials, while weapons were almost all ofGerman manufacture. Officers were armed with

easier. Germany, and to a lesser extent Austria­Hungary, began sending vitally nceded guns, ammu­nition, communications equipment, aircraft andother high-technology items. They also had to supplycoal after the Russian fleet disrupted seabornesupplies from the Ottoman Empire's own mines innorthern Anatolia.

During the course of the war, German expertstried to improve the chaotic Ottoman logisticalsystem, but with little success: most Ottoman Armieshad to live off the land much as they had done forcenturies. The Ottoman Army was not, of course,entirely dependent on outside help. Though eventraditional craftsmen had largely been ruined byche:.tp foreign imports, a number of governmentfactories had been established for basic military itemssuch as uniforms and packs. More technical produc­tion facilities also appe2red during the war, a Germannaval captllin named Pieper Pap helping set upmunitions factories while Austro-Hungarian techni­cians supervised a new propeller-making workshop.

Of more immediate concern W;lS the effect thatmassh'e mobilization had on food production, withfamine as the inevitllble result. During the war,supplies of draft horses also slumped to 40 per cent,oxen and buffaloes to tS per cent. The shomge ofdraft animals, and disease among the remainder (thecountry only had 250 vets), was a serious problem forthe Ottoman Army which had constantly to requi­sition more from the peasants - disrupting agricul­ture even further. Even when beasts of burden wereavailable they were not always suitable for theconditions in which the Ottoman Armies fought. Ineastern Anatolia during win(er, animals could not getthrough the snowbound mountains and ammunitionhad to be brought to the frOn( on the shoulders ofpeasant women volunteers.

Colours ofan unknownregiment IUId its colourguard during 8 meda/­pving CCI Clliony on thePalestine front. The

ribbons hanging from theIlaptaffrepresent medalsgil'en to this unit.as awhole. (Askeri Mazesi,lsumbul)

swords, though these were not generally carried inaction, and they generally purchased their ownpistols of European commercial design. The infantryrifle was the Turkish Mauser, ofeither Modell8<)J orModcll903 (for short'M.I&}3' or 'M.I903'). Latersupplies included German M.1888 rifles, the so­called Commission Rifle, and apparently some Ger­man Mauser M.1898s while the Austrians sentadapted Russian Mossin-Nagant M.I&}t rifles.Some reservists may even have carried the obsoleteblack-powder Turkish Mauser M.1887. Bayonetswere made by a number of German companies inSolingen and Suhl. Some Ottoman infantry also seemto have carried lighting knives in their boots, just astheir medieval predecessors had done. Cavalry werearmed with a rifle or carbine, the latter usually beingthe Turkish Mauser M.I90S. They also carried asword or lance o~ both, the sword being either theM.IC)09 made by Carl EicL:hom of Solingen or anearlier model. The supply situation could be very

21

different on each of the fronts, particularly in thelatter part of the war when one unit of8,000 men wasrecorded as only having 1,000 rifles.

Artillery and other weapons

Despite scvere losses during the Balkan Wars, theOttoman Army still possessed German, British,French and other artillery in t9t4. During the courseof the war new guns came from German or Austr~Hungarian manufactUrers. Krupp was the mostimport:mt supplier, though at first demanded im­mediate cash paymenl.

The almost complete lack of heavy guns was the

u

Ottoman Army's greatcst problem. During theAngl~French naval bombardmenl of the Dardan­elles dummy ballerics were set up; thesc wereallegedly m:mned by two old reservists each armedwith a length of stO\'e-pipe and sc\'eral smokecartridges which they lit at random inlervals beforeSOIimpering bad: inlo shallow dugouts. During theGallipoli campaign the Ottomans pressed into serviceccnfur)'-old mortars from the Army Museum inIstanbul. Fortunately the collapse of Serbia openedup a direct supply route, allowing sc\'eral big howit­zers to arrive from Austria, along with a quantity ofmountain artillery. Nevertheless Ottoman Armies onthe Caucasus front were always chronically short ofartillery.

There was always a dearth of machine-guns, theOttomans only having a handful of Maxims andHotchkiss at the start of the war. As far as otherweapons were concerned, the Ottoman Navy's minesincluded Russian examples rctrieved from the seaoutside Trabzon, French from off Izmir, and evenold Bulgarian mines from the previous Balkan wars,A lad: ofland-mines meant that lorpcd~headswereused in the shore defences of the Dardanelles whileordinary garden wire from ncarby (:arms was

L~rt: A Turkish heavy backp-ound It-~ars th~

artillery ""((~rylit whit~shiN with m,ntis ofGallipoJi in '9'5. Th~ p-ouped naITOit' blacklllr;r~gunsfought o1fth~ titjtching orren It-omfir5t Allied attempt to ~tha soldi~r's tunic.fortt a lt7fy through the (AsJ.;eri Miizcs;, Istanbul)StraitS by na,..1polt'ualon~. The man;n the

An o.\"-drnwn heavygun onthe march. '9'7. probablyan lIustro-Hunlfllrill1l­madeSkodll '49mmhowitzcr. Severalonlookcr5 appear to wearAustro-HungJlri/lnumTorms and thebuildings in thcbacliKfOundsU/(gCSt thatthis photograph was takt:non thc Ga/ici:l1l front. Itcertainly illustrates thelogistical difficulties facedby (he Turb inmountainous te~inlacking proper roads.(lJnperigl mrr MuseumQ60J40)

stretched underwater ncar vulnerable beaches. Otto­man forces were similarly shoTt ofsandbags, many ofthese being used by the soldiers to patch their tattereduniforms. So short were the soldiers of entrenchingtools that they captured these from the enemywhenever possible. Their officers, meanwhile, foundthat maps they captured from the British weresuperior to the Ba~d~k" 'tourist guides' on whichthey had often had to rely.

GERMANINFLUENCE

Since most European and American historians basetheir work on German rather than untranslatedTurkish sources, there has been widespread exagger­ation of the role of the Germans in the Ouoman wareffort, There were, in fact, around 500 Germanofficers in the Ottoman Empire when war broke outand some were immediately put in command ofMinistry of War departments including Operations,Intelligena:, Railways, Supply, Munitions, Coal andFortresses. Once direct overland communicationswith German)' were opened a great many moreGerman offia:rs and NCOs were sent to scn'e in theOttom:m Army, Navy and Air Forces. Towards theend of the war relati\'ely large German combat unitsalso arrived, most importantly in Palestine.

In the autumn of 1917, however, the relationshipchanged. The German military mission was replacedby a German-Quoman military convention. Underthis new arrangement many Turkish officers weresent to Germany for ad\'anced training while therewas less direct German supervision of basic OuomanArmy training. Ottoman divisions were reconstruc­ted along German lines, though it remains unclearhow far these changes were carried through inpractice. The Germans complained about what theysaw as an unnecessary volume of Ottoman paper­work, though the records show that Turkish andArab officers were also often less than impressed bytheir German colleagues. The Germans, with fewexceptions, failed to understand the Turkish men­tality or to show sensitivity to the Ottoman Empire'sproud Islamic heritage, often making it all tooobvious that they saw themselves as superior to bothTurks and Arabs. On the Ottoman side youngofficers, particularly those who favoured the newTurkish nationalism, resented being treated assecond-class soldiers.

In terms of broad war aims the Ottoman andGerman High Commands had been at odds since thewar began. After the Russian Remlution the Turksfound themseh'cs facing e\'en greater oppositionfrom Germany than from Russia in attempts toregain eastern territory. In the meantime Germans,British and Turks all had their eyes on the Baku oilfields ofAzarbayjan.

German oDicer inspectinga company ofTuriishsrorm-trOOpers inPalestine, probabl}' in1918. The S()ldiers l'tIdtheir commander l ...~ar thespecial Turkish SIW

helmet which differedsJiXhliy from that ofGcrm:m troops. (bnperialWar Muscum Q/Joo.u)

"

Road

Military historians have gi\'cn less attention to theOttoman road system which was e\'en weaker thanthe rail network. The Empire was actually in theprocess of a large road-building scheme in 1914,though the projects so far completed were all inwestern provinces and so only influenced the Galli­poli campaign. The first eight months of the war sawa huge repair and road-building effort by militarylabour battalions, continuing until February 1916 inSyria, Jordan and Palestine where sections of theresulting well-paved roads are still visible. The role ofanimal power can hardly be exaggerated and theOttoman Army's efforts in the Great War have beendescribed as a losing battle between the Turkish

standard inf.mryuniforms p!us. I.rge brassgorget inscribed with theM'ordKanun, maning'La w', and yelloM'aiguilleue cords on the:right breast.

