Caucasia During World War I

Before World War I, Clausewitz's ideas about war had become a widely accepted idea throughout Europe. For this reason, war was accepted by most statesmen as an action that would result in an attack in a short time. Accordingly, the thing to do in war was to neutralize the enemy as quickly as possible with encirclement maneuvers. The war plans of the countries were also prepared on this basis.
The Russians had prepared Plan 19, based on the offensive, to seize East Prussia. He had three separate plans against the Ottoman Empire. The first plan was prepared according to the possibility of fighting the Ottoman Empire alone. According to this; An attack would be made with eight corps from the Caucasus and a landing would be made from the Black Sea to the Bosphorus in coordination with this attack. The second plan was prepared according to the possibility that the Ottoman Empire would remain neutral. In this case, it was considered to leave two corps in the Caucasus. Then, according to the developments that would occur, one of the corps would withdraw to the European Front.
Third plan; It was prepared according to the possibility of going to war with the Triple Alliance and the Ottoman Empire at the same time. According to this; Two corps and Cossack troops were to be left in the Caucasus and the defense would be made. The Russians had prepared another plan to seize the Straits in March 1914. According to this, a landing operation would be carried out with an army from the Black Sea, and Thrace and the straits would be captured. However, when it was announced that the German warships Goeben and Breslau, which entered the Dardanelles on 10 August 1914, were purchased by the Ottoman Government on 11 August 1914, this plan lost its validity.
The war plan of the Ottoman Empire was based on defense. This plan was prepared by the German Colonel Bronzart von Schellendorff, who was the Second Chief of the General Staff, on June 7, 1914, by order of Enver Pasha. The plan was based on the assumption that the Ottoman Empire would fight alone with the Balkan states and Russia and that the Russians would land in Istanbul and its surroundings. For this reason, it was planned to defend the Bosphorus with most of the troops and to leave weak covering troops at the borders.
When the alliance agreement was signed with Germany on August 2, 1914, this plan was canceled and a new plan was prepared. According to this plan; the straits will be held with sufficient force, the Russian navy will be attacked in the form of a raid in the Black Sea, and a landing will be made in Odessa. Defense will be made in Eastern Anatolia, and according to the situation of the Balkan states, an attack will be made from the Balkans to Russia and from Syria to Egypt.
The First World War, in which the parties were prepared according to these plans, started with the Austro-Hungarian Empire declaring war on Serbia on 29 July 1914. After that, the German army entered Belgium on 4 August 1914. When the Belgian army resisted the occupation and retreated to Antwerp, the German army continued to advance towards France by separating two corps for safety against the Belgian army. The German army, which attacked the French and British armies on 21-22 August 1914, defeated both armies.
Thereupon, France moved some troops from other regions against the Germans and counterattacked with the British. In the Battle of the Marne, which took place on 5-10 September 1914, the German army was defeated. The retreating Germans were organized for defense and began to prepare positions. After that, as both sides continued to prepare positions to prevent the encirclement, the battle line expanded from Switzerland to the English Channel. Thus, contrary to the thought based on the offensive before the war, the battles turned into positional battles.
The battles in Eastern Europe followed a different course. Russia completed its mobilization before the Germans expected and entered German territory with two armies. One of these armies defeated German troops in East Prussia on 19-20 August 1914, but stopped because it moved too far from the other army in Poland. Since Masuria Lake, which was between the two Russian armies, divided the Russian forces, this pause put the Russians in a negative military situation.
The Germans, on the other hand, became advantageous due to the possibility of moving troops quickly and safely, thanks to the railway network in the south of the lake. Taking advantage of this advantage, the Germans carried their troops from East Prussia to Poland by train, attacked the Russian army there and destroyed this army until 30 August 1914. After that, they moved their forces to East Prussia and attacked the other Russian army and expelled them from East Prussia in mid-September.
Meanwhile, the battles of the Austro-Hungarian army did not develop as planned before the war. The Austro-Hungarian army could not defeat the Serbian army and the battles turned into positional battles. Austro-Hungarian troops in Galicia, on the other hand, faced the Russians between 26-30 August 1914. It suffered a heavy defeat and began to withdraw on September 11, 1914.
Despite these fierce battles, World War I was mostly limited to the European continent until October. By the end of October, the war had spread from the Caucasus to the Indian Ocean. Because the successes of the Germans against the Russians in Eastern Europe convinced the Ottoman rulers to join the war. Thus, the Ottoman navy attacked the Russian ports on October 29, 1914.
Thereupon, the Russian army attacked by crossing the border from Doğubayazıt on October 31, 1914. The British are; They started to occupy Aqaba on 1 November 1914, Fao Island on 3 November 1914 and Basra on 6 November 1914. The Ottoman State declared war on the Allied Powers on 11 November 1914 and Jihad-ı Akbar on 14 November 1914.
