AH Question: Consequences for Arabian Peninsula of a surviving Ottoman Empire

Let us assume that for one reason or another, the Ottomans do not get involved in the First World War. Therefore, our point of departure, for the purposes of this debate is during or after 1914. The Balkan wars are over, and most of the Empire is now in Asia. Presumably with the British focused elsewhere, there is no Arab revolt, and the House of Rashid succeeds in defeating the Sauds for control of Nejd and Hasa. However, what I do no know is what the consequences of these events would be. The discussion may get into the evolution of the Ottoman Empire after this point, but I want the discussion to focus on what the consequences are for the various statelets of the Arabian Peninsula with a surviving Ottoman Empire. Have at it.
 
The Arabian peninsula was under Ottoman suzerainty, except for the British South and Kuwait.
A surviving Ottoman Empire would formally incorporate Najd into its lands, IMO. Oman + South Yemen + Greater UAE are British administered, as well as Kuwait. The Ottoman Empire is the world's 3rd leading power during the *Cold War or whatever.
 
The Arabian peninsula was under Ottoman suzerainty, except for the British South and Kuwait.
A surviving Ottoman Empire would formally incorporate Najd into its lands, IMO. Oman + South Yemen + Greater UAE are British administered, as well as Kuwait. The Ottoman Empire is the world's 3rd leading power during the *Cold War or whatever.

Assuming that your opinion is correct, is there any way to move the rest of the peninsula into Ottoman orbit, and if so, what effect would this have on the politics and composition of the Empire?
 
I'd hazard that the more desirable bits of the Peninsula (oilfields, Hejazz) could be protected by locally strong garrisons, blockhouses, minefields and machine guns. The remainder of the country could be dominated, if not directly controlled by bribing Bedouin leaders and employing a small force of aircraft and armored cars.
Considering that the oilfields had yet to be developed OTL, I'd be curious to see if UK, US, German or other capital would end up up financing the drilling.
 
Assuming that your opinion is correct, is there any way to move the rest of the peninsula into Ottoman orbit, and if so, what effect would this have on the politics and composition of the Empire?
The rest of the peninsula has a TINY population, so not much. I think a surviving Ottoman Empire would become very Arabized.

For the Ottomans to get the rest of the peninsula: I think the CP might have to win WWI, with the Ottomans in the CP. It's possible that Britain gives them to the Ottomans if the Ottomans join the Entente though. I could see Churchill giving them up in WWII if the Ottomans DOWed the Axis, too.

With Iraq and Saudi Arabia's oil though, the Ottomans already have something like 40% of the world's oil though. I think Oman + UAE would put them over the 50% mark though.
 
I'd hazard that the more desirable bits of the Peninsula (oilfields, Hejazz) could be protected by locally strong garrisons, blockhouses, minefields and machine guns. The remainder of the country could be dominated, if not directly controlled by bribing Bedouin leaders and employing a small force of aircraft and armored cars.
Considering that the oilfields had yet to be developed OTL, I'd be curious to see if UK, US, German or other capital would end up up financing the drilling.

I've wondered whether the remaining non-Turkish bits of the Empire would be whittled away into foreign "spheres of influence" or local autonomies, but for now I'm wondering what happens on the Arabian Peninsula, and that consequences that specifically has for the Empire.
 
The rest of the peninsula has a TINY population, so not much. I think a surviving Ottoman Empire would become very Arabized.

For the Ottomans to get the rest of the peninsula: I think the CP might have to win WWI, with the Ottomans in the CP. It's possible that Britain gives them to the Ottomans if the Ottomans join the Entente though. I could see Churchill giving them up in WWII if the Ottomans DOWed the Axis, too.

With Iraq and Saudi Arabia's oil though, the Ottomans already have something like 40% of the world's oil though. I think Oman + UAE would put them over the 50% mark though.

Well, Hasa is already out of the Empire formally in 1914, but how true that would be later is anyone's guess. In the meantime, there's also Kuwait being a potential point of contention between the British and the Turks. Nonetheless, with respect to Iraqi oil, you are correct.

As for Arabization, I'm not sure. It seems that there were simultaneous though completely separate currents towards Arabization on one hand and Turkification on the other. The best way I could see that balanced from an Ottoman perspective is to promote the Islamic character of the state as a means of unifying its largest communities, Arabs and Turks. Nonetheless, some of this will depend, I suspect, upon developments on the Arabian Peninsula.
 