A Turkish miliTAry'poliettnan with the crewofme ClJprurcd BritishsubrruuineE15 whic:hran.pound in meDtudanelleson .]A-prj!'9'5. Th~menM'ore

could not cope with large volumes of military trafficwhile the limited rolling stock meant that only ahundred small trains could be made up. Even MajorKiibel, the German military transport expert at­tached to the Ouoman nil.....ay service, criticized theGerman-controlled Anatolian and Baghdad Railwa}'Company for not providing the services that theOttoman Army was entitled to, criticism repeated byhis successor Lt. Col. BOurich. The fact th:u mostnilway technicians were militarily unreliable non­Turks merely compounded such problems. Then

. there was the question of fueL South of the Taurusmountains locomotives used wood instead of coaLThis required o\'er 31,000 soldiers and devastatedthe forests of surrounding provinces. By 1917engines were fuelled with cotton seed,liquorice, olivebranches, vines and even camel dung! South of theTaurus the single-track railway also ran close to theGulf of Iskenderun where it was vulnerable to navalgunfire, This area was also a nodal point in the entiresystem and as such the Ottoman Army had tobe on guard against possible Allied landings. Con­stant attacks on the railway lines through Syria,Jordan and Anbia by the Hashemite Arab Army notonly interrupted schedules but were increasinglydifficult to repair due to a shortage ofmaterials.

Rail

The only proper modem railway service was in theBalkans, but most of this had been lost in 1913. Therailways system in the Asian provinces was \'erylimited, single track and fragmented. Within Ana­tolia some incomplete lines were linked by narrow­gauge track while a third gauge was used in Lebanon,sixty soldiers being allocated to every freight car forthe frequent transloading. The stations were tiny and

The very inadequacy of the Ottoman Empire'scommunications gave them a special significanceduring the First World War.

TRANSPORT

Senior officers & ceremonial dressI: Mustafa Kemal Be}', General Staff service dress, 19152: Em'e:r Pasa. dre" unifonn c.l9173: Standard bearer with regime:ntal flag, Nisanci (Rifle:) Battalion

2

3

A

InfantryI: Turkish line infantryman, marching order, c.19142: Infantryman, off duty, Galicia c.l9173: Arab bicycle infantry, Arabia 1915

B

I

•

3

ea"*'ry1: Cavalry officer2: NCO of. Turkish cavalry regiment., <:.19113: Kurdish irTeplaT officer

2

r.

3

o

•

1SpeciAlist TroopsI: Auault part}., 19182: Ski-hOOPS NCO. CauCS$UI c.I9173: Officer, machine-gun detachment

2

Artillery1: Artillery officer, GaUipoli t91S2: Artillery officer, Galicia3: Artillery Sergeant, Galicia

Air ForcesI: Naval Pilot Engineer MUlazim (Lieutenant) Ahmet of the Naval Flying School, Yesilkoy, dress uniform2: Army Air Force Obsenrer MUlazim (Lieutenant) Sitlci, No.... Squadron, southern Anatolia 19173: Gennan volunteer Pilot K1einehayk ofNo. 10 Squadron, southem Anatolia., summer 1917

F

•

N."I: Sailor or naval landing party, Palestine2: Able seaman1 Commander, winter uniform 1915

H

I

Miscellaneous b'OOps1: Infantryman, Istanbul Fire Brigade2: Allied Mghan Prince, c.l9173: Boy soldier, volunteer bomb thrower at Ga1lipoli, 1915

3

kagni or ox-eart and the enemy's railways, steamshipsand motor lorries. On the Caucasus front even therugged kagm could not be used and here Onomantroops were often supplied by caravans of packanimals. Add to this a lack of maps for many areas,the destruction ofbridges by winter wcather, snow inthe mountains from September to May, a nearCStrailhead over six hundred miles away, and it seemshardly surprising that munitions took six wed:.s toreach the Caucasus. Evenlually German engineersbuilt a motor road as far as Si"as but the OnomanArmy had no mawr transport, other than a few staffcars, and so could provide no tet:hniCilI support fortrucks when these arrived. E"en in the relatively kindconditions of GaUipoli teams of buffaloes hauled theheavy artillery and if hills got in the way hundreds ofsoldiers pulled these guns with ropes.

Sea

Before the war, maritime communications had beenvital for theOuoman Empire. Dna: war broke our theRed Sea, castern Mediterranean and Aegean wereclosed by the overwhelming power of enemy navies.The Turks and their Yemeni sympathizers could usesmall dhows along the Red Sea coast and such vesselseven maint;l;ined contact with Onoman allies inSomalia and Eritrea. Smugglers continued to ply theMediterranean and Aegean coasts of Anatolia despiteBritish, French and Italian patrols. From the sum­mer of 1915 until the Revolution of '917 the Russianneet prevented large Ottoman ships from sailing theBlack Sea, and strangled vital shipments ofcoal fromZonguldak to Istanbul. Small amounts were stillmoved in sailing ships, the Russians claiming to havesunk about a thousand of these during the war. TheBlack Sea was opened once more after the RussianRevolution but before then the Ouoman state ranshort ofcoal, much of which had to be brought by railfrom central Europe. Even the almost enclosed Sea ofMarmara was made haz.ardous by enemy submarines,supported as they were by Greek sympathizers livingon the coast, although Liman von Sanders considered

Orron1an U'OOp$t:rossingthe Tigris or £upht'fltC$ ina gufa, a typeofprimirivebirumen-covcred reed bmftthat had~n used in It'flqfor thoUSMnds of)·eJlT$.Onc msn "'caT$ the At'fIb

hC8dkufiya cloth while thcothers ha "e rhe old­fashioned soft feZC5 still,,'om b)' Turkish troopswhen ofTdury.

the effectiveness of the submarine war to have beenexaggerated by British naval historians.

The Ottoman Empire also had a remarkablyeffective Ielegraph servia: operating over huge dis­tances but the country had no wireless before the war,nor were there any telephones outside Istanbul. TheOttoman Sultan could lelephone the Kaiser in Berlinbut, frustratingly, nOI his o"'n commanders at thefront.

THE NAVYThe Ottoman Navy played only a minor role in theFirst World War for the simple reason that it was notdesigned to face the British and French neelS.Considerable effort had been put into strengtheningthe Navy betwee~ 1()09 and 1914 bUI the foesenvisaged at thai time were Greeks and possiblyRussians. A British Rear Admiral also supervised am.ajor naval reorganiz.ation. In fact British RoyalNa.vy innucncc was so strong thai, from 1910, notonly were Ouoman ships painted the same colours asthose of Britain but officer insignia also mirroredthose of the Royal Na,'y. Turkish technical officershad the same colours between their slee,"e ranking

l3

stripcs as did the British. Orders were placed inBritain and Frnnce for new vessels rnnging frombattleships to gunboats; and the Ottoman yards atSamsun, Izmir, Beirut and Basra competed to seewho could makc thc beSt small ships in the shortesttime. The Navy was a popular arm of service, thcexploits of the ex-American cruiser Hamidiy~ underHiiseyin Rauf in the Aegean and Adriatic havingbeen a great boost to public mornle during thcotherwise catastrophic First Balkan War.

During the months of Ottoman neutrality theFleet steered well clear ofaction. In the meantime theinfluence of the British naval advisory missioncollapsed, and its personnel were replaced by Ger­mans. The main arsenal was in Istanbul and, witharound 6,000 personnel, the Navy's primary role wasto survive as a threat to any cncmy attacking thecapital. It also had to protect supply convoys in theSea ofMarmara and, as f:lr as possible, the Black Sea.

By the outbreak of war the Ottoman Navyconsisted of three :lrchaic pre-dreadnought banle­ships, HaJ'ruddin Barbar()ssa (1893), TurKut R~ij

(1894) and MtJuJiy~ (1874), to which were added theGerm:ln b:lttlecruiscr G()~bm renamed as the SullanStlim Yavu.:::: (1912) :lnd the light cruiser Bmlau nowcalled A1idilli (1912). In support was the e\'en oldercoastal defence pre-dreadnought battleship Afuin-i­ZQf~r (1869) :lnd the slightly more modern lightcruisers Hamidi)'~ (1903) and M(('idi)'~ (1903). TheOttoman Navy also had eight 'destroyers, seventorpedo-boats, threc torpedo-gunboats, perhaps nineother gunboats, an old gunboat converted for mine-

laying and approximatcly elevcn lightly armed motorlaunches. Support vcsscls includcd a torpedo depotship, a hospital ship, four troop transports and a navaltransport, a naval rcpair vessel, threc smaller dc­spatch \'csscls, and an Imperial yacht. During orimmediately prior to the war a minelayer was addedto this fleet. Construction of six small German­designed destroyers was belie\'cd to have been startedin Istanbul during the war and although none arc saidto have becn completed, the Ottoman Navy did endthe war with :In extT2 dcstroyer in :lddition tosurvi\'ing pre-war vcssels. It also ended up with anextT2 torpedo-boat. Therc arc also rcports thatattempts were made during the war to refit twoderelict German submarines, though without muchsuccess.

In the face of o\'crwhelmingly morc numerousenemics, the Ottoman Na\')' attempted few offensiveopeT2tions, although HMS Galiath was sunk by theOttoman torpedo boat Muavmd Milli under Com­mander Ahmet Efendi on 13 May 19'5. The navy's

Alxn'c: Pcuy·officus ofLheO,tom:1lI N,nml Air$erl'icc. These men wereIImlerg-oing tcchnicllltmining'H che Yesilkoyflying scht)()1 1I(.'"r ISlIInbulin '9' 7, (H,IVllell,k AWzcsi,fst:mblll)

Midshipmen in their whireSlimmer uniforms underinsrruction by an officcronbo:lrd:l Turkish gunboac.l'hc officer Illso 1f'C.'Uf'S hissummer sen'ice uniformwith rhe c)'pial Ottom:1npcaJdcsscap. (Deniz,\lUzesi, IstvnbuJ)

main role was convoy protection, particularly in theSea of Marmara. The second British submarine toenter this area, E IS, was sunk by the Ottomans,followed by the Australian AE 2 which was alsodestroyed by a torpedo-boat. The £ 14 next got intothe Marmara, where il sunk the transport ship CiilC~mal, though during a later auempt to penetrate theDardanelles in 1918 the £ 14 was itself destroyed byan Ottoman vcssel. Torpedo boats were particularlyimportant, escorting con\'oys which stuck closeinshore so thai the Navy only had to protect onc flank.