In this study, the military operations carried out by the Ottoman Empire in Eastern Anatolia and the Caucasus during the First World War, which the Ottoman Empire entered with great expectations by declaring Jihad-ı Akbar, will be examined from a strategic point of view. This operation will be handled together with the political and military developments that emerged during the war, and these developments will be mentioned when appropriate.

Battles Between the Ottoman Army and the Russian Army

When the Ottoman Empire entered the war, the Germans could not defeat France and England on the Western Front, and the battles turned into battles of attrition, but they gained significant success on the Eastern Front. For this reason, on November 25, 1914, they informed their armies on the Western Front to abandon the war of maneuver and take up a defensive formation at depth. In this way, they attacked the Russians by pulling the four corps they had saved from the Western Front to the Eastern Front.
Unable to hold on against this attack, the Russians left Poland in December and retreated behind the Nida and Dunajec Rivers. These successes of the Germans prevented Russia from moving troops from Eastern Europe to Iran and the Caucasus. Thus, a situation emerged that encouraged the Ottoman Empire to attack the Russians from Eastern Anatolia.
As a matter of fact, Enver Pasha, who evaluated that the Russian army in the Caucasus was quite weak, saw that the Russians could not move troops from Eastern Europe to the Caucasus, and decided to attack the Russian army. It is understood that the ambiguity of the Bulgarians' situation is also effective in this. Because, if Bulgaria joins the war on the side of the Allies, it is thought that all the troops will gather on the Bulgarian border and Bulgaria will be crushed. For this, the Russian army must first be destroyed.
When news was received that the Russians would move troops from Eastern Europe to the Caucasus, it was decided to launch an attack before these troops reached the Caucasus. Because with the available forces, it seems possible to destroy the weak Russian troops in the Caucasus. If this can be done, the Caucasus will be captured and the Turan road will be opened. In addition, it would be possible to ensure that Russia, which was under the pressure of the German army on the Eastern Front and the Ottoman army in Eastern Anatolia, was defeated and withdrawn from the war.
According to the plan prepared for this purpose; The Russians will be identified from the front with one corps, and two corps will advance from the north to capture Sarıkamış and besiege and destroy the Russian forces. The troops began to advance on 21 December 1914 in accordance with this plan. However, the corps that were going to besiege suffered heavy casualties while trying to cross the snow-covered mountains. Despite this, Sarıkamış was attacked on December 26, 1914, but the city could not be taken in the battles that continued until January 2, 1915. When the Russians counterattacked on January 3, 1915, the Ottoman army had to retreat. After this withdrawal, the operation, which had perfect planning on paper, ended unsuccessfully on 19 January 1915.
The failure of the Sarıkamış Operation revealed that long-distance maneuvers made with the help of the developed railway network on the flat lands of Eastern Europe could not be carried out in the rough terrain of Eastern Anatolia and in cold climate conditions. For this reason, the Ottoman army started to implement a strategy based on defending every inch of land. Due to the mountainous nature of the terrain, the battles were mostly dependent on valleys and roads.
At the time of the Sarıkamış Operation, the center of gravity of the First World War was still on the Western Front. For this reason, the Germans wanted the Ottoman army to attack the Suez Canal in order to prevent the British from bringing troops from their colonies to the Western Front through the Suez Canal. In accordance with this demand, the Ottoman army started the operation on January 14, 1915 and tried to cross the Channel on January 31, 1915, but was repulsed by the British.
After these battles, the parties, who saw that the offensive movements made from the beginning of the war did not yield any results and that the battles turned into attrition battles, decided to weaken and wear out their opponents. They started to give more weight to the subjects. For this purpose, they accelerated their efforts to cause revolts in the territories of rival countries. While the Ottoman Empire and the Germans encouraged the Muslims under the Entente Powers to revolt, the Entente Powers provoked the Christians and Arabs in the Ottoman Empire to rebellion.
These efforts have produced some results whose effects continue to the present day. For example, Armenians started to mobilize in the Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia regions immediately after the Sarıkamış disaster. In February 1915, Armenian gangs started to operate in Bitlis, and in March there were signs that the Armenians would revolt in Van. Thereupon, the Harput, Diyarbakır and Bitlis Mobile Gendarmerie Battalions were sent to Van, but the rebellion attempts could not be suppressed.
The events caused by the Armenian gangs were also heavily supported by the Russians, who were operating in Eastern Anatolia. The efforts made for this purpose were reflected in the operational plans of the Russian army commanders. The Russians encouraged not only the Armenians but also the Nestorians to revolt. The Russians also applied to the British on January 2, 1915, for an operation that could relieve them, as they were stuck during the Sarıkamış Operation. Upon the approval of this request by England and France, it was decided to open a new front against the Ottoman Empire. However, since the Entente Powers did not have enough ground troops, a naval operation was planned for the Dardanelles Strait.
