Middle Eastern theatre of World War I

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Middle Eastern theatre of World War I was fought between the Allied Powers, primarily the British and the Russians on the one hand, and the Central Powers, primarily the Ottoman Empire and a German Military Mission, on the other. The Allied side also included the Arabs who participated in the Arab Revolt in the Sinai and Palestine Campaign, and the Democratic Republic of Armenia after the Russian Revolution of 1917. Fighting in the theatre began on October 29, 1914; hostilities ended on October 30, 1918 and a peace treaty was signed on August 10, 1920. This theatre encompassed the largest territory of all the theatres of WWI. It comprised four main campaigns: the (Sinai and Palestine Campaign, the Mesopotamian Campaign, the Caucasus Campaign, and the Dardanelles Campaign). There were also minor campaigns in Arabia and Southern Arabia, Aden, and Persia.

[edit] Prelude

The Ottoman Empire joined the Central Powers in October–November 1914, pursuant to the secret Ottoman-German Alliance^[2] signed on August 2, 1914, threatening Russia's Caucasian territories and Britain's communications with India and the East via the Suez Canal.

The Ottoman Empire's entry into hostilities occurred on October 29, 1914 when German battlecruiser Goeben and light cruiser Breslau, operating under Turkish flag, shelled the Russian Black Sea port of Odessa.

[edit] Activities

[edit] 1914

Mesopotamian Campaign: The campaign was fought mainly in the Tigris River valley region of what is now Iraq, and included battles on the Persian Gulf coast, at Basra, and numerous struggles around Kut and Baghdad.

Caucasus Campaign: The Russian and Ottoman armies fought in the Caucasus and eastern Anatolia (northeastern Turkey), with the Ottoman Empire suffering a crushing defeat at the Battle of Sarikamis in November-December.

[edit] 1915

Mesopotamian Campaign: Initially the Ottomans successfully repelled the British incursions. However, fortunes reversed after the disastrous Siege of Kut.

Caucasus Campaign: The Russians went on the offensive, advancing as far as Lake Van, but the Ottoman forces were ultimately able to drive them back. Ottoman repression of the Armenian population in Anatolia, who had evinced pro-Russian sentiments, grew into what is now called the Armenian Genocide. The fighting was largely inconclusive as the focus of the Ottoman and Russian war effort shifted to the Dardanelles Campaign and the Eastern Front respectively.

Dardanelles Campaign: the campaign, which began on April 25, took place at on the Gallipoli Peninsula on the European side of the Dardanelles (tr:Çanakkale Savaşlari), and is commonly referred to in Australia, New Zealand and Newfoundland simply as "Gallipoli". The British and French mounted a combined operation with the goal of capturing the Ottoman capital at Constantinople (now Istanbul). The campaign started with a Naval attempt to force the Dardanelles. When this failed the Allies decided to seize the European side of the Dardanelles with an amphibious assault. The troops were able to land but could not dislodge the Ottoman forces after months of battle that caused the deaths of an estimated 131,000 soldiers, and 262,000 wounded. Eventually the Allied forces withdrew. The campaigning represented something of a coming of age for Australia and New Zealand, with the Australians still today celebrating April 25th as ANZAC Day. Kemal Ataturk, who would go on to become the first leader of modern Turkey distinguished himself as a Lieut. Colonel in the Ottoman forces there.

Arab Revolt: The British, based in Egypt, began to incite the Arabs living in Hejaz near the Red Sea and inland to revolt to expel the Ottoman forces from what is the modern-day Saudi Arabian peninsula.

Sinai and Palestine Campaign: The Ottomans launched an unsuccessful attack across the Sinai with the objective of destroying or capturing the Suez Canal.

[edit] 1916

Arab Revolt: In 1916, a combination of diplomacy and genuine dislike of the new leaders of the Ottoman Empire (the Three Pashas) convinced Sherif Hussein ibn Ali of Mecca to begin a revolt. He gave the leadership of this revolt to two of his sons: Faisal and Abdullah, though the planning and direction for the war was largely the work of Lawrence of Arabia.

Caucasus Campaign: The Russian offensive in northeastern Turkey culminated with the capture of Erzurum in February and Trabzon in April.

Sinai and Palestine Campaign: The Ottoman forces launched a second attack across the Sinai with the objective of destroying or capturing the Suez Canal. Both this and the earlier attack (1915) were unsuccessful, though not very costly by the standards of the Great War. The British then went on the offensive, attacking east into Palestine. However, two failed attempts to capture the Ottoman fort of Gaza resulted in sweeping changes to the British command and the arrival of General Allenby, along with many reinforcements.

[edit] 1917

Mesopotamian Campaign: British Empire forces reorganized and captured Baghdad in March 1917.

Caucasus Campaign: Russia effectively withdrew from the war in 1917; the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk of 1918 eventually restored to Ottoman Empire the territories it had lost to Russia during the war.

Arab Revolt: The revolt was a success, aided immensely by General Allenby's conquest of Palestine in 1917 (see the Sinai and Palestine Campaign for details).

Sinai and Palestine Campaign: Late in 1917, Allenby's Egyptian Expeditionary Force smashed the Ottoman defenses and captured Gaza, and then captured Jerusalem just before Christmas. While strategically of minimal importance to the war, this event was key in the subsequent creation of Israel as a separate nation in 1948.

[edit] End of hostilities, October 30, 1918

Main article: Armistice of Mudros

The Armistice of Mudros, signed on aboard HMS Agamemnon in Mudros port on the island of Lemnos on October 30 1918, brought an end to the Sinai and Palestine Campaign.