The OUoman Navy's own most serious losseswere during coastal protcction duties. The oldbattleship Mwldiye was torpedoed by submarinc B11 in the Dardanelles on 13 Deccmbcr 1914, theHayruddit, Barbarossa by E II in thc Sca ofMarmaraon 8 Augusl 1915, though thc Turgul Reis survived.All three of these were used as floating batteriesduring thc Gallipoli campaign. The Ouoman Navyand Army combined in various small offensivcsagainsl Aegean islands. Here captured documents~

suggested that Greek piratcs were directed by Alliedintelligence to raid the Turkish mainland for bootyand to carry off women, children and cattle. Despite a

Turkish M•."officialsinsp«r rhe capturedBritish submarine £'5w"hich ran ap-ound in April'9'5. Theofficcron theright w'ith II note-pad is IIsulrlicutcnllnt from utechnical b,...mch Rnd h;u

no 'cur/' on his singlesl«.·(, ring. In the dist:l1JCf:on rhe left is. COlnTl1l1ndcrwi,h three rings and ·cur/'.Next to hilll $t:lnd scH~rlll

sailors in thcir durk blucw'intcr uniforms.

lack of proper minelaying vessels the Ottoman Navylaid at least 423 mines during the war, more thanFrance and ncarly as many as Italy. Isolated from therest of the Ottoman Fleet several river gunboatsoperated in Iraq, two being captured by the British.

By the end of the war the Ouoman Navy had lost,in addition to the two old prc-dreadnought banle­ships, the new German light cruiser Midilli/Breslaumined off Imbros in 1918. The smaller protectedcruiser !I1uidjye had been sunk by a mine in the BlackSea in 1915. raised and repaired b)' the Russian Navyonly 10 be retaken by the Onomans in 1918. Twolorpedo gunboats claimed sunk by the British in1915, the PeyJ:-i-SroJ:el torpedoed by £2 and theBurf-i Sa/vet torpedoed by E14, had in fact beenbeached :IOd repaired. Another torpedo gunboal had,however, been sunk while :ll least three ordin:u)'gunboats were lost along with three destroyers andthree lOrpedo boats.

THE AIR FORCESIn 1914 the Ouoman air ann was founded under theguidance of a French officer, Captain Dc Gays.During the war he was quickly replaced by a Gennan,Major Erich Sarno. When the Onom3ns entered theW;Ir they had six landplancs, four of which wereoperational; in addition lO four ground instructionaircraft, two seaplanes and an observation balloon.There were only ten qualified pilots, who weresupported by a small number of mechanics of whommany were Amlenians ofdoubtful loyalty.

Even before hostilities broke out one Nieuporrseaplane was sent to support thc Dardanelles de­fences, and another soon followed. Two Bleriots wereintended for the Caucasus front but instead patrol­led the northern entrance lO the Bosphorus. A newlyarri\'ed and relatively modern Rumpler biplane was,meanwhile, sent to Syria. The OtlOman's first oper­ational flight of the Greal War was probably aseaplane reconnaissance off the Dardanelles on 17August 1914 - shordy before the Empire actuallyentered the conflict. This Nieupon seaplane wasreplaced by a Bleriot on 5 November, and this solitarymonoplane nick-named Erlugrul, made several flightsover the British and French fleets during the build­up to the Gallipoli campaign. The first Onoman

l5

vicwry in air combat came on 30 November 1915when Ll. Ali Riza and LI. Orhan in an Albatros CIshot down a French Farman near the Dardanelles.Delh'eries of new German aircraft started by air inMarch 1915 and, in addition to the five Germanaircraft sold before the war, Germany wen! on to

supply o\'er 260 aircraft though not all had arrivedsafely or emered service before the war cnded. TheOHoman Air Force also added 12 aircraft capturedfrom the Russians and British, several of which wereflown against their original owners.

The first numbered OHoman Air Force squad­ron was formed at Galata and Canakkale in January1915, and as the war continued many more were

Aircrew under trainingarthe OUQlJJan Air Forcestrainingsehool, J'esilkiiy,probably in '9'1. TheOttoman personnelincluded Army and ",.,..1olIicers bur this 8"Oup alsoincludes two Iranians,Ahrnet Han standinK on

36

the left and Hussain Hanbehind him to the left.Both ""ent on to fly asobservers in the OrtomanAir Forces No. '4SqWldron~ar

Amman in present-dayJordan. (Hlwaed,k Miizesi,Istanbul)

A poup ofpilots, traineesand insCTUCtlHS in front ofoneofrhe OrromanAirForce's few 81eriot )(1-:1monoplanes at thel'esilkiiy flying school ncarIstanbul. Pilot First Lt.Cern1l1 Durusoy, $Ojted onthcporr winK ofthisaircra.fr (nicknamedErlugrulA flcw sc"':ralhazardous reconnaissance

Pilot Lt. Orhan oftheOttoman Air Service's No.J Squadron with his PfalzA /I monoplane in '9,6.FollowinK the suddcn lirobRel·olt, this squlldron ,,'ashurriedly transfcrred fromthe UI.ICJISU$ to the lIi;az

missions O"er the Britishfleet as it bombarded theDardanelles forts in /Han;:h'9'5./1'1 Turkey CernalDurusoYlindthe~~I..1Lieutenant, lIiisc}'in Scdat,lire rrprded lIS thc ommost important flyinKhcrocsofthe Gallipolicampaign. (lIal"ae,hkMikc:si, Istanbul)

where it WlIS thrown intob/lttlc upinst Lall7cnccand his Arob gucrrillaforces. Lt. Orhan "'CIU-Snonnal service uniform,wirh AirForcc winpon hiskalpak. (lflwac./,k Miizesi,Isranbul)

created. In 1917 Ouoman squadrons varied from asingle aircrafl with two pilots and two observers to 22

aircraft with 13 pilots and 13 obsef\'ers. By the end ofthe war there were 18 squadrons in existence, varyingin strength from a single pilot and no observer, to 12pilots and 18 observers. The Ottoman Air Forceoperated from 66 airfields during the war, seven ofthem in occupied neutral or enemy territory (four inIran, onc in Egyptian Sinai and two in what had beenthe Russian Empire). Although German personnelplayed a \'ital role in de\'e1opment, technical supportand oper.uions, this should not be exaggerated. Most,though not all, fighter pilots werc German; but menof Turkish, Arab and e\'en Iranian origin dominatedthe observation squadrons. By the end of the war,follo\\'ing determined efforts to train Ottoman per­sonnel, all three Naval squadrons as well as fh·c Armysquadrons were commanded by Ouoman officers;four squadrons were under joint command, and onlysix remained under German officers.

AUXILIARIESAND ALLIES

A parrol orTud:ish s/iisoldiers in the Caucasus.Such nwunlllin tTQOPSIf'CI'(' essential in 11

mountainous region If-hich

IflU snowbound for manymonths. Each man usesonly a single ski~polc.

(Asktri MiUesi, Istanbul)

(Nou: Some of these groups werc covered in MAA208: Larurenu and Iht Arab Rtvoll, including pro­Ouoman Arab tribes in Arabia and Yemen, theSanussi in Libya, the Tuareg, various Saharanpeoples and the 'Ali Dinar revolt in Darfur.)

European concepts of nationalism had been feh in theOttoman Empire for at least a century; first amongthe Greeks, then Serbs and Bulgarians, then amongstArmenians, Macedonians and even the Turks them­selves, and finally the Arabs. Wars of 'nationallibcration', massacres and counter-massacres hadcharacterized Ottoman history throughout the 19thcentury and extreme nationalists were indulging inhorrific acts of violence - guerrilla resistance to theirsupporters, terrorism 10 the Ottoman authorities. In1C)09 the 'Young Turk' government banned thecarrying of arms in mixed Slav, Greek and AlbanianMacedonia and in the partially Armenian easternprovinces of Am.talia while the Army set up specialanti-terrorist 'pursuit battalions'.

Within whancmained of the Olloman Empire in

t9'4- there were many competing nationalisms, somehighly developed, others only stirring. The Arabs, forexample, were the second most numerous peopleafter the Turks, and although Arab nationalism hadexisted among the educated urban elite for gener­ations, it only took rOOt among ordinary people inreaction to the Turkish nationalism of the YoungTurk government. During the early part of the GreatWar the authorities tried to Turkify the Arabs ofSyria, but this proved to be impossible and by 1918some Turk nationalists were even advocating Arabindependence wilhin a new federated state - too lateofcourse.

There were many Turkish-speaking OrthodoxChristians in Anatolia, some of whom identifiedthemselves with the Greeks. They tended to keep alow profile, however, and were little affected by thewar. The Jews ofthe Ottoman Empire were generallyvery loyal, those from long-established Shephard;communities outside Palestine (where the status ofthe recenl Zionist colonizers was more sensitive)often enjoying a prosperous position in a state with notradition ofanti-semitism.