In accordance with this plan, the Allied Powers started to bombard the positions at the entrance of the Dardanelles Strait as of February 19, 1915. After the bombardment, the ships entered the Dardanelles on March 18, 1915, but had to retreat with heavy losses. Thereupon, on April 25, 1915, a landing was made to the Gallipoli Peninsula with the main forces and to the Anatolian side with the secondary forces for the purpose of deception. However, although the landing troops held the shore head, they could not advance and the conflicts turned into positional battles. At the same time as the Dardanelles campaign, the British troops in Basra also started forward operations.
In April, when intense clashes took place on these two fronts; The rebellion of the Armenians in Bitlis and Van intensified even more. Although the city of Van was besieged by the gendarmerie and tribal forces, the rebellion could not be suppressed. Taking advantage of this opportunity, the Russian army moved forward and occupied Manzikert on May 11, 1915, Patnos and Erciş on May 12, 1915, and Van on May 16, 1915. When Van was occupied, the Armenians committed a great massacre on the Muslim population in the city. Upon this massacre, the Ottoman Government decided to immigrate the Armenians in the war zone.
The Ottoman Empire, which tried to suppress the Armenian revolts on the one hand and had to fight in regions far from each other, on the other hand, could not shift forces between the fronts in a short time due to the limited means of transportation. As a result, Ottoman troops were defeated in the Battle of Shuaybiya on the Iraqi Front, which was held with very weak units.
After this battle, which took place on April 14, 1915, the British advancing rapidly; They captured Amarra on 3 June 1915 and Nasiriyah on 25 July 1915. Although the captured area was sufficient to protect the vital oil fields, the British government ordered the troops in the region to take Baghdad. Because the British, who could not be successful in the Western Front and Çanakkale, need a victory to be won. Also, if the British army succeeds in advancing northward, it will be possible to unite with the Russian army in Eastern Anatolia.
Continuing to advance on this order, the British troops were defeated in Salman-i Pak near Baghdad on November 24, 1915. The defeated British retreated to Kut'ül Amare on 3 December 1915 and were organized here for defense and surrounded by Ottoman troops. Thus, the unification of the British troops and the Russian troops advancing from Eastern Anatolia to the south was prevented.
The British asked the Russians to expand the operation in Iran in order to relieve their besieged troops. But Russia could not send large troops to Iran. Because a significant part of the troops in the Caucasus were connected to the battles in Eastern Anatolia, the troops in Eastern Europe are experiencing troubled days. Taking advantage of the low ratio of force and area, the Germans kicked the Russians out of Galicia as a result of the attack they started on May 2, 1915. The defeat against the Germans, who advanced to the San River in Poland on 14 May 1915, turned into a disaster for Russia. The affected 3.3 million civilians migrated to the interior of Russia, as the Russians burned everything as they retreated so as not to leave logistical resources to the Germans. These immigrants caused internal unrest in Russia.
This defeat One consequence of this was Bulgaria's participation in the war on the side of the Central Powers. Seeing the defeat of the Russians on the Eastern Front, Bulgaria joined the war on the side of the Allied Powers on 6 September 1915, after the other Entente Powers failed at Çanakkale. After this, the German and Austrian armies attacked Serbia on 6 October 1915. On October 14, 1915, when the Bulgarians attacked from the east, the Serbian army was defeated and retreated to the Adriatic coast through Albania. As a result of the occupation of Serbia, it became easier to support the Ottoman Empire with German weapons and equipment.
When the occupation of Serbia was completed, the Germans turned their attention back to the Western Front in early 1916. The German army attacked the French on February 22, 1916, with the main target Verdun, and on February 25, 1916, Douaumont, one of the most important points of the defense system, fell. But as the French continued to defend Verdun, the battles turned into battles of position.
In Eastern Anatolia, while the Ottoman army remained on the defensive, the Russians continued their offensive and succeeded in advancing. Thus, they occupied Erzurum on 16 February 1916 and Muş on 17 February 1916. On the Black Sea coastline, on March 4, 1916, they captured the town by landing on Pazar, and after the landing on March 7, 1916, they occupied Rize on March 8, 1916. Trabzon was occupied on April 18, 1916, and the Russians landed two divisions in Trabzon between April 20-30, 1916.
Despite these successes, Russia has started to experience some important developments that will directly affect the military situation on the front. Because, as a result of the military failure in Europe, the collapse of the economy, the dissatisfaction triggered by hunger and migration, the internal stability deteriorated and the revolution started in Russia on March 9, 1916. As a result, desertions in military units increased.
The Ottoman Empire, on the other hand, sent some of the troops here to Iraq and some to Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia when the Entente Powers withdrew their soldiers in the Dardanelles region. As a result of this, some important developments have emerged against the Entente Powers in Eastern Anatolia, Iran and the Middle East. The British, who attacked four times from the Basra direction, were not successful against the reinforced Ottoman troops and the British troops in Kut'ül Amare surrendered on 29 April 1916. The Russian forces in Iran, on the other hand, were defeated by the Ottoman troops sent from Iraq on 3 June 1916 and began to retreat to the north.
