Bagdadbahn finished in november 1913

Khalkali

Hello! I wonder how war in the Middle East would look if Phillip Holzmann AG and their chief engineer Meissner managed to complete Bagdadbahn sometime before First World War. OTL it was almost finished except Taurus-Amanus tunnels, Nisibin-Samarra and Tell Ebiad-Ras el Ain. Howewer this effectively blocked ottoman supply during wartime. Let's assume all segments of BB are finished in late 1913 - would the Ottomans have same power projection as the British who had to rely on sea supply?

Ottoman peformance historically was pretty good - they held in their arab provinces till 1917 and even inflicted defeats on Britain like at Kut el Amara - and that despite non-existent logistics. With supplies flowing along bagdadbahn all the time from 1914, they might even conquer Persia and Egypt not to mention eliminating british forces in Mesopotamia. Late in 1915 Germany establishes link with Turkey and can start sending war materials too.
 

MrHaakwood

Persia and Egypt is a little bit bold.

But perhaps the BE has to shift more soldiers to the Middle Eastern theater, which than are missing in France, the theater decisive for wining the war.

Edit: Welcome to the board!
 

Khalkali

Oh yes, I forgot Welcome everyone!

Persia and Egypt may be a little far-fetched, but I guess it'd depend on time-frame: during Somme Offensive or after Gallipoli Britain may be vulnerable to unexpected strike in that theaters. Of course it'd depend on Berlin and overall strategy - OHL may decide that main offensive in that year will be in Middle East and send 500,000 soldiers there, or just they can just flood Ottomans with tons of supplies (instead of sending them to Verdun or A-H) and reinforce them with small engineering/pioneer units that will build roads and infrastructure for offensives.

OTL all that was prevented by bagdadbahn being in construction. But with corridor to Turkey open sometime in 1915 and railway network available through the deserts, why not strike south and shut down the Abadan refinery and Suez Canal? This would undermine Britain's position as much as submarine war and strategically is a sound thing to do.
 

Lord Malikai

There's a problem here in that any PoD which produces an earlier Berlin-Baghdad railway is going to have significant implications in the lead up to WW1, and could potentially butterfly it entirely. But let's throw a butterfly net on this scenario for sake of discussion.

The big changes won't happen until late 1915 when the line from Germany to Turkey is properly opened up by the fall of Serbia. So the first real difference will be a much stronger offensive against the Suez in spring/summer 1916. Obviously if this goes well it could radically change the war in the short term as the British throw everything they can to take back the Sinai. In the long term, the effects will vary depending on British or Turkish success and the resources allotted to the campaign. However, besides this and a better shot at fending off British strike through Mesopotamia, there may be fewer changes than you'd think.

While it's tempting to believe that even a completed line from Istanbul to Baghdad would significantly improve the Ottoman Empire's fortunes before 1916, the real problem is that the Empire simply doesn't have the resources to fight a modern war; being able to efficiently move around nothing counts for very little. This may be a bit hyperbolic, but it speaks to the crucial CP issue of the war: their resource deficiencies made allocations a zero sum game, every shell fired in the Sinai is one less fired on the Somme. Yes, more efficient transport would help this somewhat but not enough to really change the overall situation.
 

Khalkali

Yes, the Ottomans produced very little, but let's assume someone intelligent in Berlin decided to strike British where they can be hit most: in Suez and Persia/India.

Germany can simply scrap Verdun offensive and send ammunition, medicines, food, artillery pieces to Ottomans. Germans can also send engineers and logistics specialists to improve ottoman supply flow. Turkish soldiers were as stubborn and sturdy as Tommies, and if well-equipped could mop out the Middle East.

If bagdadbahn is operational, any number of troops sent by Britain can be countered by same number of troops sent by Berlin. If really determined on winning the orient Germans can simply sit on defensive on both eastern and western fronts (WWI was rewarding the defender anyway, and if Russia attacks all the time it will fall apart faster) and simply sent men and supply from scrapped offensives to Egypt and Persia (which could be a wonderful jumping ground to India and Turkestan). India will revolt if large turkish or german army will arrive near Karachi. CP can also stir things up by declaring independent India as their war goal. OTL Persians en masse wanted to join CP and only weak military presence, both their own and turko-german stopped them from being one more CP member. I think it could unfold much as Japanese conquest of Malaya and Burma OTL. How can UK counter well-equipped Ottoman army plus 500,000-700,000 Germans?
 
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LordKalvan

The initial projections for the completion of the railway from Constantinople to Baghdad were pretty optimistic, both in terms of costs and completion times. It is anyway highly unlikely that a project of such magnitude in a completely undeveloped area of the Ottoman empire and with major mountains to cross could stay on schedule.

I am willing to take some suspension from disbelief and grant you an early completion of the link to Baghdad. This would have certainly changed the operations in Mesopotamia although it is by no means sure that the Ottomans could have foiled the British landing in Basra. A raid against the oil fields and the Abadan refinery would also be probably feasible: it would be a slap on the face of the British but the impact on the war would not have been major.