37

Armenians

Armcnians, howcvcr, werc in a very difterent situ­ation. Unbiased estimatcs number the Armenianpopulation of the Ottoman Empire at almost1,250,COO. But these Armenian Christians werethemselvcs divided amongst Orthodox, Catholic andProtestant groups. They were also very seanered andnowhere formed a majoriry except in a tiny corner ofeastern Anatolia. Elsewhere in Anatolia they com­prised '5 to 25 per cent of the population. The detailsofthe Armeni:m massacres that took place during theFirst World War are hotly disputed by historianswith differing sympathies. All, howe\'er, tend to agreethat they resulted from the 19th eentury spread of theEuropean concept of nationalism in an area previ­ously noted for centuries of relative harmony be­tween linguistic, cultural and religious groups. It isalso clear that aU sides were guilty of the mostappalling barbarity during the Great War, somecarried out with the full knowledge of a political ormilitary leadership, other resulting from banditry or

Ya\'cr Hayri PafB, a seniorTurkish offlccr in theMedinain 19,a. (AskeriMiJ7.esi, Istanbu/)

An O,toman Armycook·house on the Gill/ipolifrollt, '9'5. This is t;/car/yan Amb unit, one ofthoscwhich played a sipi/kantrole in the Turkish victorylit Gallipo/i. The largeste ...··pot is remarkablysimilar to th~ used bythe famousjanissariesellrlicr in Ottoman history,and whieh became asmuch a focus Qfunit/o)'8lty IJ$ the IlncientRoman legionary eagleshad done.

38

from uncaring Incompetcnce on thc part of localauthorities.

When the Great War broke'out, it was immedi­ately appatent that most Armenians both inside andoutside Ottoman territory sympathized with theAllied causc. In August 19t4 the senior Armenianreligious leader resident in Russian-ruled territoryproclaimed it a sacred duty for all Armcnians tosupport the Russians. Inevitably most Armeniansoldiers in the Ouoman Army wcre disarmed andsent to work in labour battalions. Armenian. revo­lutionary cells already existed but there is disagree­ment about how far they fought in support of Russia.Armenian volunteers certainly started killing Muslimcivilians as soon as Russian troops crossed theGuoman frontier. At the same time large numbers ofAnnenian deserters from the Ottoman Army wereenlisted as allies and auxiliary forces by the Russians.The rest of this sad Story is one of massacre andcounter-massacre by and upon Kurds, Armenians,Turks, Christian and Muslim Gcorgians, as well asthe uprooting and deportation of entire populationsby both Ottoman and Russian authorities. l':uropeanand American sources sympathetic to the Armeniansestimate that 600,000 Armenians died. Turkishsources put the deaths at 300,000 and maintain that atleast as many Turks and other Muslims wereslaughtered - not to mention half a million CenlT2lAsian Turks massacred by Russian troops before theRussian Rc\'olution.

Thc Caucasus

The Ottoman Army could rely on the support ofTurkish-speaking Muslims in the Russian-ruled

being commissioned as majors in the Asirtl HaftJSuvar; AlayJtm. Arms and uniforms would besupplied by the government but men had to find theirown horses and harness. II remains unclcar how farthis new organiZlluon actually developed during thewar, but between 20,000 and 30,000 tribal cavalrywere already in the field against the Russian Army bythe end of 1914. The importance ofKurdish irregularauxiliaries may actually have increased as regularOuoman units were scattered across so many distantfronts.

Kurds

To a great extent intermingled with the ChristianArmcni:ms were the Muslim Kurds who had atradition of resistance to central go\'ernment control.At this time they had linle sense of Kurdish'nation3Iism' but had dcveloped a deep antagonism totheir more advanced Armcnian neighbours. In I&)ISultan Abdlilhamit raised a force of mostly Kurdishbut also Turcoman and Ar.lb tribalauxiliarics whichcame to be known 3S the Hamidiyr ClV:llry. This wasintended 10 counter Russia's famous Cossacks, andcontrol the eastern parts of Anatolia. After 11)08,"however, the Hamidiyt dispersed until, around 1914,:I. military commission started planning a new forcefrom the same sources to be known as the Asirtl HaftJSiivari Alayftm or 'Tribal Light Cavalry'. It wassupposed to consist of 24 regiments in four brigades.Service was to be between the ages of 18 and 45: threeyears as a recruit, twelve years as a trooper, twelveyears in the reserve. All units were be commanded byregular cavalry officers while tribal chiefs would begiven proper tr.lining in regular regiments before

Kurtlish IrreglllllN>' ill theDllrsi"rrllnt,:c1i Ilre!l oreasterll Amltoli;1 ill 19'7.Dilly offlccrs in thl:'Kurdi!ih irrt'glll:lr I\sirctIb.fifSuvari Alayariauxiliary all'alry appcOlr rohal'e ..·om IIniromls, theirmen being dressed intraditional Kurdish

COSCUIIII: though firmed bythe stntt'. The ofliccrSClllCd 011 the right M"ellrs

the broild-brimIllt'd'sou'l4"('Ster'sccn 011 otherTurkish cs\·alrYfflell. Healso has II JQng-bJlldcds ..·ord rrom the CRucasusIIIQUnlllins 011 his hip.(AdcriMOzcsi, Istanbul)

"

MilicRr)' band pinyinI' onthe parsldcground acDamascus during ami!iclIry re"iew in April'9'7. Thebandapin M'c#r

Anrb kufi)'a hc#dc1orhslind then: 1IT'C rnusicsd orrncdiCIII symbols on theircollar patches. (ImperialWlIrMuseUrrJ Q9!J.4u)

Caucasus. Traditional antagonism between Sunniand Shia Muslims was disappearing in the wake ofmassacres by Russians and their Armenian aux­iliaries. Local volunteers played a particularly im­portant role on the extreme left flank of the Ouomanfront, in the mountainous Artvin area near the BlackSea. Later in the war the Ouom2on Army also tried tofill its depleted ranks by enlisting Turks from theRussi20n Gucasus but the m20in milit20ry contributionof these people was in the 'lsl2om Army' raised inAzarbayjan after the Russian Re\·olution. This drewin non-Qttom2on Muslims from throughout theGucasus and operated largely in(lependently, justlike similar forces raised by Georgi2o and Armenia.Though never officially recognized by the Ottomangovernment, the 'Islam Army' was given consider­able help. Many Turkish Ottoman officers \'olun­tcered to serve in its ranks, the most famous beingEnver's brother Nuri Pa~a. As early as 1916 aGeorgian Volunteer Legion had been raised, largelyfrom the Muslim Georgian area of Lazistan, to fightalongside the Ottoman Army. Originally intended to

promote a revolt in Russian-held Georgia, thisVolunteer Legion remained under Germ20n controlwhile the Ottomans wanted to use it as a normalbattllion. In the end it took very liule part in thefighting, being stationed on the Black Sea coast atGiresun until disbanded in January t917.

Balkan Muslims

Other assorted forces lacking permanent or official..

Army structures were raised during the war, oftenbeing known as miiretub units. Another group ofirregulars were thefedais who, mostly being ofBalkanMuslim refugee origin, had been raised during andsince the disastrous Balkan War. Often motivated byreligious zeal or a desire for vengeance on the BalkanChristians, they were consequently reprded as fana­tics by their foes. Thousands more were recruited in1914, many being sent to the Caucasus front andnorth-western Iran in an effort to stimulate anti­Russian revolts there. Several hundred were alsoreported in Syria in b.te 1914. Later in the war theOttomans apin tried to recruit from the remainingTurkish population in Macedonia following theAustr~German-Bulgarian occupation of this area,though with little success.

Persia

Iran, or Persia as it was then known, was one of themost anarchic areas of the Middle East in 1914.Though independent in theory, it had been dividedinto British and Russian spheres of influence.Whereas the army of the Ottoman Empire could fighton half a dozen fronts and keep various numericallysuperior foes at bay, and Afghanist20n could rely on itsrugged terrain and warlike people to dissuade in­vaders, the Iranians had few such advantages. Effortshad been made to create a properly equipped regulararmy but all failed to produce b.sting results. By 1914some 13,000 infantry were scattered about the CQun­tty, unpaid, untrained, badly clothed and led by an

officer corps ofstaggering incompetence and corrup­tion. The 38,000 or so cavalry were rather moreeffective, being recruited on a tribal basis under theirown leaders, but e,'en they formed lillIe more thanlocal militias defending only their own areas. Irre­gular cavalry were drawn from the Kurds, Lurs,Turcom:ms :md Arabs though rarely from themajority Farsi (Persian) community, and such forcesowed loyalty to their tribal leaders rather than to acentral government. The artillery arm had 5-6,000men with about 50 breech-loading guns, plus twice asmany muzzle-loading field and mountain guns, onlyhalfof which wcre fit for service.