Despite these negative developments in the country and on the fronts, Russia decided to ease the burden of its allies due to the ongoing battles of Verdun on the Western Front. For this purpose, the Russian army attacked the Austro-Hungarian army on June 4, 1916, and the Austro-Hungarian defense was dissolved in a short time. However, as a result of the German counterattacks between 16-23 June 1916, the Russian troops had to withdraw. When the Russian counterattack in July also failed, discipline in the Russian troops collapsed and Russia's internal problems increased.
Thereupon, the British launched an intense bombardment in the Somme region on June 24, 1916, in order to reduce the pressure on the Russians. The British army attacked on 1 July 1916 but was unsuccessful. This time, the British started limited targeted attacks and broke through the German defense on 14 July 1916. However, as the reserves could not enter the battle in time, they could not benefit from this success. The attack on Flers on September 15, 1916, however, was unsuccessful due to heavy rain.
Although these offensives were unsuccessful, the Germans were quite compressed. Thereupon, the Ottoman army took action to relieve the German army. In order to prevent the British from sending troops from the colonies to the Western Front, the Second Channel Operation was started on 16 July 1916. When this operation failed, the Ottoman army started to prepare defensive positions on the Gaza-Birüssebi line. Thus, in 1916, the war could not get rid of its stagnant structure.
However, the Russians had some success in their offensive operations against the Ottoman army in the Black Sea coast and Eastern Anatolia. The successes of the Russians on the coast encouraged the supporters of the Pontus Society and in 1916 the Greek gangs in the Canik (Samsun) region took action. On the other hand, some tribes in the north of Tunceli revolted with the encouragement of the Russian troops who continued to advance through Erzurum.
The Ottoman army, which tried to prevent the riots behind the front and struggled with the Russian army, had to continue to retreat into Anatolia. As a result, Bayburt fell on 16 July 1916 and the 3rd Army was withdrawn to the Gümüşhane-Kelkit line. It fell in Kelkit on 22 July 1916 and Erzincan on 25 July 1916. But go too far The new Russian army gave an open side against the 2nd Army in Diyarbakir. Evaluating this, the 2nd Army attacked on 2 August 1916 and took back Muş on 6 August 1916 and Bitlis on 7 August 1916.
After that, the Russians began to face great difficulties not only on the fronts but also within the country. For this reason, Russia had to be completely preoccupied with its internal problems. Because at the beginning of 1917, a new revolutionary wave emerged in Russia. On February 23, 1917, a great workers' uprising started in Petersburg and soldiers joined the uprising. As a result, the tsarist regime was overthrown on March 2, 1917, and a Provisional Committee was established in the Duma on March 3, 1917. When a Soldiers' and Workers' Soviet was also established in St. Petersburg, two governments emerged in Russia.
When Lenin, who was in Switzerland, heard the news of the revolution, he thought that he could use the soviets to realize the socialist revolution he had planned. For this reason, he returned to Russia in April, after the Petrograd Soviet declared its committee on 14 March 1917 as the sole authority.
Information about these revolutionary movements also reached the Ottoman Empire. Discipline collapsed in the Russian army, which was aware of the revolution, and desertions increased. Thus, the Russian threat in the Eastern Anatolia region started to decrease and the attention of the Ottoman army was directed to Iraq and Syria-Palestine regions.
For this reason, some organizational and task changes were made. Deputy Commander of the 2nd Army, Mustafa Kemal Pasha, was sent to Aleppo to command the Hejaz Forces Expedition, which was planned to be established. When the establishment of this army was abandoned, he was appointed to the 2nd Army Command on March 5, 1917. On March 8, 1917, the Caucasus Army Group was established and Ahmet İzzet Pasha was appointed as its commander.
Following these developments, the British captured Kut'ül Amare on February 25, 1917, Baghdad on March 11, 1917, and Samarra on April 24, 1917. After the occupation of Kut al Amara, the Ottoman troops in Iran, who had advanced as far as Hamadan, were ordered to return to Iraq, but these troops could not reach the front before Baghdad fell. In the Syrian Front, the British attacked the Turkish forces in the Gaza-Birussebe defense line on March 26, 1917, but they withdrew unsuccessfully. They attacked again on the same line on April 17, 1917 and were unsuccessful again. However, in their third attack, they took Bisüssebe and drove the Turkish army back to Jerusalem.
These successes, which meant that the British approached the Russian armies in Anatolia, did not benefit the Russians. Because Russia is in a state of complete collapse and this situation is also reflected in the armies on the fronts. For this reason, the military situation in Eastern Anatolia started to turn against the Russians. In the winter of 1917, 190,000 soldiers remained in the Russian army, which suffered 100,000 casualties and was spread over a wide area. This number was increased to 250,000 with the supply personnel, but the Russians lost their offensive ability as the discipline was broken.
The armies of the Russians in Eastern Europe are also considerably weakened. Despite this, the government decided to continue the war. In accordance with this decision, the Russian army attacked in Eastern Europe in July, but suffered a great defeat. After that, a political and military wreckage remained from Russia. Taking this situation as an opportunity, Lenin declared the Bolshevik revolution, but the government controlled the situation by using military units.
