AHC/WI: The Central Powers incite a Muslim rebellion

"Max von Oppenheim, the German diplomat and orientalist, described Islam as “one of our most important weapons” in his famous position paper of October 1914. Oppenheim wanted to spark a Muslim revolt stretching from India to Morocco that Germany could use for its own purposes. Germany just needed to get the message across, Oppenheim insisted: Russia, Britain, and France were the oppressors of Muslims, whereas the Germans would liberate them",
-https://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/books/187128/nazi-romance-with-islam

What if somehow, the Central Powers were able to incite a rebellion among the Islamic subjects of the British, French and Russian empires, either in all of the aforementioned colonies/territories or just one of them? What would need to happen for this rebellion to occur?
 
"Why weren’t the men motivated by jihad? It’s perhaps more pertinent to ask, “Why would they have been?” As Rogan points out, the concept was daft to begin with. “It was not a natural thing: a targeted jihad focusing on three Western countries but excluding three other European countries. You hate Britain and France but not Germany, Bulgaria and Austria – what is that about?”

"Rogan also thinks Oppenheim and his enthusiastic band of orientalists were deluded. “There was this misconception that Muslims behave in a uniformly fanatical way: they pray together in massive numbers, they obviously all surrender their thoughts in a uniform way, and if you turn that to your advantage you’ve got a powerful force to motivate and mobilise. It just doesn’t work that way.

"“Muslims are like people anywhere else. Their willingness to get into something as risky as war is going to be determined by their interests, or their fears, or the threats that they face. It’s not because somebody waves a sword or a Koran and tells them to go to war.”..." https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/museums/11022199/Germanys-Grand-WW1-Jihad-Experiment.html

Anyway, it should hardly be necessary to explain that Muslims weren't a monolith--that for example Arabs and Persians did not necessarily have any fondness for the Turks. And with the Persians there was not only the fear of Turkish imperialism but the Sunni/Shia divide. https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/persia-joins-the-central-powers.448377/#post-17356113
 
"Why weren’t the men motivated by jihad? It’s perhaps more pertinent to ask, “Why would they have been?” As Rogan points out, the concept was daft to begin with. “It was not a natural thing: a targeted jihad focusing on three Western countries but excluding three other European countries. You hate Britain and France but not Germany, Bulgaria and Austria – what is that about?”

"Rogan also thinks Oppenheim and his enthusiastic band of orientalists were deluded. “There was this misconception that Muslims behave in a uniformly fanatical way: they pray together in massive numbers, they obviously all surrender their thoughts in a uniform way, and if you turn that to your advantage you’ve got a powerful force to motivate and mobilise. It just doesn’t work that way.

"“Muslims are like people anywhere else. Their willingness to get into something as risky as war is going to be determined by their interests, or their fears, or the threats that they face. It’s not because somebody waves a sword or a Koran and tells them to go to war.”..." https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/museums/11022199/Germanys-Grand-WW1-Jihad-Experiment.html

Anyway, it should hardly be necessary to explain that Muslims weren't a monolith--that for example Arabs and Persians did not necessarily have any fondness for the Turks. And with the Persians there was not only the fear of Turkish imperialism but the Sunni/Shia divide. https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/persia-joins-the-central-powers.448377/#post-17356113

The Germans would have to be able to convince the various Muslim populations that Germany would win the war, be able to aid their rebellions and would pursue policies that the Muslims would prefer. Throughout the war, the Germans struggled to project any power outside of Europe and could barely send supplies to their Ottoman allies

In the end, the Entente succeeded in provoking an "Islamic" revolt by Arabs against the Ottomans. It wasn't hard- the Ottomans hadn't been very nice to their Muslim brothers and sisters, the Entente controlled the seas and could send supplies and land troops to back up the rebels. Meanwhile, India, Egypt, Morocco and Algeria remained quite as they sent hundreds of thousands of Muslims to support their colonial masters
 
During WW1 a group of German intelligence agents were sent to Persia and Afghanistan to try and foment a rebellion against the British in the name of Islam. The German fantasy was getting the Ottomans to meme a jihad into existence that would end British control of India, or at least distract them enough to get the UK out of the war.
 
Top