Two othcr military forces played a role grcaterthan their numbers would suggest. One was theRussian-offieered Persian Cossack Brigade whichconsisted of a little over 3,500 mcn in four cavalryregiments, four infantry companies, one horse andtwo mountain artillery batteries plus a machine-gundctachment. With modern equipment, discipline andtraining it was by far the best miliury force in pre­war Iran. Unforrunately it also suffercd from con­fused loyalties, serving as an instrument of Russianinflucnce and ncver being allowed to endangerRussian military domination. The second 'modem'force was the so-called Swedish Gendarmerie whichhad been reorganized by Swedish mercenary officersin 1911. It now consisted of six regimentS, about6,000 horsemen and infantry armed with Mauserrifles, mostly recruited from the Persian-speakingpopulation. Unforrunalely its Persian officers dis­liked their over-enthusiastic S .....edish colleagueswhile the entire force suffered from the hostility ofRussia and of the Persian Cossacks. As a result theSwedish Gendarmerie had developed pro-Germansympathies.

Prey to internal dissension and foreign manip­ulation, Iran was clearly not in a position to defenditselfwhen invaded by Russian, Ottoman and Britishforces during the Great War. In fact widespread anti­Russian feeling lay behind strong pro-Ottomansympathies during the early part of the war. InNovember 1915 anti-Russian feelings ran so high

Ouoman AmlYCllmclrnmsport on the Iraqi fromin 1916. No bcastofburdcncould opt:rale as effecti~'cJyin the dcsvot liS II sillGle­humpuJ dromcdllry or

Arabillll CIImel, This was..,.·cJl-biown to rhe Twks,though their Britishf~rook some rime to rekarnthe lesson. (Asl'm !I1(izcsi,lsrsmbul)

that the Swedish Gendarmerie turned on the PersianCossacks, forcing those in Hamadan to surrender.Interestingly enough the Gendarmerie were helpedby a band of German and Austro-Hungarian POWswho had escaped from Russian camps in the Cauca­sus and Central Asia. Ottoman and German involve­ment in Iran was ne\'ertheless often in competition.The Ottomans, for example, tried 10 organize a newIranian arm)' under a Persian General, Nizam alSaltaneh, who hoped to drive both the Russians andthe British from his country. BUI Ihis rudiment2ryforce collapsed when the Russian Army in north­western Inn suddenly advanced south, itS fewinfantry battalions simply deserting before the Rus­sians arrived.

The Germans also set up their own puppetPersian government and army at Kermanshah, whichin turn led to increased British intervention insouthern Iran, In· January 1916 a new pro-Russiangovernment in Inn tried to reduce the numbers ofSwedish Gcndarmeric and increase those of thePersian Cossacks, the latter being placed underRussian control whilc the Russian Army moved tooccupy a large part of western Iran. This did not,howc\'cr, end pro-Ottoman sentiments in the areaand as late as 1917 the jangali tribe under KuchikKhan anempted to slOp an Anglo-Russian armym.arching through their forested mountain homelandsouth of the Caspian Sea. One of the few positiveresults of this confusion was the training ofa handfulof Persian officers by thc Ottoman Air Force atYcsilkoy near Ist2nbul. Since their own country hadno aircraft, two of these men subsequently served asobscrvers in the Ortoman 14th Squadron in 1918.

placed himself bene2th the religious - though notpolitical- authority of Istanbul and began rccruitingan army in the largely Muslim southern lowlands.Fearing a mass rising the three European colonialpowers sent extra troops to their rcspcctivc colonies.In the end, though, it was the Ethiopians themselvcswho ended Lij jasu's ambitions. In September 1916the leading Rases or nobles ofShoa marchcd on AddisAbaba and, with the support of the EthiopianChurch, deposed Lij jasll who fled to the wild coastalterritory of the Danakil. Ethiopi::tn troops sub­sequently took part in operations against SayyidMuhammad Hasan's 'Dervishes', winning a bloodyvictory in August 1917.

Meanwhile the Ottoman consul at Harar, MazarBey, had been serving as Sayyid Muhammad Hasan'sm2in contact with the outside world, particularlywith GeneT:l:1 AJi Sait Pa~ who commanded Ottoman

Into this real-life version of John Buchan's'Great Game' rode a number of Turkish, Germanand Austrian agents, thc most effective being Dr.Wassmuss the one-time German Consul at Bushire.With his colleagues he organized tribal forces inmany regions, damaging not only British and Russianinfluence butthrcatcning a full-scale rising. The kingofAfghanistan managed to control the excesses of themost fanatical anti-British clements but Britain stillfeared that Or. Wassmuss aimed at India itsclf. Themost successful period for these agents was 1915 andas a result mutually hostile bands of tribesmen andtheir mentors were soon chasing each other aroundmuch of Iran, Afghanistan and o,'er the border intowhat is now Pakistan.

Somaliland, Eritrea and Ethiopia

\Vhile Germans, Austrians and Ottomans were stir­ring up trouble for the British in and beyond Iran, theOttomans also stoked the embers of anti--<:olonialresentment against British, French and lulian forcesin the Hom of AfriCli. The man at the centre of thistrouble was Muhammad Abdullah Hasan, a resis­unce leader and poet who, known to his foes as the'Mad Mullah', was neither mad nor a Mullah(religious teacher). SaY}'id Muhammad Hasan, as hewas more properly called, led his first rebellionagainst British rule in 1S99 and by the outbreak of theGreat War, British authority reached no further thanthe walls of a few coastal towns. But in November1914 the British went on to the offensive while to thesouth, in what had recently become Italian Somali­land, there was also a build-up of troops, many drawnfrom Italian-ruled Eritrea.

The third Empire to be ruling Somali peopleswas that of Ethiopia but in the immediate pre-waryears this Christian kingdom was having its owninternal problems. A new Emperor named Lij Jasuhad come to the throne in '913 and was attempting to

reverse a thousand years of Christianity in Ethiopiaby pursuing a pr~lslamic policy. In 19t5 he becamea Muslim and opened negotiations with the 'MadMulLah' Sayyid Muhammad Hasan. Many also de­clared Lij jasu to be mad but in fact he was a shrewdpolitician who hoped to win Ottoman military sup­port to crush the rebellious Ethiopian nobility. LijJasu scnt the Ollom.an Sultan an Ethiopian flagbearing 2 crescent 2nd QUT:l:nic declaT:l:tion of faith,.,

Said Idris, Rpro-Turkishmilirat"J' leader in/ron,19,6. His uniform is";rrual/y identical ro Mllr

ofa ~'cry senior OnomanTurkish officer. (Asker;MiJzcsi, Istanbul)

forces in Yemen. In '917 the General declaredSayyid Muhammad Hasan 1'0 be the OUoman­approved governor of all Somalia. By that time,however, the Arab Revolt prevented OUoman forcesin Yemen from giving pT:l.ctical help, aside from a fewMauser and captured French Lebel rifles that weresmuggled to the Somalis in return for food supplies.

Sources

Ahmad Emin (Yalman), Turluy in the World War(Newha\'en 1930)

G.M. Bayliss, Operations in Persia t9t4-t9t9 (re­prim London 1987)

T.N. Barker, Double Easle and Cmunt (New York1957)

A. Djemal Pa$3, "1tmoirs of a Turkish Statesman,1911-1919 (1922)

Sayed Ali EI-Edroos, The Hashemitt Arah Army1f)08-1979 (Amman & London 1980)

H. Kannengeisser, TIlt Campaisn in CaJJipoli (1927)Lord Kinross, Ataturk. The Rehirth of a Nation

(London 1964)K. Klinghardl, DenJ:IPiirdiskeittn des MarschaJJs

j"'''".et Pasda (Leipzig 1927)M. Larcher, UJ Cuene Turquc dans la Client

Mondiale (Paris 1926)A. Moorhead, CaJJipoli (London 1956)C.C.R. Murphy, Soldius of the Prophet (London

192 7)C.C.R. Murphy, 'The Turkish Army in the Great

War' ,Journal o/tht Royal Unittd Services InstituttLXV (1920) pp. 90-104

R. de Nogales, Four Years heneath the Crescent (1926)J. Pomiankowski, Der Zusammenbruch des Ollomall­

ischetl Re;ches (Leipzig, Zurich, Vienna 1928)O. Liman von Sanders, Five Years ;11 Turkey

(Annapolis 1927)U. Trumpener, CermollY o'id the OUoman Empire

1914-1918(Princeton 1968)J.L. Wallach, Anatomie einer M jJitiirhi/ft (Dusseldorf

'976)War Office, Handbook of 'he Turkish Army (Cairo

1915)

Turkish Armynu~ in'9'5. Their uniforms lirebasically thc SSiI11C liS th~of£uropclln nurses cxccptfor their hcad<1oths

which. undcr 1sllll11ic ll1w.hlld TO CO\·U thc haircntirely. (Aslu'ri MiJzcsi.Istllnbul)

THE PLATESA: Senior oBJcers and ceremonialA,: Alustaf.'J Kemal Bey, General Sraffscr"icedress, 1915Mustafa Kernal, who bIer adopted the family nameof Atatiirk, is shown here in the uniform he woreduring the GalLipoli campaign. Although a colonelauached 10 the General Staff he wears a uniformtypical of most field officers. This includes that mostchaT:l.creristic item of First World War Turkishmilitary costume, the kobo/uk, a hat formed ofa stripof fabric wound around a semi-stiff frame. Koholalucould be wound in various ways, but the one wornhere was the most common. I-Ie also wears theImtiyaz (distinguished service) medal, the Liyakat(merit) medal an~ the ribbon of thc Turkish WarMedal twice. His pistol is probably a ~l:auser

,M.19 IO!I4.