Despite this failure, the Bolsheviks continued their work and with a decision taken on October 10, 2927, on the night of October 24-25, 1917, with 10-12 thousand Red Guards, they captured all critical places in the capital. The next day, Lenin declared the victory of the workers' and peasants' revolution, and the next day he issued a statement demanding an end to the war and a just peace without annexation, compensation and justice. Russia's withdrawal from the war by signing an armistice agreement with the Central Powers on December 2, 1917, brought about the developments that would cause the Caucasus to be opened to the influence of the Central Powers.
Meanwhile, the situation in the Caucasus has become suitable for this. Because the developments in Russia have shown their effect in the Caucasus from the very first days. After the first revolution that ended tsarism, a Soviet of Workers' Deputies was established in Tbilisi on March 17, 1917, and a Soviet of Soldiers' Deputies in Tbilisi and Baku on March 19, 1917. The Provisional Government, on the other hand, abolished the Caucasus General Governorship of the Tsarist regime and established the Transoxiana Caucasus Special Committee (Özokom) on 22 March 1917.
Thereupon, the peoples of the region began to establish their own national organizations and to seek states to support them. Armenians sided with Russia and the Entente States, Georgians with Germany, and Azerbaijani Turks with the Ottoman Empire. However, after the elections held on November 26-28, 1917, Armenians, Georgians and Azerbaijani Turks formed a joint assembly and went on to work under the name of Transoxiana Caucasus Commissariat. They established a steering organ.
These nations; They also started to develop their own administrative, political and military structures. Yudeniç, the Commander of the Caucasian Armies of Armenian origin, established an army consisting of Armenians. The Georgians also formed an army and established the Georgian Milli Majlis in Tbilisi on 3 December 1917. This assembly elected an executive body and decided that men between the ages of 20 and 40 should be drafted into the military.
While these developments were taking place in the Caucasus, the Tsarist army still stood against the Ottoman army. As a result of the negotiations that started with the command of this army in Erzincan on December 15, 1917, an armistice was signed on December 18, 1917 and the Russian army began to evacuate Anatolia. Upon these developments, the Ottoman Empire abolished the Caucasus Army Group on 16 December 1917. Shortly after this, the Russian army in eastern Anatolia was completely disbanded.

Developments After the Withdrawal of the Russian Army

While the Russian armies on the fronts were disintegrating, Russia was quickly dragged into chaos, as the Bolsheviks could not yet fully dominate the country. Even in the Capital, the Bolsheviks could not absolutize their power. One of the most important reasons for this was the opposition from the Russian parliament, the Duma. Because the Bolsheviks are in the minority in the Duma.
For this reason, they asked the Duma in January 1918 to accept the revolution and the government program. When the parliament refused this, they dissolved the parliament and came to power alone. However, this situation led to the emergence of rebellions and separatist movements in many parts of the country. Already during the Brest-Litovsk negotiations, Ukraine, Estonia, Finland, Moldova and Latvia declared their independence. When the Duma was forcibly dissolved, independence movements emerged in Central Asia and the Caucasus.
Meanwhile, since the peace talks between Russia and the Central Powers held in Brest-Litovsk have not yet yielded any results; The Germans moved forward from Eastern Europe on February 18, 1918. In Eastern Anatolia, Enver Pasha ordered the 3rd Army Commander to advance in the direction of Erzincan on February 12, 1918, due to the fact that the Russian soldiers who emptied the Ottoman lands began to give their weapons and ammunition to the Armenians. Thus, Erzincan on 13 February 1918, Bayburt on 19 February 1918, Trabzon and Of on 24 February 1918 were captured.
Upon this advanced operation of the Ottoman army, the legislative assembly, which started its activities in Tbilisi on February 23, 1918 under the name of Trans-Caucasus Seym, offered to the Ottoman Empire to meet in Trabzon for peace talks. The Bolsheviks, who could not stop the German attacks in Eastern Europe, applied to the Central Powers on the same days and sat at the negotiating table. As a result of the negotiations with Russia, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed on March 3, 1918. According to this agreement; Batum, Kars and Ardahan were given to the Ottoman Empire.
After the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, the Ottoman army immediately started forward operations to capture Batum, Kars and Ardahan and entered Erzurum on March 12, 1918. Two days after this, negotiations were started in Trabzon between the Trans-Caucasus Seym and the Ottoman State delegates, but these negotiations did not yield any results.
Thereupon, the Ottoman army continued the forward operation. He captured Oltu, Adilcevaz, Malazgirt and Varto on 25 March 1918, Ardahan on 3 April 1918, Van on 8 April 1918 and Batum on 14 April 1918. In the face of these developments, Trans-Caucasus Seym declared the independence of Trans-Caucasus on the night of April 22, 1918 and accepted the Brest-Litovsk Agreement. The independence decision was announced in a declaration on April 23, 1918. The Ottoman Empire recognized this state on April 25, 1918.