[edit] Peace Treaty, August 10, 1920

Main article: Treaty of Sèvres

The Ottoman Government signed the Treaty of Sèvres on August 10, 1920; however, Turkish national movement rejected the treaty , which therefore never took effect.

[edit] Command Structures

[edit] Ottoman

The Ottoman Empire fielded a large but ineffective army during World War I. Their offensive operations were failures, most of their best generals were in fact Germans (e.g. Otto Liman von Sanders, Colmar Freiherr von der Goltz, Erich von Falkenhayn and Friedrich Freiherr Kress von Kressenstein), with only one effective Turkish Commander, Mustafa Kemal (later Ataturk), and just about all their modern war equipment (war ships, heavy artillery, machine guns, railroads, and air-planes) were built by Germans or Austrians and were maintained by German and Austrian engineers.

When holding defensive fortified positions the Ottoman Army was often able to beat back major attacks, and tens of thousands of British and Russian soldiers died making fruitless assaults on Turkish positions. However, the only successful Ottoman military operations were defensive and they suffered many defeats when attacking and defending.

Unlike the army of Austria-Hungary which essentially fell apart in 1918, the Ottoman Army was still partially intact and partially effective to the end of the war. Despite losing its armies in Palestine and Mesopotamia in the fall of 1918, it maintained a combat-effective army based around Istanbul. In 1918, the Ottoman Army was able to recapture all their lost territory in Armenia, if against weak opposition. In fact, the Ottoman Army even managed to reach Baku just before the war ended.

Despite the occasional successes and sometimes capable leaders, on the whole the Ottoman Army was a weak partner to the German Army during World War I. The Ottoman Empire almost certainly would have been defeated by the middle of 1915 without German military leadership and aid.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] British

• Mediterranean Expeditionary Force
• British Dardanelles Army

[edit] Russian

[edit] Casualties

• Ottoman Muslim casualties

[edit] Timeline

 id:canvas  value:rgb(0.97,0.97,0.97)
 id:white  value:rgb(1,1,1)
 id:subtitle  value:gray(0.8)
 id:grid1   value:gray(0.7)
 id:grid2   value:gray(0.88)
 id:black   value:rgb(0,0,0)
 id:events value:rgb(0.75,1,0.75)
 id:mark1   value:rgb(0,0.7,0)
 id:mark2    value:rgb(0.7,0,0)
 id:years    value:gray(0.5)
 id:period1  value:rgb(1,1,0)
 id:period2  value:rgb(1,0.75,0)
 id:otto    value:rgb(1,0.75,0)
 id:Mil value:rgb(1,0.8,0.4) 
 id:Gal value:skyblue       Legend:Gallipoli
 id:Mes value:orange        Legend:Mesepotamia
 id:Sina value:purple       Legend:Sinia_&_Palestine
 id:Cau  value:yellow   Legend:Caucasus

 at:14/10/1914   color:coral
 at:30/10/1918	  color:powderblue

 bar:title_WWI
 barset:Social
 barset:Resist
 bar:title_events
 barset:Bat
 bar:title_periods
 bar:periods

 bar:title_WWI     from:start till:end text:"Ottoman Campaigns" fontsize:M anchor:middle align:center width:10 color:subtitle 
 bar:title_events  from:start till:end text:"Battles" fontsize:M anchor:middle align:center width:10 color:subtitle mark:(line,white)
 bar:title_periods from:start till:end text:"Activity" fontsize:M anchor:middle align:center width:10 color:subtitle mark:(line,white)

 fontsize:S
 width:14
 shift:(3,-4)
 align:left

 barset:Social
       from:15/05/1915 till:04/12/1917 align:center color:Orange  text:Administration for Western Armenia
       from:27/05/1915 till:08/02/1916 align:center            text:Tehcir Law
 barset:break
       from:01/04/1918 till:end align:center color:Orange 	text:Armenia
       at:04/04/1917   mark:(line,green)			text:Russian Revolution

 barset:Resist
       from:30/09/1914 till:01/12/1914 color:yellow  		text:Zeitun
       from:20/03/1915 till:25/03/1915 color:yellow            text:Zeitun
       from:19/04/1915 till:03/05/1915  color:yellow           text:Van
       at:24/04/1915   mark:(line,red)                         text:April 24
 barset:break
       from:02/06/1915 till:30/06/1915  color:yellow           text:Shabin-Karahisar
       from:29/09/1915 till:20/10/1915  color:yellow           text:Urfa
 barset:break
	at:08/06/1916	mark:(line,red)				text:Arab Revolt

 barset:Bat
	at:04/11/1914	mark:(line,Mes)				text:Fao Landing 

 barset:break

 barset:break

       at:22/04/1918   mark:(line,yellow)     			text:Sardarapat
       at:15/05/1918   mark:(line,yellow)     			text:Kara Killisse
       at:15/06/1918   mark:(line,yellow)     			text:Bash Abaran

 bar:periods
	at:04/11/1914	mark:(line,Mes)				

[edit] Footnotes

1. ^ Zurcher, 'Between Death and Desertion"
2. ^ The Treaty of Alliance Between Germany and Turkey 2 August, 1914

[edit] Further reading

• The Anglo-Russian Entente:Agreement concerning Persia 1907
• The French, British and Russian joint declaration over the situation in Armenia published on May 24, 1915
• Sykes-Picot Agreement 15 & 16 May, 1916.
• The Middle East during World War I By Professor David R Woodward for the BBC

nl:Midden Oosten Front ru:Ближневосточный театр военных действий Первой мировой войны tr:Osmanlı Cephesi (Birinci Dünya Savaşı)