A2: Enver Pap, dress unifonn, C.1917As Ministcr of War and Vice-Cornmander-in-Chiefof the Ouoman Armed Forces, Enver Pa$3 wears thedress uniform of a general, though without thedoubled red trouser stripes normal for generals. Healso has a black lambskin kalpal: hat. In addition tothe Turkish Order of Osman, his medals include thePrussian Order of the Red Eagle with sash, thePrussian Order Pour Ie Merite, the Prussian IronCross, the Bulgarian Order ofMerit and the AustrianMilitary Cross of Merit.

Army) Mauser rifle M.I8<)3. By 1918 a vanety ofdifferent riOes werc also in usc.

C: CavalryCI: CnvaJryofflccrThe most notable feature of this man's uniform is thevery large form of kobo/ok with upturned brim and along rear part to shade his neck. Otherwise his dress is

Hz: Infantryman, offduty, Galicia c.'9'7This man has been almost entirely re-cquippcd bythe Austrians or Germans and has been issued with acaptured Russian Mossin-Nagant M.1891 riOe. Histunic is one of several much cruder patterns intro­duced during the course of the war. Notc thcstrengthening patches added on the knees and el­bows. Towards the end of the war a variety ofdiffcrent, and perhaps locally made, cartridge beltswere also in use. Surviving photographs show thatthe old-fashioned soft red fez, supposedly phased outbefore the Great War started, was sometimes stillworn when men wert offduty.

and Libyan Arab ~ueriIJa

forces maintllinoo theirresistance throughout thewar, effectively penningthe invading Italiansapinsr the coaSt. (AskeriMiizcsi, Istanbul)

A Turkish officer I'nd hisAfricun balnlan in Libya,'918. The bridle, saddleand stirrups ofthe officer'sho~a~ofatypiculNorth African or Libyanrype. Ottoman Turkish

H3: Arab bicycle infantry, Ambia 1915At the start of the First World War a large proportionof the Ottoman Armies in Syria and Iraq wererecruited from the local Arab populations. Theyfought with distinction at Gallipoli but many laterjoined the Arab Revolt and fought as allies of theBritish. Othc.rs remained 10)'21 to the OttomanEmpire until the end of the war. Most were uni­formed and equipped in the same way as Turkishinfantry, except that they wore the Arab kufiyaheadcloth and 'oqa/ camel hair ring instead of theTurkish kaba/ok hat. But somc wore white uniformslike this man stationed in the Muslim Holy City ofMedina. He is armed with the German M.1888 rifle.There were supposed to be four cyclists in eachinfantry battalion at thc starl of the war; but the onlyother complete bicycle-mounred unit in the OllomanArmy was an infantry company far away at Edimencar the Bulg.trian border.

B: InfantryHI: Turkish line infnntryman, marching order,C.1914The ordinary Turkish infantryman of 1914 was wellequipped and well dressed. Only whcn large numbersof reserves were called up did the standard ofunifonns deteriorate. This man carries full marchingequipment, as hc might ha\·e appeared at the start ofthe Great War. While his simple but practicalunifonn is purely Turkish, the rest of his cquipmentis Gennan in style. He is armed with a 'Turkish'(meaning made specifically for the Ottoman Turkish

A3: Standard bearer with regimental flag,Nisanc, (Rifle) BiltmlionApart from the unusual loose winding ofhis kaba/ak,this standard bearer wears ordinary infantry uniformplus the olive-green collar patches worn only bysharp-shooter units. The visible side of the Oag bearsthe Muslim Declaration of Faith: fA ilaha i/f A//ah,rI1a Muhammad rasu/ A//ah, 'There is no god but God,and Muhammad is the Prophet of God'. Thc othcrside of the flag bore the Ottoman Empire's coat ofanns.

campaign. His skis have simple foot or ankle bindingsrather than the modem form of boot clips, and heuses only a single ski pole. Photographs of Turkishski-troops show some with very light-coloured collarpatches. These havc been hypothetically shown aswhite on this reconstruction.

that of a typical Ouoman officer. He carries anM.1909 cavalry sabre with the Turkish crescent andstar cut through its guard. On his chest he wears theribbon ofthe Turkish War MedaL

0: NCO ora Turkish cavalry regiment. C.'9'7The cavalryman's saddle and harness are essentiallythe same as the officer's, though non-commissionedranks had to carry more equipment. This man wears acavalry version of the Turkish ;aba/d. (Arab cavalryunits were similarly dressed except for their ;ufiyahead-cloths.) The grey collar patches identify him asa cavalryman and on his back he curies a 'Turkish'Mauser M.1905 cavalry carbine. Turkish cavalryhorses were generally wugh but small ponies, oftenbetter able [0 cope with harsh Middle Eastern terrainthough less formidable in a charge.

C3: Kurdish irregular officerThe Ouoman Empire's auxiliary cavalry consisted oftribal auxiliaries, mostly recruited among the Kurdsof eastern Anatolia. Uniforms were supposed to beprovided by the government, but available phot~

graphs indicate that el'en some officers still woretraditional Kurdish costume. This man does, how­el'er, have a Turkish Army gTeatcoat and boots. Therest of his clothes, and his probably Martini rifle, arehis own.

Turkish ski-troops wellf'iflgcomplete white !,mow­camoufltlgc, including8"3 uzc sct"CCns IlCrQSS their

fllCCS, t9'5. Thcy WQuidprobably opc.rnlC assnipers. (Asked Milzcsi,Isranbul)

D: Specialist troopsD,: Assau/t party. 1918Towards the end of the Great War some Ottomaninfantry were issued with steel helmets which dif­fered from the German type in several respects.Among the first units to be so equipped were 'storm­troopers', comparable [0 those seen on the Europeanfronts; these served in Palestine and in Trans­caucasia. Over his left shoulder this man carries a bagof grenades and he is armed with the German ratherthan 'Turkish' Mauser M.1898 rine. This maysuggest that he was attached to the recently formedY.ldmm Army in Syria and Palestine.

D2: Ski-troops NCO. Caucasus c.1917Turkish formations of sid-troops evolved underAustrian or German direction and reflected Austr~

German mountain troops. This man is well equippedfor the rigours' of an eastern Anatolian winter

DJ: Officer ora machine-gun detachmentBeneath his long overcoat this officcr would wear auniform similar to that ofMustafa Kemal in Plate AI,although his kohu/ak is different in both shape andwinding. Only officers wore this style, though not allof them did so. The grass-green collar indicates hisbranch of the service and is repeated in the narrowedging of the cloth around his kaha/d. The man isalso armed with a revolver, probably of Austrianmanufacturc.

£: ArriJJery£1: ArtiJJcry officer, GaJJipoli 1915Some Turkish artillerymen continued to wear whiteuniforms in summer, as Ottoman troops had done foralmost a century. This officer also wcars a ltaha/akwith blue cdging indicating his branch ofservice, andwith its leathcr chin-strap pushed up on top. On hiship is a large artillery-type Parabellum pistol in itsholster.

£2: ArtiJ/cry omccr, GllUcilJAhhough the units that the Ouoman Empire sent 10

Galicia were well equipped and generally uniformedin the usual fashion, they were often resupplied bytheir German or Austrian allies. The leather braces tothis man's belt also appear to have been characteristicof the Galician fronl. He wears a standard officer'suniform, his branch of service being shown by hisblue collar. and he has the ribbon of the Turkish WarMedal.

E]: Artillery Sergeant, GaUcjaThis NCO is basically dressed in the standarduniform for his rank, which is indicated by bothshoulder markings and rings on his slee\'es. His tunicand lTousers arc once more ofa very rough and poorlymade type seen later in the war.

F: Air ForcesFI: Naval Pilor Engineer MiiJaZIm(Lieutenant) Ahmet ofthe Na val FlyingSchool. Ycsilkoy, dress uniform.Most Ottoman aircrew were recruited from theTurkish he2rtland or from Turkish or other Muslimrefugees from the Balkans; others came from theArab provinccsofthe Ottoman Empire as far south asYemen, or even from neuml Iran. Captain Ahmetwas of Arab-African origin and may ha\'c been thefirst 'black' Air Force pilot in aviation hislOry, havingreceived his 'wings' in 1914-15. I-Ie wears the

standard dress uniform of an Olloman naval officer,although as a technical officer the rings on his sleeveslack the loops worn by combat officers. The scarletbetween the rings also idenlifies him as an engineer.

F2: Army Air Force Observer kliilaZlm(Lieutenant )S,,1.:1. NO.4 Squadron. southernAnaroUa 1917

Lt. SItk1 was a Turkish officer who qualified as anobserver at Yesilkoy outside Istanbul in 1917. He firstserved on the southern coast ofTurkey, then in whatis now Jordan and finally in southern Syria agajnstLawrence of Arabia and the Arab Revoh. Here hewcars the full uniform of an Onoman flyer, distin­guished by his red collar, the winged device on hiskafplJltand the Air Force badge on his left breast. Theflying coal, helmet and goggles he carries are all ofGerman make.

