Historically, the Ottomans stayed in World War 1 more or less until the end, signing an armistice only a few weeks before the Germans themselves. This was despite the massive amount of strain this was putting upon the state and upon civilians within the Empire. So say that the Ottoman government is a bit more in tune with what the people desire, and decide to sue for peace after the fall of Baghdad or Jerusalem. Would the allies accept an armistice? What conditions would they offer to the Ottomans?
WI Early Ottoman Peace WW1
- Thread starter Nassirisimo
- Start date
Paul V McNutt
Banned
I would assume the same terms as the OTL peace, the loss of the non Turkish territory.
Not all the land signed away at Sevres was non-Turkish though, and not all of the land kept was Turkish.
Deleted member 9338
I can not see the British stoping at Baghdad. They will want to head the Caucasus region to support the White Russians.
David S Poepoe
Banned
However the Ottoman government followed the desires of the people by going to war.
Deleted member 9338
I was not aware that the "government" followed the will of the people. Early on it appears that the rulers of the Empire were all doing their own thing.
Jon
David S Poepoe
Banned
Aksakal's Ottoman Road to War in 1914 mentions that the Ottoman public were supportive of war since they (as many other nations) saw war as the means to stop their decline.
The Ottomans could only get remotely favorable terms while still in control of either Baghdad, Jerusalem, or both. Perhaps Morgenthau is the man to bring them out of the war?
Cook
Banned
In going to war the government didn’t even follow the desires of the majority of cabinet, let alone the people; several members of cabinet only found out about the Triumvirate’s decision to go to war when they read about the attack on Sevastopol in their morning paper. During the heated cabinet debate following the navy’s attack on Sevastopol, Enver Pasha drew his pistol from its holster and placed it on the table in front of him, he then asked his opponents to continue their arguments; his rather pointed method of debate won over the dissenters.
This is a good point. By all logic, no one in the Ottoman Empire should have wanted war. They had suffered a disastrous defeat 2 years previously, and were heading into a war that would involve fighting on many difficult fronts.
And at any rate, the people were almost rabidly against the war when their sons had disappeared at the front and they themselves were starving.
Cook
Banned
Undoubtedly things would have been better for the Turks if they’d withdrawn from the war in 1917 and the earlier the better. Even with the loss of Bagdad in March 1917, the Ottomans were by no means totally defeated in Mesopotamia and still presented a serious challenge to the British. The Ottomans would have had the strength to offer terms for an armistice to the allies, rather than being so weak that they were forced to accept whatever the allies wished to propose, as happened in October 1918. The Turks could have secretly offered terms to the allies, confident that if the allies rejected their terms and offered an unacceptable counterproposal they could continue fighting.
In 1917 the allies would have jumped at practically any terms the Turks suggested, happy to be generous just to get Turkey out of the war; in February Russian had undergone a revolution, the Russian Tsar had abdicated and been replaced by a provisional government that was struggling to assert control, establish order and continue the war all at the same time. If the Ottoman Empire was to withdraw from the war the British and French could have rushed aid through the Dardanelles to southern Russia to prop up the government, at the same time the Russians would have been able to resume trade through the Black Sea, earning much needed foreign capital. That would have justified being very generous to the Turks. A cease-fire with permanent borders corresponding to the lines of control by the various forces on the ground would have been acceptable. While the Sykes-Picot Agreement had divided most of the Arabian territories of the Ottoman Empire into spheres of influence and controlbetween Britain and France, the urgency of the situation in Russia would have taken precedence over any agreement on war aims that had been agreed by diplomats in the relaxed atmosphere of a gentleman’s club in less urgent times when anything had seemed possible.
The French would have objected that the British would be gaining most of their objectives with regard to the Sykes-Picot agreement while France would be getting none of theirs, to which Lloyd-George would undoubtedly have replied that it was the British Empire’s forces that had done the bulk of the fighting, the extent of French involvement in the Middle Eastern fighting consisting of sending a single division of colonial infantry to take part in the Gallipoli campaign, what Lloyd-George succinctly described as ‘a handful of nigger troops’. Besides which, with the fighting in the Middle-East over, the bulk of the British Empire forces in the region would be transferred to the Western Front, something the French had been demanding for most of the war.
