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The Mesopotamia Campaign
In Mesopotamia, British forces successfully repelled an Ottoman attack at Shaiba on April 12, 1915. Having been reinforced, the British commander, General Sir John Nixon, ordered Major General Charles Townshend to advance up the Tigris River to Kut and, if possible, Baghdad. Reaching Ctesiphon, Townshend encountered an Ottoman force under Nureddin Pasha on November 22. After five days of inconclusive fighting, both sides withdrew. Retreating to Kut-al-Amara, Townshend was followed by Nureddin Pasha who laid siege to the British force on December 7. Several attempts were made to lift the siege in early 1916 with no success and Townshend surrenderd on April 29 (Map).
Unwilling to accept defeat, the British dispatched Lieutenant General Sir Fredrick Maude to retrieve the situation. Reorganizing and reinforcing his command, Maude began a methodical offensive up the Tigris on December 13, 1916. Repeatedly outmaneuvering the Ottomans, he retook Kut and pressed towards Baghdad. Defeating Ottoman forces along the Diyala River, Maude captured Baghdad on March 11, 1917. Maude then halted in the city to reorganize his supply lines and avoid the summer heat. Dying of cholera in November, he was replaced by General Sir William Marshall. With troops being diverted from his command to expand operations elsewhere, Marshall slowly pushed towards to the Ottoman base at Mosul. Advancing towards the city, it was finally occupied on November 14, 1918, two weeks after the Armistice of Mudros ended hostilities.
Fighting in the Sinai & Palestine
As Ottoman forces campaigned in the Caucasus and Mesopotamia, they also began moving to strike at the Suez Canal. Closed by the British to enemy traffic at the start of the war, the canal was a key line of strategic communication for the Allies. Though Egypt was still technically part of the Ottoman Empire, it had been under British administration since 1882 and was rapidly filling with British and Commonwealth troops. Moving through the desert wastes of the Sinai Peninsula, Turkish troops under General Ahmed Cemal and his German chief of staff Franz Kress von Kressenstein attacked the canal area on February 2, 1915. Alerted to their approach, British forces drove off the attackers after two days of fighting. Though a victory, the threat to the canal forced the British to leave a stronger garrison in Egypt than intended.
For over a year the Suez front remained quiet as fighting raged at Gallipoli and in Mesopotamia. In the summer of 1916, von Kressenstein made another attempt on the canal. Advancing across the Sinai, he met a well-prepared British defense led by General Sir Archibald Murray. In the resulting Battle of Romani on August 3-5, the British forced the Turks to retreat. Going over the offensive, the British pushed across Sinai, building a railroad and water pipeline as they went. Winning battles at Magdhaba and Rafa, they were ultimately stopped by the Turks at the First Battle of Gaza in March 1917 (Map). When a second attempt to take the city failed in April, Murray was sacked in favor of General Sir Edmund Allenby.
Reorganizing his command, Allenby commenced the Third Battle of Gaza on October 31. Flanking the Turkish line at Beersheba, he won decisive victory. On Allenby's flank were the Arab forces guided by Major T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) who had previously captured the port of Aqaba. Dispatched to Arabia in 1916, Lawrence successfully worked to foment unrest among the Arabs who then revolted against Ottoman rule. With the Ottomans in retreat, Allenby rapidly pushed north, taking Jerusalem on December 9 (Map).
Thought the British wished to deliver a death blow to the Ottomans in early 1918, their plans were undone by the beginning of the German Spring Offensives on the Western Front. The bulk of Allenby's veteran troops were transferred west to aid in blunting the German assault. As a result, much of the spring and summer was consumed rebuilding his forces from newly recruited troops. Ordering the Arabs to harass the Ottoman rear, Allenby opened the Battle of Megiddo on September 19. Shattering an Ottoman army under von Sanders, Allenby's men rapidly advanced and captured Damascus on October 1. Though their southern forces had been destroyed, the government in Constantinople refused to surrender and continued the fight elsewhere.
Fire in the Mountains
In the wake of the victory at Sarikamis, command of Russian forces in the Caucasus was given to General Nikolai Yudenich. Pausing to reorganize his forces, he embarked on an offensive in May 1915. This was aided by an Armenian revolt at Van which had erupted the previous month. While one wing of the attack succeeded in relieving Van, the other was halted after advancing through the Tortum Valley towards Erzurum. Exploiting the success at Van and with Armenian guerillas striking the enemy rear, Russian troops secured Manzikert on May 11. Due to the Armenian activity, the Ottoman government passed the Tehcir Law calling for the forced relocation of Armenians from the area. Subsequent Russian efforts during the summer were fruitless and Yudenich took the fall to rest and reinforce.
In January, Yudenich returned to the attack winning the Battle of Koprukoy and driving on Erzurum. Taking the city in March, Russian forces captured Trabzon the following month and began pushing south towards Bitlis. Pressing on, both Bitlis and Mush were taken. These gains were short-lived as Ottoman forces under Mustafa Kemal recaptured both later that summer. The lines stabilized through the fall as both sides recuperated from the campaigning. Though the Russian command wished to renew the assault in 1917, social and political unrest at home prevented this. With the outbreak of the Russian Revolution, Russian forces began withdrawing on the Caucasus front and eventually evaporated away. Peace was achieved through the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in which Russia ceded territory to the Ottomans.
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