F]: Gennan volunteer Pilot Klcinchuyk ofNo.10 Squadron, southern AnatoUa. summer 1917

K1einehayk was a German reserve officer seconded 10

the Turkish Air Force, where he served for severalmonths in 1917. Here he wears a kabafd withTurkish Air Force wings on the fronl. I-Ie is alsoshown with a German 13-18 em aerial camcra.

G:NavyGJ: Sailor ofnavlJllanding parryThe ovcrwhelming might of the British and French

...

Ouomlln Army mccJicnlorderlit"S with /l 't'/lcolcr',orc:u.mcl Jitter, in 19,6.Such littcrs ",cre also USt'dby AI/it-d /lrmies in thcMiddlc EnSt /lnd thoughexcruciatinglyuncomfortablc ",crc oftcnthc only mcans ofcvacu/lting thc 'I·ounded.Notc the/arge Rc<iCrescent arm·bands 'I'ornby onc orderly and theofficer. fAderi ,\luzes;,Istanbul)

The fimcrnl orSulranRcsnt in Isrnnbul in 19,8.Thc oorr4c is cscorred bytroops from !he pnlaecguard ""caring ",-hite lamb­sl.:in kalpaJ..-s with plumesat !he front. Othcrphotographs show I.hat theroute orrhe funeral WlIS

guarded by men from !heIstanbul F;re Brigade,itselfIf regular Anny un;I.(Asleri Muzes;, Isranbul)

navies meant that large Turkish ships couJd almostnever \'enture into the Aegean or MediterraneanSeas, though the)' were active against the Russians inthe Black Sea. Instead the Turkish Navy concen­trated on small C02stal operations against enemy (andpirate) bases on islands offthe Anatolian C():lst. Here 2

petty officer with such a landing party wears the whitesummer uniform worn by all Turkish seamen, plus adistinctive white kobalok. On his legs he has canvasgaiters O\'er stiffanvas boots with leather soles.

G2: Nav:J} ablc scamanBritish influence was widespread throughout themodernized Ouoman Turkish N.avy: Turkish shipswere painted in the same colours as those ofthe RoyalNavy. Naval uniforms of men and officers reflectedBritish influence and officer insignia also mirroredthat of the Royal Navy. Only the shape and design ofthis sailor's cap is distinctly Turkish for, like theOttoman officer's peakless hat worn by Naval PilotAhmet (Plate FI), it lacks any protuberance whichwould prevent a Muslim's forehead from touchingthe ground as he prayed.

GJ: Naval Comnl.'lndcr, winter uniform 1915The fact thaI this senior naval officer still wears anold-fashioned stiffform of red fez, supposedly phasedout when the Onoman Navy was modernized, mightsuggest that he was a member of the naval reserve.The Commodore's three rings and loop on his slee\'csare virtually identical to those of the Royal Navy.Meanwhile his leather boots and gaiters suggest thathe has a shore posting.

H: ftlisccllancousHI: IsCt.mbul Fire Brigade InfantrymanThe Istanbul Fire Brigade constituted a regularArmy infantry' regiment. When serving in thatcapacity its uniform was identical to that of otherinfantry regiments except for a special collar badge.This man is shown in his fireman's uniform whichhas the same collar badges, including the Arabicnumber 12 which might refer to his fire station inIstanbul.

H2: Allied Afghan Prince, C.'917Among the many Muslim nations where the OUomanEmpire tried to foment anti-British, anti-Russian,anti-French and anti-I taJian risings was Afghanistan,which was at that time under a large degree of Britishcontrol. In 1917 a delegation of pro-Ottoman Afghanleaders visited Istanbul where they met senior mili­tary officers at the Flying School at Yesilkoy. Thevery Onoman-style uniforms worn by a prince in thisdelegation suggests that they had travelled incognitofrom Afghanistan, and were given suitable clotheswhen they arrived.

HJ: Boy soldier, voluntccr bomb thrower tJt

Gal/ipo}i,1915Under the Ottoman conscription syStem a sonsometimes served in place of his father. Suchyoungsters oflen fought hard and could becomeNCOs. This boy is a sergeant, as shown by hisshoulder-boards. The slippers on his feet mightindiate that the Army had no bootS small enough orthat his military role necessitated stealth.

NOles sur Ics plnnchcs en coulcorli

A 0l'I>citfs <Ie ~uc lTa<k .. Cbimoni.l. AI ;\IlI$Ur. Ktmal daM 101I u"ironn~<Ie

Ia campa,... <Ie Gallipol;' II porI~ un unir_ CIM"" d·officic:, ..., I< '<lni.. <IoncI< ch:aP<"'u bboaLok dis'i....ir. Son piOlole! eM ..... dou,~ un ~bu<cr ;\IocICl<19lo-H. A2 1':"," ,,_. ;\I"••,,.., de .. G...,.,..,. pon~ I'u"ir_ <Ie .......ia d'unome....J u ....... douw.. ...,,,tt> .....Itloundafd ...' k pontalon. I.·on!", p.....-..<Ie l'AicIeR~ ._"" tanlllK all_.1a Cnli. de r.. pnuaimM. I"()rd,.., pnuaimPou, k ;\Im,~. 1'On!", bulprio.. <I.. M"',~ .... Ooi~ ",i~ta;""aulridtienM d..;\Iml~. AJ PunoCtnKbnl r.'".nl u" bbaoLaL lieht: d IQm.- _ttl oli~d'unlirnt' d·.Ii<~. Le dnP<"'u 'I" il porI~ Ollmpon~ Ia Dkb.ral;o. de Foi "'.....Ittunr..

81"w...n.. 01 F... lAYUI.ws19l••_tilde ....rd>o .....pIon. Sont utOfi.....u:M

II.''' ..... It """~do_ kil eM "'.yk:ollrnwad. IA r..a1 eM ... ~bll5tt Ml89J.....". C'IIn\'II~ pou. I· twq"" OIIto1lUM. 81 I.e fa __mo;t;q"" 'I"" ~ oold.al...._ 19l7. '·eM pal ttl .......KIt. .i-ftIi par IQ•.au id.ie,. D1110s allan:mda. il. u.. rullil MOIIia-S.,...e. Sa I..niq"" at ......sn,phaa .....pIe. ;"Irodun pc11da..,1a I""lTC. OJ Soldat be d·;..ra i bicydtclCc.Anba<. 1915. II ptlfV l'oaaIudd .... louda.... poiI ~ IieIa ...bh&bll ....rc: .. po.u fIIttl aIImauad M 1888,

C c.,-.I<ne. CI (IIliaer ......,..Imc pona., u.. u....r_ IYJIO'IIIO of'olficicr""- bon qvc _ bt-bl aoit~ puG. II pone boc de......... -ad<lo 1909 n«'" aoiaoa........ n...r""l0 __ p ....Cl .cp M""" I"CO._.1917pone.. bbaobk nIori<.11• IQ'~ II: ... col d'. _brt • to pon~ conbmc •...,.......b.-. """I'" MI'IOi. Cl~uftIIlitrK llparW ...__d .. bona. r ................ Ie ""IC~.'" _it_ .._hnil M.naai ......~_6ou<c.

I) T"",,,,,"~~ d·-. 191 . DI en pon~ ...-.q .,;.,.i1 .... _ ••li ' deM ....... d'.f.aiI ...b a11eoaaaJad plaril'f"i' \11M. D! T.-pa -';COi 11; doa e...e-._. 1.17. St:su._.. , ,uti .. ""U d it ........ bit DJOlIicocr ••",d.. "N'"1IUIn·' ...",.. 1tIoac _--. II pon~ ulatbk ••)k~.. _coI"COt ........ lin...........KIt. 11_ ..... d· ,.."he,

E AtU1Iene. EIOII'iatt d·anlIleno. GaIlipoli 1.IS Pone tOr...- bbao:.-.... los uou",," 01"" ._ ........., r.. tndn d I'm. SOB....ba..~ GIl Iaonk. bIeaI. ~ If'" __ .. tan-dac de 0:. II~ ........................""" d·arUllrnt ..... _ ..... UOl!"a<Kr d·arUIIerir. GaIicie. quiponer-r- d'c6xr owadanl Sa laraoadw • ....-itt eM' 1.1..... pat_col...... iI. k ...boo.1o taialIk • .....,.., Iurqu<. E.J SnJC* d·arUIIcrit. GaIi<:ie.... .....foronc, IUIMbrol _ ..... itadicj,ut 1'iJ'U"I i r ....r I jl ........... lei .....daa. Sa " _ w. _ If""~rc:CfIb I'ut ",ii_ rot-lAfd .........11a JUttft.