I've wondered whether the remaining non-Turkish bits of the Empire would be whittled away into foreign "spheres of influence" or local autonomies, but for now I'm wondering what happens on the Arabian Peninsula, and that consequences that specifically has for the Empire.
No, because the Arabian Peninsula is seen as backwards until oil is discovered. The Ottomans aren't weak enough to hypercolonize like China was, and they'll get first dibs on the oil since the Rashids (and even Saudis) were their tributaries.
 
As for Arabization, I'm not sure. It seems that there were simultaneous though completely separate currents towards Arabization on one hand and Turkification on the other. The best way I could see that balanced from an Ottoman perspective is to promote the Islamic character of the state as a means of unifying its largest communities, Arabs and Turks. Nonetheless, some of this will depend, I suspect, upon developments on the Arabian Peninsula.
Well, I don't think the Arabs would like Turkification, so I speculated that Islamic + soft Arabization would win out, with an emphasis on the former. If hardcore Turkification occurred, the Ottoman Empire has less a chance of surviving.
 
Well, I don't think the Arabs would like Turkification, so I speculated that Islamic + soft Arabization would win out, with an emphasis on the former. If hardcore Turkification occurred, the Ottoman Empire has less a chance of surviving.

I agree that the Empire's prospects are close to doomed if Turkification wins out. However, it's going to be hard for the Ottoman state to actively oppose efforts in that direction on some things I suspect. But, again, this is a separate issue.

No, because the Arabian Peninsula is seen as backwards until oil is discovered. The Ottomans aren't weak enough to hypercolonize like China was, and they'll get first dibs on the oil since the Rashids (and even Saudis) were their tributaries.

But there was little real value in Cyprus and the Levant, and European governments were taking interests in both. Granted, of the two, only Cyprus was under the full control of another power.
 
But there was little real value in Cyprus and the Levant, and European governments were taking interests in both. Granted, of the two, only Cyprus was under the full control of another power.
Well, both have a significant Christian presence. Cyprus has the whole Greek thing going on, and the Levant is the Holy Land.

If you want an example of the Arabian Peninsula being dismissed pre-oil, just look at Saudi Arabia. The Hashemites could have driving the Saudis from Hejaz if they had British help. But the British didn't see any reason to do so, despite the fact that the Saudis were hostile to the British and the Hashemites were appeasing the Brits.
 
First off, this doesn't happen in a vacuum. Turkish neutrality in WWI means a likely Entente victory, more likely than not without US intervention and very likely without communist revolution in Russia. There would be no WWII and no Cold War as we know them.

The Saudis had taken Hasa in 1913, so I think the momentum was in their favor. The Ottomans would eventually put their resources at work against them, but the question is if they do this before or after the end of the war in Europe. A British-Ottoman rivalry had been shaping out for some time, and I would expect Britain to also put its resources at work in the Arabian Peninsula after winning WWI. They would not care much about Najd but would be very interested in Hasa, specifically in keeping it under the rule of the weaker party, which would be the House of Saud.

Besides the Gulf Coast, another Great Power dispute in the Peninsula would be over the vast area between Medina (the southern terminus of the Hejaz Railway) and Aden, with the British backing the Zaidis of Yemen, the Idrisis of Asir and the various sheikhdoms in their Protectorate while the Ottomans try to solidify their control over the Sharifate of Mecca.
 
First off, this doesn't happen in a vacuum. Turkish neutrality in WWI means a likely Entente victory, more likely than not without US intervention and very likely without communist revolution in Russia. There would be no WWII and no Cold War as we know them.

The Saudis had taken Hasa in 1913, so I think the momentum was in their favor. The Ottomans would eventually put their resources at work against them, but the question is if they do this before or after the end of the war in Europe. A British-Ottoman rivalry had been shaping out for some time, and I would expect Britain to also put its resources at work in the Arabian Peninsula after winning WWI. They would not care much about Najd but would be very interested in Hasa, specifically in keeping it under the rule of the weaker party, which would be the House of Saud.

Besides the Gulf Coast, another Great Power dispute in the Peninsula would be over the vast area between Medina (the southern terminus of the Hejaz Railway) and Aden, with the British backing the Zaidis of Yemen, the Idrisis of Asir and the various sheikhdoms in their Protectorate while the Ottomans try to solidify their control over the Sharifate of Mecca.

Good points all, but what are the long-term consequences of that?
 
I know little about the subject but I'm finding this very interesting reading. I would like to encourage people to continue!
 
The Arabian peninsula was under Ottoman suzerainty, except for the British South and Kuwait.
A surviving Ottoman Empire would formally incorporate Najd into its lands, IMO. Oman + South Yemen + Greater UAE are British administered, as well as Kuwait. The Ottoman Empire is the world's 3rd leading power during the *Cold War or whatever.

