War of Independence Writings: "World War I and Mustafa Kemal Atatürk" (Part 1)
With the participation of two German warships, the Ottoman Navy attacked Russia in the Black Sea on 27 October. Thus, the Ottoman Empire joined the war. At this time, Atatürk was in the rank of lieutenant colonel and was serving as military attaché in Sofia. When the Ottoman Empire joined the war, he wanted to take part in the front.
The First World War started after the assassination of the Crown Prince of the Austro-Hungarian Empire by a Serbian in Sarajevo in June 1914. Thereupon, the Ottoman Empire signed an alliance agreement with Germany on 2 August.
Some time later, with the participation of two German warships, the Ottoman Navy attacked Russia in the Black Sea on 27 October. Thus, the Ottoman Empire joined the war.
At this time, Atatürk was in the rank of lieutenant colonel and was serving as military attaché in Sofia. When the Ottoman Empire joined the war, he wanted to take part in the front. Accordingly, on 20 January 1915, he was appointed as the commander of the 19th Division, which was in the process of being established in Tekirdağ.
After a while, the Entente (in February 1915) launched a naval operation to cross the Dardanelles, but failed. Thereupon, troops were landed on 25 April. When the land battles started, the 19th Division was sent to the Gallipoli region and Atatürk participated in the battles.
Atatürk was promoted to the rank of Colonel upon his successes in the battles and was assigned to the Anafartalar Group Command at the corps level. When the Allied offensives failed and the battles lost their intensity, he was appointed as the Commander of the 16th Corps in Edirne in January 1916 and after a while he transferred this corps to Diyarbakır. During this transfer, he was promoted to general.
On the Eastern Front, first as the commander of the 16th Corps and then as the Deputy Commander of the 2nd Army, he fought successful battles against the Russian army. In 1917, the advance of the Russian army in Anatolia was stopped.
In Iraq and Palestine, the British advanced rapidly and posed a great threat in the south of the country. Upon this, Enver Pasha held a meeting in Aleppo on 24 June 1917, which was also attended by Mustafa Kemal Pasha.
At this meeting, he announced that the 7th Army Command under the command of Mustafa Kemal Pasha and the Lightning Armies Group Command under the command of General Erich von Falkenhayn would be established, and that the 7th Army and the 6th Army in Iraq would be attached to the Lightning Armies Group Command.
Cemal Pasha, the commander of the 4th Army, who realised that if this was done, the Germans would become dominant in the direction and administration of the operations on the Southern Front, objected to this. However, Cemal Pasha's objection was not only to the command structure. The operation planned to be carried out with the Lightning Armies Group also carried great drawbacks.
According to the plan, while strong defence lines should be established against the British advancing from the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, an offensive operation was planned to be carried out with insufficient forces. Mustafa Kemal Pasha also objected to this plan.
Despite these objections, Mustafa Kemal Pasha's appointment was approved on 7 July and Falkenhayn's appointment was approved on 11 July, and Lightning Armies Group was established on 15 July.
Some people try to blame the failures on the Syrian-Palestinian Front on Atatürk. However, the commander of the military units in this region was not Mustafa Kemal Pasha, but the German general Falkenhayn. The Germans remained in command until the end of the war.
Mustafa Kemal Pasha served as the commander of only one of the three armies on this front for about two months in 1917 and for nearly three months in 1918 until the signing of the Armistice of Mudros. During these missions, problems arose between Mustafa Kemal Pasha and the Germans due to mistakes made by German generals and German officers in influential positions.
For example, the fact that Falkenhayn was too late in reorganising the troops for battle and that he thought that "it was possible to make an attack on the rear of the British army by travelling through the desert" caused disagreements with Mustafa Kemal Pasha.
Falkenhayn could not decide on how the operation should be carried out after making examinations at the front, and he wanted the decision to be made by the Deputy Commander-in-Chief. However, Enver Pasha left the decision to him.
In this process, Cemal Pasha, the Commander of the 4th Army, and Mustafa Kemal Pasha, the Commander of the 7th Army, were given a passive duty and the command and administration of the entire front was left to the Germans. Mustafa Kemal Pasha objected to this and conveyed his thoughts to Falkenhayn and Enver Pasha.
On 20 September, he wrote a report from Aleppo and sent it to the Deputy Commander-in-Chief and 4th Army Commander Cemal Pasha. When these suggestions were not taken into consideration, he resigned from the army command and travelled to Istanbul.
