It could be a northern ireland situation for the Sinai ottomans use ottomans jews as spies infiltrating Jewish side in the conflict, like wise with arabs.
Osman Reborn; The Survival of Ottoman Democracy [An Ottoman TL set in the 1900s]
- Thread starter Sarthak
- Start date
It is nice to see the Balkan wars are some what changed,
Looks like another quagmire, with the Arabs & Zionists
I really hope they stay as administrators and Enver is not ever given command of military units. Enver proved himself so thoroughly incompetent in leading the army he so 'meticulously built' IOTL. I hope he is not a Turanists or a vocal one at least, can't go with an ethnically homogenous Empire when all Middle Eastern state have been anything but for thousands of years.
If and when the great war kicks off, it will cause the collapse of the Russian Empire is going to leaving a power vacuum in Persia & the Caucasus, one the Turanists would push to fill.
Actual functional democratic institutions have given the large minorities a say in their Empire, Turkic nationalism that took inspiration from German nationalism should be on the decline until Russia's collapse. There shouldn't any ethnic genocide as the Empires of the Middle east are mult-ethic, they can't congeal into "nation states".
The success of the Ottoman Parliament & the Empire should have made it apparent a Turkish solution is ill-suited to the Empire.
Edit: Mustafa Kemal in a decent position in the army is also great for the nation in later conflicts, it is also good he didn't pickup Turkish nationalism from OTL.
All the Empire,(can it even be called such when the many distinct peoples are all eventually fairly represented through the democratic parliament?), needs to do is avoid costly revolts, continue reforms, widespread development, holding out until oil is discovered & it's importance realized, avoiding costly wars at any cost to allow for this should be the priority.
Wars would put strain on the fledgling democratic institutions, even if territory is gained, world standing improved, and the public confidence in the Empire boosted; the cost of waging war & integration is less attractive until Russia stops being a threat. Peace is need for: education to be expanded, reforms to be passed, capital to be raised, industries to be create, infrastructure to build; a war won has the costs associated with waging it & the divergence of resources that could be used improving the Empire. A war lost ends all progress made & sends it back into it's downward spiral.
OH NO
Looks like another quagmire, with the Arabs & Zionists
Tallat and Djemal despite their massive faults and complicity in the Armenian genocide were fine administratively, Enver is the problem.
I really hope they stay as administrators and Enver is not ever given command of military units. Enver proved himself so thoroughly incompetent in leading the army he so 'meticulously built' IOTL. I hope he is not a Turanists or a vocal one at least, can't go with an ethnically homogenous Empire when all Middle Eastern state have been anything but for thousands of years.
If and when the great war kicks off, it will cause the collapse of the Russian Empire is going to leaving a power vacuum in Persia & the Caucasus, one the Turanists would push to fill.
Actual functional democratic institutions have given the large minorities a say in their Empire, Turkic nationalism that took inspiration from German nationalism should be on the decline until Russia's collapse. There shouldn't any ethnic genocide as the Empires of the Middle east are mult-ethic, they can't congeal into "nation states".
The success of the Ottoman Parliament & the Empire should have made it apparent a Turkish solution is ill-suited to the Empire.
Edit: Mustafa Kemal in a decent position in the army is also great for the nation in later conflicts, it is also good he didn't pickup Turkish nationalism from OTL.
All the Empire,(can it even be called such when the many distinct peoples are all eventually fairly represented through the democratic parliament?), needs to do is avoid costly revolts, continue reforms, widespread development, holding out until oil is discovered & it's importance realized, avoiding costly wars at any cost to allow for this should be the priority.
Wars would put strain on the fledgling democratic institutions, even if territory is gained, world standing improved, and the public confidence in the Empire boosted; the cost of waging war & integration is less attractive until Russia stops being a threat. Peace is need for: education to be expanded, reforms to be passed, capital to be raised, industries to be create, infrastructure to build; a war won has the costs associated with waging it & the divergence of resources that could be used improving the Empire. A war lost ends all progress made & sends it back into it's downward spiral.
Last edited:
Chapter 13: Qajar Woes
Chapter 13: Qajar Woes
***
“The history of the Pontic Greek population within the Ottoman Empire is an interesting one. The Pontic Greek population of the empire like the Armenians were divided between pro-Ottoman and pro-Russian lines. However nonetheless, during the 1878 Russo-Turkish war, the support of the pontic greek communities in Trabzon made the government turn its attention to the pontic greeks. As this unwanted attention became known, the pro-Russian pontic greek communities started to immigrate into Russian Georgia and Russian Armenia as well leaving behind a population of Pontic Greeks in the Ottoman Empire which was either pro-Ottoman or at least ambivalent towards the empire.