After the Ottoman army seized Kars on April 25, 1918 and the land up to Arpaçay on April 26, 1918, the Transoxiana Caucasus Government applied to the Ottoman Empire again for negotiations. On May 11, 1918, negotiations were started in Batumi, but these negotiations did not yield any results.
The Ottoman army's capture of all the lands up to the 1877 border and the disagreements that arose between them during the negotiations in Batum led every nation represented in the Trans-Caucasus Government to declare their independence. Firstly, Georgians decided to declare their independence in a meeting they held on May 22, 1918. Thereupon, the Germans landed 3000 soldiers in Poti on May 25, 1918 to support the Georgians. On May 28, 1918, they signed an agreement with the Georgians and gave assurances for the protection of Georgian borders.
Meanwhile, the Azerbaijani Government asked for help from the Ottoman Empire to stop the massacres of the Bolshevik and Armenian forces against the Turks and other Muslim peoples. The Ottoman State, which welcomed this call, decided to establish a new army under the name of the Caucasian Islamic Army. Nuri Pasha, who was assigned to the command of the army, On May 25, 1918, the 5th Caucasian Division, which was to be used in the formation of the army, arrived in Ganja on June 9, 1918.
Upon these developments, the Trans-Caucasian Seym dissolved itself in a meeting held on May 26, 1918, and the Executive Committee of the Georgian National Assembly declared the independence of Georgia. This was followed by the declaration of independence of Azerbaijan on May 28, 1918 and by Armenia on May 29, 1918. These three states signed an agreement with the Ottoman Empire on June 4, 1918. The Ottoman State also signed an agreement with the Northern Caucasus Government on 8 June 1918.
These agreements that the Ottoman Empire made with the states in the Caucasus on its own, disturbed the Germans. For this reason, the Germans called on the Ottoman Empire to respect the borders determined by the Brest-litovsk Agreement on 8 June 1918. They also stated that the advance of the Ottoman Empire in the Caucasus harmed the Turkish-German alliance and that they did not recognize the agreements signed by the Ottoman Empire. Thus, the Turkish-German alliance, which had been going on since the beginning of the war, came to a breaking point for the first time.
On June 9, 1918, the Germans wanted the Ottoman army to stop its advance towards Baku, to withdraw to the border determined in Brest-Litovsk, and to turn with all its might to the British in Northern Iran and Mesopotamia. However, Enver Pasha refused these demands. He also said that he would resign if Germany insisted on its stance. The threat of resignation forced the Germans to act cautiously and to seek a basis for agreement. As a result of these efforts, the Ottoman troops advancing towards Tbilisi turned east and reached Ganja on 20 June 1918.
In the face of this advanced operation of the Ottoman army, Russia informed Germany that if the Turks attacked Baku, it would count it as a reason for war. The Germans did not react negatively to Russia. Because they are planning to seize the Baku oil and open the way from the Caucasus to Iran, Turkestan, Afghanistan and India. However, they do not have enough strength for this.
For this reason, Germany has decided to nullify Turkish plans in the Caucasus with diplomatic maneuvers by using its presence in Georgia. On the other hand, he started negotiations with Russia to find a diplomatic solution to the Baku problem. In these meetings, the Russians stated that they could compromise with Germany on the Baku oil in order to stop the Turkish army through Germany.
Despite all these prevention efforts, Turkish troops continued to advance and reached Kurdemir, which is between Ganja and Baku, towards the middle of July. Thereupon, on 13 July 1918, Germany once again demanded that the Ottoman army stop advancing towards Baku and resist the British in Syria, Iraq and Iran with all its might. Accordingly, the Ottoman army in the Caucasus would be sent to Iran via Julfa-Tabriz and from there to Iraq.
The Ottoman army did not heed these warnings of the Germans and continued the operation against Baku. Thereupon, the Germans transferred some infantry battalions from the Crimea to the region to reinforce their forces in Georgia. On the other hand, they continued negotiations with the Russians for an agreement that would give Germany the right to use its oil resources in return for guaranteeing to give them Baku.
Meanwhile, in Baku, there is the Baku Soviet of People's Commissars, consisting of Bolsheviks and Mensheviks who seized power in April 1918. At a meeting held on July 25, 1918, when a decision was made to ask the British for support against the Ottoman army, the Bolsheviks opposed this decision and, when their objections failed to yield any results, they withdrew from the Baku People's Commissars Soviet. Thereupon, a coalition of Russians and Armenians under the control of Social Revolutionaries took over the administration and declared the Middle-Caspian Dictatorship.
The first attempt of the Middle-Caspian Dictatorship was to invite the British in Iran to Baku. Upon this call, British troops reached Baku on 4 August 1918. These units are; It consists of three infantry battalions, a field battery and some armored vehicles. The number of personnel is about 1000 people in total. As soon as the British came to Baku, they started to strengthen the defense of the city by taking the Dashnak, Social Revolutionary and Menshevik forces under their orders and commands.