fF_.I·... fll.caopllaUl<'A1aMto _oriJ-aftUint.lUII'..... pfanim pib.. ' de I......oi"'. r iaT;o.. 11 pone l'.,.;r- ocandan:ld·..... ,.;,a.,. ...,..t 011 1..- r F' I 'k oacha li1Ilio:!.--1 ",,'i1 e<toftIci,., ledanaqui' , inriaoe enl'ft Ia ,...poilo nwIiq"" qu'il ...."'anw. F! IA Lt. Sid pon~ I'.Dit'<armo ......'*' d'"" .,-utew OItoma11l. Sa.-eICe ......e.... 1 _ _c r.briq.... en A1Iema..... F'J 0lIici0roIIemuad .rbcn~diudWi r IIM 1""1"" 1I ...nl.abatol.," .... aikai I·..........11C",,,,", aOricn"'" a1lttnalKlt U-llknt.G .\bn"",. GI Sou>.-olIlcacr d'..... _,.._ de d<bao.-q n' qu, pon~ un..,.;r....... bl..", d''' •• Ull ....balal b1aM" del...., de wile: flO' bon"" ok ,..Ie..ide i .....die: de CIIi. Glc.. .....~Iot de Ia ri... Oil c.. ....,d<kpt1",itaio que rim "" puOtM f;'IItpklatr Ie frono "' !nun ok 10tIChn" Ie: 101 dutUl'... priCrct. GJ c.. com....ndo"l ,..1en u..ir d,.i,·., pon~ UM r.........ide:1lCm~ de rel ......~. 1_btlal 100 ,.mblkn en "'"' """,,",,I qu';1 • u.. """~ i,=II l)j,-CfI. III S<>Idal d·,nr,"IU;' dco PIlttIJ"or" d·I ...",bIll. I:unir...........idenl'9"" i fflui d·uI'" ,q;......c. d·i.. f... I.... lOur""", Ie bad,. .pfcial.u col,III Pnllff .f,h:an .11ie ouI"". <Ie 1917. IA I'rillff porle u.. unif.......... ",).",OiComan ind;quanc qu'.1 • pcuc-n", 'Q,..~ ill<qi:.. ilO depllil r Ar,,,",,i.c.n. UJ 1....-ipaukll" plac.. de I·.."ir....... de« "1'(01'I i..diqu~"c qu'il e<t .." 1. 11 pori.dco .....c""""" <Oil paru 'I"" r Arm<e" ·.,..il par. de bool.....Ifu;o"'''''' i'.. ""'"lui. soil pal'« qu'il de,.. i. 1'....;11<' i 1.lItrobtt.

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A 0l'IU:je,.., hOheo'm Ran.. und 7.cf('ftMlilitl1. Al ~I f. 1' 1 in ";n"G.mpoli-f.ldu ..'f....... f.. I..... d;' Iypd(h<: u .. ironn ti Sc.booIIU; mi' de'""h:ara~I.,;.tiocht:nK.baolal.Hu'. Kri ooi l'locolo: h:andc:h .. 1icta hncilei..lichwn tine: .\b-., Mode" 1910 I., AIO Knopm'....... £ft,..,. "III c.... dieDinuo..Difoi'm rincs GcMnIa <lie ndo,d....1lism doppo:lc... rot... Slmfcn... den liottn. Oct p"",1Iiocht: Orde llOica Mien "'il Scharp<:. dot; pi'Cu8iochcr........K~ ..... .P'!':"1lia<h<: Orden """, It Mmle...... tau nach<: \'..dit....oo,_deft wad du iSPtfI'ridIisclw ~1il fftI'dic-rwk<C1lL AJ SUflCb, nlt:l..... m" riJac-m..... ~bunclencnK.bobk wad oli>ynuan Aufnahcr SdwfJehumn. A..f.... ~1aJIo.dit .. In.....e11l du tSlanaiocht: G1aul>oaabtk lnia IUl'hriobeoa.

B llOfaJacm.. Bl Fddinfanl..... Ulil 1'1. in ta uwiocu"'. $riMlillifonn is< liidiadatt'.krkunf't. doda ...... ReM A_ is< Scil ....,.,dna....... Beim. Gc--da. ha aidI Ulil 'I..rl*tac· 10 MIlI9J. dieriF- lW die iirUclat A....- tiIl..orrn. .."n:Ic. H1 Am ....,.......-. ~... "" 1-.da. d...- SoIdao 1917••ultt 0....0 ... f _on.... Ost..m.: 0<Iet ..... Drcll.dwn d '""" "'" cin ..-. ba:,Oloasift..:-.: -Go:..dar. SaM U jad:~entspidM ......~"."M..........."'""mad des KnqeI ~..M OJ Anboothcr I ...... FaIarnd-I.r......... Arabim. 1.1S.Aaocdlt rbacIltn K.h&bll lnI' .. dw ...t.dwKopIbcdcd.UiII mil K Ihaandota""'" u.... Iaol ti Grcodar M1

C Kant..... CI 1' iii "'piIda ~..olwi _ Kah&bll "",",oltaID Er"1 -.. Ka bd des 19090rrM....._ ...............oUdor H.albnoooad Srcn. ...f SrichNan rioap'a';'".. Cll.:_oI6na .. lUrl.... K , q ••_ 1917 Kant-Icncbbolal. Er sn- Ktaf<SM\IOCk K u "I riaa'luruIdMOa' M _Ka..tkricw..1IOwt ...1l90S bri Cl Ku,tIia<kr~-~,lt~__ M..id ""'" SC..fd .... I"'~A~ ......... _KIead""" ......_~~ ........~_odbat.

I) So I a.ppca.SmotnlniPPi'.I'I' Dll>ictcf \\aoIiIo StaIaI.........."M T__ Gruao......... .ad is< _ .-r u _, _"nar\iodoo:a' ,\10 M1198 bn-a..... l>lli Sl.oc P!""- 1'11 ...I'M" I SaatSbttbabal ....nnr.... B· t abaluw. 1 m

Sl.......... D3Ql1iaxr "1M' iI2:..~ Et lnI' riaea w.,aaM.OIIO! r... ' Kalatbl.... iI " p.....- K..... filM .....TnlPP"'P''-'" Er ...................-.. bn-alliwo,

EAndrrio. EI A~.G.Pipoli 1'15, Er,.... tIic-'lcU.u.-. .....lit.. _ ...iodIM>l T"'Pl"'"' tndM·.md _ Stammott~ Sctn K.latbl bat<:Mt b1a... bncIeuar...... tIic 'rnol'P<"'PlI"*I 1ac2IeidIoIa. r................. Parabchm-l'iatolr .. And Y~..~.-...,. U ArteIIocoico-Ofiricr.C.I; ~" r SaatT"'pptiIpi' .....wird b1a K....~btn........... I RancI ..... "'rliadatn" iIIe. FJ Andler-Fdd.dld. G.1Wn. Sunoiudouuf<lnft o.nD<SR~ duodI die Sd"'.lo~ rilde Stftiral .'\...-1 ~'-' .SmwU..di:ornIjade ..... d.. II rc-Iali_ acIoleclu... So.... <kr no .....o.palttnl Kriopjahmo .utUlIChtc.

F'L..r.~ FI llou"' Ahmei boda...rriu....,hcr Abourn",...., ......... rifttt Cf$Ittl l'iloi ,n Gad"",hl~ ..... L..r.r.hn. Er c""ll..... owadon:l 1lism D;mu ci _nilrdan~I~.0;., Slmr...an ooirwn Amad. ~cnO>;ei<b""", ill.. ala lCChraixM. Off...... u.... <Iiio: .,har1adaroleFarbc ...·iadatn den IIii'll" d<u<...... daB~, I..,.......' .01. F! I Sill, , .... ditlOtJlplonu linir....................oM:httI ~' orin f'lcice el. dit Flin¥r-brillc ..nd dtt Ikim lind okUllCho:r l.uftnllC: u c1h ..,..rdc, I ti..... K.bala~mic dc:nt l'iloi....bl>tkhcn an <kr V",dc:neiC' u..d .... dc:uu;chcs II 18 "'"l..nbild' L

G Mori GI ;\1.., ci.... 1..ndu"pr...1'l'O' ," ...11<, .som...........ironn. eint1tl.. ti8tn Ka,,"lok und Sq.Il~ma..hcn lab...uir." Sud.l.. mi. l.Nerwlllen.G! Dicot. \'011.....«* 1""11 do< ch.rall....';,.,h< '"'~ildloo< Mu'-"", ..... """.ni_........ ~hri.... Du"'h dM:sc Form ..., .. de" M...i<nta moslith. ",i, dc:' Slim bei'"Gebtt un~chindUidtn Oodtn .U bttuh,.",. GJ l>ieoc-r Mo,i""k"",,,,andeu. i......Wi"lcru",ronn In,l cint .hmodilch<:••Idr. ~.""" des I'OIcn rta, I)~ l..(tk."itklu"d G.nullChc.. l~" ".h<:, daB .. an l....d poalitn ilc.

II l)i\'~""" IIlI"f,,,c.rill dc:. I..."bulu ~·.u....,.h,. 0 .. u";r",,,, IIei.h,.bcQ<hal .."" beoondc"'" " ..~b'~ith... d... dc:' a"dere"I.. fa"c.no,,,,,i,,, c III AlI~n" .f.,,""'lI<lau rn........ 1917. Iln Prinx lrill.i... U..if...... """, iIdI.n Slih...... "urllCbei"lkh bcd.U'~I.daB.r inl"llnllo all'ArC"""iI..,, 0"1."'''' iOl. IU o.c SChuJI....""le." d.. U..if...", diaa Ju.., ...u"lWOChMn ihn .Ia Scrica"c~", .:, Ir••c l"ralofl'~I .. u"d " ... ' en'..·.de' ·<il ditA....... ltine Slitfcl h.ne. dit llei" ....u....."'... ode' .-cil., bei oc; AurlraCIChIcich<:n ",u60~ .

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