The problem with the operations against the Suez canal would not have been reduced by a lot. There were problems with the supplies of ammunition, artillery, food (ammunition had to come from Germany but with Serbia still in the fight the Belgrade route was out and neutral Romania was making difficult to send war materials through Bucharest). A successful attack on the canal would have required prefabricated sections of bridging pontoons to be carried by the attacking army. Kress von Kressenstein (the German officer advising Djemal on the campaign) wrote in his memoirs that it would have been necessary to build a railway from Ma'an to the canal to mount a fully supplied offensive with sufficient strength to break through. He also added that the construction of the railway would have taken 3 years (and he may have been optimistic). With no railway the strength of the attackers had to be drastically reduced: from the 50,000 men that von Kressenstein deemed necessary went down to a nominal strength of 20,000 (but only 12-13,000 reached the canal).
Procuring camels proved to be a hard (and very expensive) task. Getting on board Bedouin irregulars much more of the same: the Bedouins swore to participate in the Holy War, took very hefty bribes in gold and disappeared in the desert.
Given these problems it was certainly impressive to get 12,000 men across the desert, but the likelihood of a successful crossing of the canal was not very high. The British had some 35,000 men protecting the canal with good logistics, entrenchments and barbed wire barriers (not to mention the added protection of some warships in the canal).

The only reasonable chance of success would have been an anti-British insurrection in Egypt and Sudan but notwithstanding the efforts (and once again the gold) that the Germans poured into this attempt the insurrection never materialized. Even Abbas Hilmi II (the Khedive deposed by the British in August 1914) who was in Constantinople when the war broke out was a dubious card for the Ottomans: Enver Pasha was convinced that he was still dealing with the British (and Abbas was sure that the Ottomans had no intention to put him again on the throne).

BTW, the number of Germans troops you assume might be transferred to the Middle East (500,000!!) is wrong by at least an order of magnitude. Even if it were possible to transfer so many troops (and it wasn't) they had to stay on the western and eastern fronts, and stiffen the Austrians on the Italian front.
What the Ottomans needed was artillery and logistics specialists and as much supplies as the Germans could send.
 

Delta Force

Banned
Wasn't the Indian Army one of the largest in the world? I don't see the Central Powers posing a realistic military threat to India, but it could certainly cause domestic instability. The Central Powers would be operating at the edge of their supply lines and have to rail everything in (they don't have any industry past Anatolia), while the Allies would be at a major transportation nexus of their own supply lines and have access to the industrial resources of the colony (and those of Japan, as needed). It's going to be difficult getting thorough the deserts and mountains of Mesopotamia, Persia, and Afghanistan on the way to India since the terrain is harsh, the railroad doesn't go that far, and the British would easily dominate the ocean East of Suez.
 

Khalkali

Can't the Germans build a railway through Persia during wartime? From Baghdad to Teheran and transport supplies to indian border by trucks. Pretty easy... Stalin built highway through caucausus during WWII for his lend-lease so it is possible.

Industry in India/colonies? Colonies existed to feed British workers, India even in 1960 was an agrarian land. British in India and Russians in Turkestan are as far from their bases as Ottomans in Persia... colonies are soft underbelly, that's why Japan attacked UK in 1941 remember?

Also how Allenby conquered Palestine? British had to cross Sinai first too... and to overcome all problems of Kressenstein.

Germans lost 300,000 soldaten on their Verdun offensives to break french spirit... and it only worked retroactive in 1940. So if Kaiser doesn't waste soldiers on any offensives except Middle East, he can save 500,000 men for Persia and Egypt - as well as ammunition, artillery pieces, medicines, cigarettes etc. for starved Ottoman soldiers.
 
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TFSmith121

Banned
Can't the British counter with the famed Alexandretta landing?

Can't the British counter with the famed Alexandretta landing?

Best,
 

LordKalvan

Khalkali said:
Can't the Germans build a railway through Persia during wartime? From Baghdad to Teheran and transport supplies to indian border by trucks. Pretty easy... Stalin built highway through caucausus during WWII for his lend-lease so it is possible.

Also how Allenby conquered Palestine? British had to cross Sinai first too... and to overcome all problems of Kressenstein.

Germans lost 300,000 soldaten on their Verdun offensives to break french spirit... and it worked retroactive in 1940. So if Kaiser doesn't waste soldiers on any offensives except Middle East, he can save 500,000 men for Persia and Egypt - as well as ammunition, artillery pieces, medicines, cigarettes etc. for starved Ottoman soldiers.
Click to expand...

Allenby marched along the coast, like all armies did in recorded history whenever they tried to conquer Egypt or went the other way around. Allenby's logistics were handled by the navy, again ditto. The coastal route is not a practicable one for the Ottomans for obvious reasons involving an R and a N.

I will not comment on the Baghdad to Tehran railway which is beyond anything rational: just 900 km crossing mountains to get to a place which is still 1500 km from the Pakistani border. Well done.