At the turn of the century, around 25% to one third of the population of the Pontus area were made up of Pontic Greeks. Whilst many of these Pontic Greeks had been ardently anti-Abdul Hamid II, they worked together with the CUP during the 1908 Revolution that brought democracy back to the Ottoman Empire. They supported the CUP throughout the 1909 countercoup attempt but had fallen out with the CUP after the CUP turned towards radical Turkish nationalism as their ideology. Nonetheless, the Pontic Greeks remained one of the empire’s most pro-democratic populations and as democracy became ever the more strengthened in the empire, turned increasingly pro-empire as well.
Governor Matthaios Kofidis of Trabzon
It was therefore approved on January 2nd, that Deputy Matthaios Kofidis, a Pontic Greek by ethnicity and a member of the chamber of deputies would become the next governor of the Trabzon Vilayet. Kofidis was an important man in politics from the Pontic steppes of the empire. Kofidis was a well liked man, even in the muslim population of Trabzon who lovingly called the man ‘Kofidis-Effendi’. He was involved in the state as a businessman running the tobacco industry of the area and was an avid historian as well. Writing on the Trebizond Empire turned out to be his niche so to speak and he wrote multiple books about the Trebizond Empire.
logo of the Ottoman Socialist Party
Kofidis was politically a member of the Ottoman Socialist Party. He had once been a part of the Committee of Union and Progress, however had fallen out with the party over religious and ethnic issues as the party turned towards Turkish nationalism as its ideology. Instead Kofidis joined the Ottoman Socialist Party and rose during the 1912 Ottoman General Elections as a member of the Ottoman Socialist Party, where he won the mandate of his constituency and became a deputy in the Ottoman Chamber of Deputies.
His assignment to the governorship of Trabzon was an important move forward by the ottoman government, which had always been quite hesitant to appoint non-muslims to governor roles in the past. It was a message being sent by Grand Vizier Ali Kemal which was basically saying that religion no longer was required for becoming a part of the government; competence instead was required. It marked an important day for both the Ottoman Empire and the Pontic Greek community of the Ottoman Empire.” A History of the Ottoman Pontic Greek Community: Unity in Diversity. University of Trabzon, 1998.
“It would take a fool in the early 1900s in Europe to say that relations between the great powers were fine. The empire was split between two major alliances, that of the Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance. But even within these two alliances there was factionalism present. Austria and Italy distrusted each other in the Triple Alliance, and Britain and Russia could rarely see eye to eye in the Triple Entente. Nonetheless, both alliances were united in their opposition to the other alliance. Tensions were rife, and a single trigger could spark a Europe wide conflict. Sad fact of the matter however was that many of the powers wanted a war. France wanted a war to regain its lost territories in Alsace and Lorraine, Britain wanted a war to gobble up Germany’s precious colonies of South West Africa and East Africa, Russia wanted a war to annex Galicia and Volhynia, the Germans wanted a war to achieve their dream of European hegemony and their colonial ambitions of mittleafrika, the Austrians wanted war to put the pesky slavs in their place, and the Italians wanted war to regain the honor that they had lost in the Italo-Ottoman War.
The European Alliance System
Frankly put, no one was really interested in long term peace, and everyone knew that a big war was coming. And the Ottomans knew this as well, they would have been fools not to see the tensions riding high in Europe. The Moroccan Crisis’s had led the continent to a point of no return so to speak in terms of diplomatic relations. The Ottomans were friendly with Germany, Austria Hungary and Britain, however they wanted no part of a European wide continental conflict.
The new Ottoman Senate convened in early January to discuss the issue of the current tensions in Europe and the senate voted overwhelmingly, around 81 to 19 to isolate itself from tensions in Europe, instead furthering their own diplomatic interests by acting as a mediator between the Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance. The Ottomans also had look in the Balkans to make this strategy. Greece was pro-Entente, with its favorable pro-British policies. Serbia and Bulgaria by default of having its patron as Russia were pro-Entente as well. Romania on the other hand was a pro-Triple Alliance nation and Montenegro often drifted between the two. Austria-Hungary obviously was pro-Triple Alliance. As a result, the Balkan peninsula was quite divided on the issue. However seeing as the overwhelming majority of the states were pro-Entente, the Ottomans made a decision not to court to the Triple Alliance too much, for fear of turning the Balkan countries against the Ottoman Empire once again. The empire was fairly certain that it could take on one or two countries in the Balkans at the same time pretty fine, however it was sure that it could not take on the majority of the Balkan countries all at once.