The entry of British troops into Baku forced Germany to reevaluate its position on Baku. Meanwhile, the ongoing negotiations between Germany and Russia were concluded and an additional agreement was signed in Brest-Litovsk on 27 August 1918. According to this agreement, Russia will not object to Germany's recognition of Georgia and will give Germany a share of Baku oil. In return, Germany will not support any state's operations in places other than Georgia and will endeavor to prevent any force from entering Baku.
German forces in the region to stop the Ottoman army and The commitments in this agreement are practically meaningless, as either were not sufficient to drive the British troops out of Baku. In addition, the Russian armies in the region are scattered and the armies of the newly established Armenian and Georgian States are quite weak. The British troops in Baku and Iran were also not strong enough to intervene in the Ottoman army.
Seeing this situation, the British thought that the next target of the Ottoman army after the Caucasus would be Turkestan. At that time, the conditions in Turkestan were also suitable for such an operation. In Tashkent, a Bolshevik Soviet dominated the administration of the city. In Bukhara and Khiva, the Turks, the indigenous people of these regions, declared their independence. Since these Turks could form an alliance with the Ottoman Empire, the British began to follow the developments quite uneasily. Because they consider that with the support of Afghanistan, attacks can be made to India from here and that conflicts may arise in Iran and Mesopotamia due to the conflicts that will arise.
Another danger that made the British worried is the possibility that the Germans, collaborating with the Bolsheviks, could seize Central Asia via North Asia and attack from there in the direction of South Asia. For this reason, when the Turkestan Government, which declared its independence, asked for help, General Malleson, who was in the Mashhad region, was immediately sent to Turkestan. As soon as Malleson's troops reached Turkestan, they clashed with the Bolsheviks in Dushak, Kaakha and Merv with the armed groups of the Turks living in the region.
In the meantime, the Tsarist armies were completely disintegrated and some generals began to form regular units called the White Army to take action against the regime. The only reliable military force in the hands of the Bolsheviks is the Red Guards, made up of armed workers, formed in Petrograd in 1917. The Red Guards are not an army, but a militia. Because Marxist theory is against classical armies. But emerging threats made it necessary to establish a regular army.
For this reason, Russia decided to establish the Red Army in January 1918 and began to gather soldiers with a declaration published on February 22, 1918. Thus, the personnel of the Red Army reached 196 thousand people in April. However, when the Entente Powers saw that the Red Army was getting stronger, they immediately took action to disperse this army.
First, the Japanese landed in Vladivostok in April 1918. In May, the 40,000-strong Czechoslovak Legion in Russia rebelled on its way to France and captured the Trans-Siberian railway. In late June, the British landed in Murmansk, and in early August the British and French landed in Arkhangelsk. US troops joined the British and French in northern Russia and the Japanese in Viladivostok in August. Thus, the conflicts that took place during the First World War reached their widest limits.
Meanwhile, the USA's participation in the war on the side of the Allied Powers in 1918 began to change the balance of power between the Entente and the Allied Powers. Realizing that the consequences of this were starting to show on the Western Front, Germany decided to neutralize the British and French in a decisive battle before large numbers of US troops arrived in Europe.
For this purpose, the German army attacked the British troops in France on March 21, 1918, but the British and the French, who sent support troops to them, stopped the German attack. Thereupon, the Germans attacked the French positions in Aisne on May 27, 1918, and in a short time they reached the Marne, 65 km from Paris. But this attack was stopped here by the French supported by the US troops. After that, with the participation of many US soldiers, the Allies, which gained superiority against the Germans, started a counter-attack on August 8, 1918. This offensive, which started in front of Amiens, succeeded in breaking through the German lines.
The Entente Powers also attacked on the Macedonian Front in September, and the front was split on September 15, 1918. When Bulgaria could not stop the advance of the Allied armies, it withdrew from the war by signing an armistice on September 29, 1918. On October 24, 1918, the Italians attacked the Austrian army and the Austrian army could not resist the Italians and started to withdraw.
In September 1918, the Ottoman army in Iraq retreated under the pressure of the British army. In Syria, the British broke the front in the coastal area with a raid on September 19, 1918. Enver Pasha, who wanted to take advantage of the opportunity that emerged after the disintegration of the Russian army, withdrew some troops from the Syrian Front and sent them to the Caucasus. In addition, the 15th Division withdrawn from Romania was sent to the Caucasus Front instead of the weak Syrian Front.
Thereupon, the Germans in Syria They sent their other troops to Georgia. Thus, the Ottoman army in Syria, which was already weak, weakened even more. The remnants of the weak Ottoman troops, who started to retreat after the front was split, were able to reach Aleppo with difficulty. However, the small number of Ottoman troops that managed to retreat stopped the enemy offensive in the north of Aleppo on October 25, 1918.