Forget the 500,000 soldiers please. It's pure ASB.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
Khalkali said:
Ottoman peformance historically was pretty good - they held in their arab provinces till 1917 and even inflicted defeats on Britain like at Kut el Amara - and that despite non-existent logistics. With supplies flowing along bagdadbahn all the time from 1914, they might even conquer Persia and Egypt not to mention eliminating british forces in Mesopotamia. Late in 1915 Germany establishes link with Turkey and can start sending war materials too.
Click to expand...


Welcome to the board.

No, the Ottomans would not have the same power of projection the British had, but it helps a good bit. By the time we get to about the Baghdad area, the Ottomans will have noticeably better supply ability (probably).

The track is a single track. The rivers of Iraq can handle about a single track worth of Cargo. The lines will stall down somewhere as they did IOTL. The UK can hold the Basra area if they want to, and they will want to unless something else goes really bad.

Conquering Egypt is out of the question. You can read my TL where there is an Ottoman wank by accident, and you can see why I think even with great help, the Ottomans can't win in Egypt. It is just too easy for the UK to reinforce by sea, and when they UK can't hold the Red Sea shipping lanes, the war is over. Also, that thread is dead, so don't comment there.

Persia is more interesting due to very low force levels there. You can have TL where the Ottomans end up with a much better situation in Persia.

I can't rule out some small (brigade or division) size German elements in Iraq.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
Khalkali said:
Persia and Egypt may be a little far-fetched, but I guess it'd depend on time-frame: during Somme Offensive or after Gallipoli Britain may be vulnerable to unexpected strike in that theaters. Of course it'd depend on Berlin and overall strategy - OHL may decide that main offensive in that year will be in Middle East and send 500,000 soldiers there, or just they can just flood Ottomans with tons of supplies (instead of sending them to Verdun or A-H) and reinforce them with small engineering/pioneer units that will build roads and infrastructure for offensives.

OTL all that was prevented by bagdadbahn being in construction. But with corridor to Turkey open sometime in 1915 and railway network available through the deserts, why not strike south and shut down the Abadan refinery and Suez Canal? This would undermine Britain's position as much as submarine war and strategically is a sound thing to do.
Click to expand...

Just no to 500K. Not even close to enough transport capacity. Now you can write a TL with a major German effort, but a max effort in the Middle East in this time frame would be 50K or so German troops. And since the Ottomans had up to 135K troops fighting Russia, the MUCH more likely scenario is these units (all or part) are used by the Ottomans to fight in the Middle East. Why use Germans when you have well equipped Ottoman divisions who will not bring up a host of internal political issues.

Also, you should read up on what was in the Sinai (not much). You can read one of the Pasha book free online at google for details. (Ceram Pasha comes to mind, look up the commander of the attack on the Suez OTL).
 

BlondieBC

Banned
Khalkali said:
Can't the Germans build a railway through Persia during wartime? From Baghdad to Teheran and transport supplies to indian border by trucks. Pretty easy... Stalin built highway through caucausus during WWII for his lend-lease so it is possible.
Click to expand...

Verdun work ok for Germans, which goes beyond this thread. No reason to take Tehran, if the CP win big with strong Ottomans, the Ottomans likely dominate Persia compared to Russia or UK.

The UK built a RR at the speed of 1 mile per day or so, multiple times. The problem for the Germans is they can't ship steel by sea to Palestine, so you need to ship it a very, very long way by rail. The problem in taking the Suez is regardless of how fast the Germans reinforce the attack, the UK can do it faster. Unless you achieve total strategic surprise.
 

Khalkali

Welcome! Thank You all for really informative answers!

I wonder where I could find more technical data on Bagdadbahn and its projected capacity, number of carriages etc. this is one of causese of WWI but detailed info is nowhere to be found.
 
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Khalkali

Thanks, I was wondering about something contemporary like brochures and prospects released by bagdadbahn company, government reports, intelligence data and the like. But perhaps McMeekin will have them as sources. :)
 

Khalkali

Ekhm what about crossing Suez in armored cars and trucks with air cover? In 1920s British projected their power through deserts of Iraq exactly in that way.

Germany can buy good american trucks before the war or even manufacture their own and armored cars were in use around 1912.
 

Delta Force

Banned
Khalkali said:
Ekhm what about crossing Suez in armored cars and trucks with air cover? In 1920s British projected their power through deserts of Iraq exactly in that way.

Germany can buy good american trucks before the war or even manufacture their own and armored cars were in use around 1912.
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There was something about a taxi company that existed from sometime around the World War I era into the 1950s or so that used American cars to drive between Mesopotamia and the coast. Apparently American companies were the only ones who had developed air cooled cars capable of driving off road in the deserts of the Middle East. Somewhere around Transjordan they would actually hit dry mud flats or lakebeds and start sliding out, so special drifting techniques had to be developed to allow safe transits. The cars would also sometimes come under attack by Bedouin tribesmen trying to take hostages or steal valuables, so they had to be heavily armed to deter that.

The British would spend a lot of money trying to drive through the desert in imported American luxury cars (it's going to be expensive even if they can get Rolls-Royce or another company to build a British alternative), and it would leave some very thin supply lines. They might be able to do car cavalry, but it's not really a feasible option for large scale operations.
 
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