Ottoman Embassy in Bucharest
As such, in order to diffuse tensions between the Balkan and ottoman state, the Ottoman Empire decided to start a rapprochement strategy in the Balkans and decided to go on the diplomatic offensive in Belgrade, Sofia and Athens as well as Bucharest. Romania, which no longer had a border with the Ottomans and were more interested in Bulgaria, Russian and Austrian territories, welcomed the diplomatic missions warmly, and several key diplomatic exchanges were made. Bulgaria, which had a sizeable Muslim and Turkish minority welcomed the diplomatic exchanges with some amount of ambivalence, not taking an offensive stance, nor taking a welcoming stance. In Belgrade however, the diplomatic exchanges were received with ill-welcome and the Ottoman delegates sent to Belgrade complained back to Constantinople that the Serbian hosts were ill-treating to the diplomats in hidden manners all throughout the missions. In Athens, in the diplomatic exchanges were simply another round in the growing relations between the two countries, and Venizelos welcomed the Ottoman delegations quite warmly, having hesitantly warmed up to the Ottoman Empire with its recent figurative olive branches. Of course the so called ‘Megali-Idea’ of Greek nationalists and the anti-greek rhetoric of radical ottomans continued to hamper Greco-Ottoman relations, however when it came right down to it, both sides ignored that side of relations and got into business.
Whilst the diplomatic exchanges did serve to lighten tensions, they did not serve to end them. Venizelos in 1914 writes in his diary, properly mentioning this fact as well.
‘The exchanges between the Balkan capitals and the Ottoman Empire were indeed soothing for the war weary populace, and goodwill sprung anew. However these did not stop Bulgarian or Serbian ambitions. In fact they only helped to make them even more coveted. War in that moment became almost inevitable. When and How was the only question left unanswered. And of course with whom? Would Greece take up arms with the Ottomans together against the Slavic invaders? Or would we continue or historic animosity with the Ottomans? Only time will tell.’
His words, would prove prophetic.” Greco-Ottoman Relations: A History of Hurt and Goodwill. Bucharest Publishing, 2003.
“Qajar Persia ever since the 1850s had become the epitome of inefficiency, bad and incompetent rulers, corruption and ill-advised foreign intervention and influence. All of which led to massive resentment against the Qajar Dynasty and its government. It didn’t help that competent Shahs were more interested in fondling women in their harems rather than actually doing their work for once. In the early 1900s revolution had swept the Qajar Dynasty and a semi-democratic government was set up after that. However woes continued to disrupt the country. When the Russian border conflict with Persia started, it was more often than not that tribal groups defeated the Russian forces rather than the actual Qajar Persian army. The economy was in the dustbin so to speak, and capitulations to the Ottomans, Russians and British had angered the Persian population beyond measure.
flag of Qajar Persia
Shah Ahmad and the regency of the Qajar Empire was also seen with a bad light, as the regency was extremely weak and inefficient, and as such the state of the country continued to decline. A small spark was all that was needed for the country to fall in civil conflict.
And this came in the form of the Persian dissidents. These dissidents took the streets throughout the country in early 1914 demanding reform of the government, of the monarchy and of the army, which exercised too much power in the government for the liking of the liberal dissidents. Led by a member of the Qajar Dynasty itself, Prince Abdul-Hussein Farman Farma, the dissidents practiced non-violent measures of protests like sit-ins and slogans to make their point known to the government. Other influential members of the Persian political spectrum such as Zia ol Din Tabatabae and Ahamd Amir-Ahmadi took part in the protests and the marches against the current Qajar government. The Persian Cossack Brigades famously turned against the strong armed Qajar army and supported the dissidents, following their prince in the marches protectively as well.
Zia ol Din Tabatabae
All it took was a single decision. A single decision to open fire on the protestors and dissidents shook the Persian nation to its very core. It is not known who ordered the army and the gendarmerie to fire at the protestors at Qom, Tehran and Isfahan, since the Regent Ali Reza Khan Al-Molk who an honest politician fired half of the cabinet on the spot when he heard the news, and the Shah was still a minor. It could easily have been a panicked officer ordering his troops to fire, however the damage was done.
The dissidents were radicalized in the ensuing chaos in the Persian cities, and many of them formed guerilla bands and attacked the Qajar army bases throughout the country. In Bandar Abbas, Zia ol Din formed a new government with the political members of the dissidents and declared his cabinet to be the legitimate government of the Persian nation. He appealed to Qajar dynasty itself and asked the more liberal minded members of the royal family to defect over to their side and to reform the Sun-Monarchy’s imperial throne. Prince Abdul-Hussein answered the call, and ordered the 25,000 strong Persian Cossack brigades to protect the Zia government, the vast majority of which agreed to do as such. In Bandar Abbas, Prince Abdul-Hussein was welcomed to the city by the population and the dissidents, where he was proclaimed to be Shah of Iran.