Despite the troubled situation that the other states belonging to the Triple Alliance faced in Europe and the Ottoman Empire in the Middle East, the Ottoman army in the Caucasus is running from success to success in this last period of the war. The 9th Army captured Tabriz on August 23, 1918. The Caucasian Islamic Army captured Baku on September 15, 1918, and a Division sent from Baku on September 22, 1918, captured Derbent on October 6, 1918. On August 12, 1918, the Şimali Caucasian Corps, which consisted of the 15th Division and Dagestan volunteers, of which Yusuf İzzet (Met) Pasha was appointed as the commander, began to attack Petrovsk. However, when the Ottoman State had to sign the Armistice of Mudros on October 30, 1918, this brought the end of the operation in the Caucasus.
At the time of the signing of the armistice, Ottoman troops were spread over a wide area from the north of Iran to Dagestan. Since the Grand Vizier and Minister of War Ahmet İzzet Pasha gave the order to withdraw the troops in the Caucasus and Iran on October 21, 1918, some of the troops that received this order began to withdraw towards Anatolian lands. On the other hand, the troops in distant regions and unaware of the order still continue the battles on October 30, 1918.
Conclusion
During the First World War, the military operations in Eastern Anatolia and the Caucasus were directly affected by the military operations in Eastern Europe and the political developments in Russia and were shaped within the framework of these developments. In addition, Çanakkale interacted with the military operations in Western Europe, the Balkans, Iraq, Syria and Iran.
As a result of this, the battles in Eastern Anatolia and the Caucasus took place in two periods with different characteristics. The first of these; It is the period from 29 October 1914, when the Ottoman Empire actually entered the war, to the Erzincan Armistice of 18 December 1917, when the Russian army began to withdraw. The second is the period from the Armistice of Erzincan to the Armistice of Mudros on 30 October 1918.
The battles in the first period took place in Anatolian lands and were experienced between the Ottoman army and the Russian army. In these battles, the Ottoman Empire and Germany acted in cooperation and the operation was supported by the Germans. The initial aim of the battles was to push the Russians out of the war in a short time by squeezing them from both fronts in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus.
The other target for the Ottoman Empire is; It is to clear the way to Turkistan and India by destroying the Russian army. When the Sarıkamış Operation was unsuccessful, this target was postponed and as many Russian troops as possible were tried to be kept on this front by defending in depth.
Except for the Sarıkamış Operation, the operation in the first period generally developed in the east-west direction and while the Russians were attacking, the Ottoman army conducted defensive battles on the lines behind each other. In this way, the Russian army could not move troops from the Caucasus to Eastern Europe, could not allocate sufficient troops to the Iranian operation, and could not unite with the British troops advancing from Syria and Iraq. However, the final outcome of the battles was determined not by armed conflicts, but by internal political developments in Russia. Thus, the Russian army dispersed without engaging in any combat and withdrew from Anatolian lands.
The operation after the disintegration of the Russian army emerged as a result of the power vacuum created by the withdrawal of the Russians in the region. The Ottoman army, which started the forward operation in order to fill this power vacuum; He quickly regained the lands he had lost until then. After that, it went out of its borders for the first time during the war and spread over a wide geography from Tabriz to Baku and Dagestan.
The battles in this period took place mostly in the Caucasus. The battles developed in the west-east direction and while the Ottoman army was attacking, the British, Georgian and Armenian armies and the Menshevik and Bolshevik armed forces fought defensively. Unlike the first period, the operation in this period took place at the initiative of the Ottoman Empire and due to the conflicts of interest, the Ottoman Empire and Germany came face to face.
Since Germany wanted to take the Caucasus and especially the Baku oil under its own control, it wanted the operation to be stopped, but this request was not accepted. Thereupon, Germany cooperated with Russia to achieve its goals. Since the operation of the Ottoman army also posed a threat to England, the Ottoman Empire had to struggle with three great states, one of which was an ally, for the Caucasus and especially for Baku.
In this struggle, the Ottoman D.The main goal of the state was to open the way to Turkistan and India by dominating the Caucasus, which it had to postpone in the first period. As a matter of fact, these roads were opened as a result of the successes of the Ottoman army. However, due to the defeats on other fronts, the Ottoman Empire had to withdraw from the war and it was not possible to benefit from the successes of the troops sent into the Caucasus with great hopes.
This result stemmed from the fact that a concrete target was determined at the beginning of the war and the available power was not used with an appropriate strategy to seize this target. In the first period of the wars, the available power was distributed to all fronts due to the uncertainty of the final goal and the ways of acting that lacked strategic vision. Thus, due to the unsuccessful operations in Iran, Iraq and Syria, enough troops could not be gathered against the Russians in Eastern Anatolia. This situation caused the Russians to advance into Anatolia.
In the second period, on the contrary, as the troops from other fronts were withdrawn and sent to the Caucasus, the armies in the Syrian and Iraqi Fronts weakened and these fronts were dissolved due to the attacks of the British. This situation caused the loss of battles on other fronts for the sake of victory in the Caucasus Front.

 
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