Actually, Kuwait was under Ottoman suzerainty too, but under British protectorate. When the Ottomans entered the war, the British declared it an independent state under British protection.

If the Ottomans hadn't entered the war, they would have consolidated control over Arabia, probably extending control into Najd. If they played their cards right, they could probably have occupied Kuwait, which would be of lesser importance to the British than keeping the Ottomans out of the war.

I don't think you'd see the Ottomans gaining any of the rest of British-held Arabia, like S. Yemen, Oman, Bahrain, and the Trucial States. But still, control over the oil of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Iraq is not bad.

In this period, the interior of Arabia is dependent on the coastal areas for food and water. That's why the Saudis were fairly impotent when confined to the interior. With Europe embroiled in war, there'd be little trouble subduing the Saudis and obtaining mastery over the interior. After the war, the Hijaz RR could be extended down to Mecca and maybe even extended across Arabia to the Gulf. It wouldn't be all that difficult technically, but it wouldn't be very remunerative a line.

The Hijaz is not Wahhabi, and al Hasa is largely Shiite, so Wahhabism becomes a curiosity of internal Arabia.

As for Pervez' point, the Saudis occupied the Hasa in an opportunistic manner because the Ottomans were locked in the Balkan Wars and unable to stop them. I don't think this can be interpreted as a long-term loss of initiative. If everyone is tied up in WWI, you can bet the Ottomans would move back in, pronto. They hadn't formally lost it - especially since the Saudis were still professing to be loyal vassals.

The Young Turk regime is often mistaken to have been engaged in a "Turkification" program. This is not the case. Their ideology was Ottomanism, which entailed a centralization drive that increased emphasis on the state language - this was not a program to attempt to culturally assimilate the Arabic parts of the empire; that idea was totally alien to their mindset. They would have viewed Ottoman as the state language; its promotion had no ethnic connotations.

The CUP government gained ascendancy because of the crushing loss of the Balkan Wars, which discredited for a time the "liberal" opposition, and they were able to hold onto power because of the war. There was a great deal of resistance to their centralist model in favor of more local control, and I think they would almost certainly have lost power if not for the war.

For the long term, you'd probably see the Ottomans as a fairly significant power. I don't think you can look at it through the European nation-state lens. Iran, for example, is as Persian as the Ottoman Empire was Turkish - in other words, the Turks were the largest ethnic group, but the empire was not constructed to benefit them above anyone else. I don't think there's any particular impediment to it lasting indefinitely.

As for Arab identity, it didn't exist. People identified as Muslims first, and then by locality, i.e. Damascene, Palestinian, etc. "Arab" referred to stinky, flea-bitten desert-dwelling nomads, and nobody would have appreciated being called that, much like "Turk" meant Anatolian country bumpkin. Calling someone from Istanbul a Turk would be like calling a Milanese aristocrat a Sicilian.
 
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Actually, Kuwait was under Ottoman suzerainty too, but under British protectorate. When the Ottomans entered the war, the British declared it an independent state under British protection.

If the Ottomans hadn't entered the war, they would have consolidated control over Arabia, probably extending control into Najd. If they played their cards right, they could probably have occupied Kuwait, which would be of lesser importance to the British than keeping the Ottomans out of the war.
I had forgotten about that, thanks. :)
People who call the collapse of the USSR the geopolitical catastrophe of the century forget that the Ottoman Empire fell in the same century.
 
I had forgotten about that, thanks. :)
People who call the collapse of the USSR the geopolitical catastrophe of the century forget that the Ottoman Empire fell in the same century.

Also, the collapse of the USSR wasn't a catastrophe, whereas the destruction of the Ottoman Empire was. Although there was this little thing called WW2 that might have made someone's list.
 
Also, the collapse of the USSR wasn't a catastrophe, whereas the destruction of the Ottoman Empire was. Although there was this little thing called WW2 that might have made someone's list.
Yep, although I think it was Putin who said that.
Still, you'd think Putin would think about the Eastern Front :rolleyes:
 
I had forgotten about that, thanks. :)
People who call the collapse of the USSR the geopolitical catastrophe of the century forget that the Ottoman Empire fell in the same century.

As much as I feel that the Empire had its flaws, I tend to agree, much for the reasons Abdul suggests in this thread. The Otomans by 1914 were a modernizing force, and provided an element of stability and order in a historically chaotic region. What I am unsure about though is how the Turks stall or reverse European encroachments into the Empire. Remember, in 1914, Egypt is technically an Ottoman vassal under British protection.
 
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