The problem is that the very reason that a Turkish offer of a cease-fire would have been accepted by the allies is the very reason why such an offer would have been unthinkable. Since the February Revolution the Russian forces in the Caucasus had been haemorrhaging troops as men, hearing word of land reform from home, deserted the army to return to their home towns and ensure that they didn’t miss out; why stay and die from either the bad weather or a Turkish bullet when you could go home and finally have your own farm to work instead? Finally, after three long years of stalemate and defeat, the Turks were seeing some success in the Caucasus. Enver Pasha’s dreams of a new Turkish Empire carved out of the Caucasus and Russian Central Asia, the very reason that Turkey had gone to war in the first place, looked like it could actually be realised. If it could be then the new lands would more than make up for the territories lost in the two Balkans Wars as well as the rebellious Arab territories now siding with the British. To ask for a cease-fire just when all of the plums looked ready to fall? That would have made all of the sacrifices of the war worthless.
Such a thing would have been unthinkable to Enver and Talaat, so any such offer would have been dependant on a change of regime, most likely a coup. And this too would have been difficult, a successful coup in Constantinople would not necessarily guarantee the loyalty of the armies in the provinces; many of the commanding officers on the various fronts were relatives of Enver; hardly men likely to follow orders from men that had killed him in a coup.
If the new government were able to establish control and negotiate an end to Ottoman involvement in the war, it would face a snake in the cradle; the men marching home from the Caucasus Front would tell stories of being about to march to Baku when they were stabbed in the back by traitors in Constantinople. The prospects for peaceful civil government post war under such circumstances would not be good.
In 1917 the allies would have jumped at practically any terms the Turks suggested, happy to be generous just to get Turkey out of the war; in February Russian had undergone a revolution, the Russian Tsar had abdicated and been replaced by a provisional government that was struggling to assert control, establish order and continue the war all at the same time. If the Ottoman Empire was to withdraw from the war the British and French could have rushed aid through the Dardanelles to southern Russia to prop up the government, at the same time the Russians would have been able to resume trade through the Black Sea, earning much needed foreign capital. That would have justified being very generous to the Turks. A cease-fire with permanent borders corresponding to the lines of control by the various forces on the ground would have been acceptable. While the Sykes-Picot Agreement had divided most of the Arabian territories of the Ottoman Empire into spheres of influence and controlbetween Britain and France, the urgency of the situation in Russia would have taken precedence over any agreement on war aims that had been agreed by diplomats in the relaxed atmosphere of a gentleman’s club in less urgent times when anything had seemed possible.
The French would have objected that the British would be gaining most of their objectives with regard to the Sykes-Picot agreement while France would be getting none of theirs, to which Lloyd-George would undoubtedly have replied that it was the British Empire’s forces that had done the bulk of the fighting, the extent of French involvement in the Middle Eastern fighting consisting of sending a single division of colonial infantry to take part in the Gallipoli campaign, what Lloyd-George succinctly described as ‘a handful of nigger troops’. Besides which, with the fighting in the Middle-East over, the bulk of the British Empire forces in the region would be transferred to the Western Front, something the French had been demanding for most of the war.
The problem is that the very reason that a Turkish offer of a cease-fire would have been accepted by the allies is the very reason why such an offer would have been unthinkable. Since the February Revolution the Russian forces in the Caucasus had been haemorrhaging troops as men, hearing word of land reform from home, deserted the army to return to their home towns and ensure that they didn’t miss out; why stay and die from either the bad weather or a Turkish bullet when you could go home and finally have your own farm to work instead? Finally, after three long years of stalemate and defeat, the Turks were seeing some success in the Caucasus. Enver Pasha’s dreams of a new Turkish Empire carved out of the Caucasus and Russian Central Asia, the very reason that Turkey had gone to war in the first place, looked like it could actually be realised. If it could be then the new lands would more than make up for the territories lost in the two Balkans Wars as well as the rebellious Arab territories now siding with the British. To ask for a cease-fire just when all of the plums looked ready to fall? That would have made all of the sacrifices of the war worthless.
Such a thing would have been unthinkable to Enver and Talaat, so any such offer would have been dependant on a change of regime, most likely a coup. And this too would have been difficult, a successful coup in Constantinople would not necessarily guarantee the loyalty of the armies in the provinces; many of the commanding officers on the various fronts were relatives of Enver; hardly men likely to follow orders from men that had killed him in a coup.
If the new government were able to establish control and negotiate an end to Ottoman involvement in the war, it would face a snake in the cradle; the men marching home from the Caucasus Front would tell stories of being about to march to Baku when they were stabbed in the back by traitors in Constantinople. The prospects for peaceful civil government post war under such circumstances would not be good.
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If somehow that 1917 peace offer holds, enough to reopen the Straits, does this at all change what happens in Russia? The Revolutions may still happen as OTL, but would the added link to the Entente, a stable-ish Ottoman state, etc help or hinder the Whites or the Reds?
I imagine that if, as per OTL, the Russians face a double revolution, with a stable-ish Ottoman state on the border, the latter is going to be tempted to establish its own proxy force in the Caucasus, or perhaps along the Black Sea coast
I imagine that if, as per OTL, the Russians face a double revolution, with a stable-ish Ottoman state on the border, the latter is going to be tempted to establish its own proxy force in the Caucasus, or perhaps along the Black Sea coast
Snake Featherston
Banned
The Allies were intending the whole time to partition and dismember the Empire, it surrendering earlier means they will probably actually try and enforce a Sevres-level "peace" with the armies and military power available at the height of WWI......
Interesting. Suppose for a moment then that one of the other attendees decides to call his bluff and draws their own weapon as well. In the ensuing shooting Enver Pasha and the other gunman manage to kill each other off and Talaat Pasha takes a bullet in the crossfire as well which injures him seriously enough that he dies a day or so later. That just leaves Djemal Pasha as the only survivng member of the triumvate, so what happens now?
If memory serves they were meant to keep Mosul anyway since when the armistice agreement came into effect it was still technically under Turkish control, however since they didn't have any troops there the British moved in and stole it out from under them. The Turk's contested ownership of the region up until the Treaty of Lusanne when both sides agreed to let the League of Nations sort the whole affair out and they came down on the side of the British. If the Mosul region was incorporated into the Republic of Turkey it could make things interesting - gives the Turks a rather nice boost to their economy but also means that they now have a lot more Kurds as well.
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The Allies were intending the whole time to partition and dismember the Empire, it surrendering earlier means they will probably actually try and enforce a Sevres-level "peace" with the armies and military power available at the height of WWI......
As Cook pointed out, the British would just as soon be able to send as many troops as they could to France, as the French wanted them to, and have the straits open, both of which an earlier peace would allow.
Sykes-Picot should be compared to any one of the German annexation plans or France's various schemes towards the Rhineland. A desirable outcome that could be achieved if circumstances allowed. By 1917 the Allies had a lot of what the wanted and now had a very strong motivation to get Turkey out of the war and the Straits opened up ASAP. Time's change and people change with the times. Do you genuinely believe the British and French were so blinded by greed they would pass up the opportunity to rescue the Russian war effort for Syria?
Grey Wolf
Donor
If the Ottomans try for an early ceasefire whats to stop the Germans invading and establishing a defensive line? Obviously it would be a major commitment of force, but it would also require ANOTHER one from the Allies to push against this line.
If the Germans seize the Dardanelles and Istanbul, sure Britain can push to open up supply routes through the Caucasus but I doubt it would be much easier than what little was getting there through Persia
Best Regards
Grey Wolf
If the Germans seize the Dardanelles and Istanbul, sure Britain can push to open up supply routes through the Caucasus but I doubt it would be much easier than what little was getting there through Persia
Best Regards
Grey Wolf
Pushing stuff across Anatolia to the Caucuses is easier than OTL taking it around the Turks and you are right that the Germans/Bulgarians might well push towards Constantinople and even take it though that might paradoxically make the Allies life easier by turning the Turks from un-cooperative defeated foes to sort of Allies.