Shah Abdul-Hussein Farman Farma Qajar, the declared new Shah of Persia
With two governments opposing each other, two claimants to the Sun throne opposing each other, and the country divided on these two lines, the stage was set for the Persian Civil War. The Dissidents controlled the southern area of the country whilst the loyalists of the regime controlled the northern half of the country in majority. As news of civil war broke out into London, Constantinople and St. Petersburg, the governments of all three nations immediately worked in a flurry of diplomatic works.
The Ottoman delegation, Russian delegation and the British delegation met each other at Alexandria in Egypt on February 18, two weeks after civil war erupted in Persia to discuss the civil war. The Ottomans proposed that the Ottomans, Russians and British to withdraw all troops until the end of the civil conflict. Russia proposed that St. Petersburg and Constantinople to use this conflict as a way to end the Russo-Ottoman competition for northwestern Iran and supported the idea of withdrawing troops from the region. Britain however did not. Britain needed the lucrative Anglo-Persian Oil Company and the Abadan Oil Fields, and proposed that all troops would remain where they were, but they would practice full neutrality in the civil war, and not interfere with it. Not wishing to loose influence in Persia if they were the only ones to withdraw troops, Russia and the Ottomans reluctantly agreed, and all sides declared neutrality in the Persian Civil War, and ordered their troops to stay put.
side of the Persian Civil War. Purple represents the Zia government.
However in secret, the three powers had already picked sides. The Russians found the old government easy to control, inefficient and quite feeble, and wanted to keep Persia in that manner. Britain who had its own financial woes from Persian inefficiency tacitly supported the Zia government, as the Zia government was made up of, perhaps the most competent men and politicians from all over Persia, including the pretender Shah who was a capable royal in his own right. The Ottomans threw their lot in on both sides, wishing to play both sides. They sent information and intelligence to both the loyalists and the dissidents and managed to cultivate a good relation with both sides. The Qajar/Persian Civil War had started in full swing.” The Rise of the New Qajar Dynasty: A Memoir. Qoms Publishing, 1976.
“Libya had been a battleground in 1911 and 1912 for the Ottomans and the Italians. The former tried to and was successful in retaining its influence and power in the region whilst the latter tried to and failed to conquer the region. Regardless of result however, it was undeniable that the area was devastated by war. Refugees had fled in land, and several parts of important cities had been destroyed in the war. The strength of the army in the region increased, and manpower used for productivity became diverted for the army.
flag of ottoman libya
For two years, the situation had been ignored in favor of solving the more important questions of the empire, however finally in early 1914, the empire turned its head back to the Libyan Vilayets of the Ottoman Empire. The Vilayet of Tripolitania was the most important and the richest of the Libya vilayets, and it was decided that this region would get the least amount of development. Cyrenaica would receive a good amount of investment from the empire whilst Fezzan would receive the most.
On February 27th, 1914, the Libyan Development Scheme was unveiled by the Ottoman Government. The LDS was a wide ranging development scheme, and mainly focused on bringing the Libyan Vilayets upto continental Ottoman standards. The slipway and dockyard projects from the NEP was thrust into Libya as well, with the intention of remodeling and remaking the ports of Benghazi and Tripoli to accommodate more ships and to make it capable of building warships in the future as well.
the Tripoli railway station built by the Ottomans in 1914.
Perhaps the most important part of this developmental scheme was the project to construct a railway line connecting Tripoli to Tobruk with Benghazi along the way. A railway line from Sirte would be diverted to the south and become connected with Sabha, the de-facto capital of Ottoman Fezzan in the region. This developmental scheme was aimed at increasing the transportation services of Ottoman North Africa, and in return increasing the productivity of the area. A Hospital Scheme was also introduced by the scheme. During the war, the lack of proper medical services in Libya had been felt and it was time to rectify it. The scheme called for the construction of 5 major new hospital centers in Libya, and some 20 smaller hospitals throughout Libya. Small scale industrial estates were also introduced in the scheme to make sure that industrial productivity in the region could be stimulated. An irrigation system was also proposed in Libya which was approved. An irrigation system was to be built to increase agricultural productivity in the region.” Development of Ottoman Libya: An Economical History. Benghazi Publishing, 1999.
***
***
“The history of the Pontic Greek population within the Ottoman Empire is an interesting one. The Pontic Greek population of the empire like the Armenians were divided between pro-Ottoman and pro-Russian lines. However nonetheless, during the 1878 Russo-Turkish war, the support of the pontic greek communities in Trabzon made the government turn its attention to the pontic greeks. As this unwanted attention became known, the pro-Russian pontic greek communities started to immigrate into Russian Georgia and Russian Armenia as well leaving behind a population of Pontic Greeks in the Ottoman Empire which was either pro-Ottoman or at least ambivalent towards the empire.
At the turn of the century, around 25% to one third of the population of the Pontus area were made up of Pontic Greeks. Whilst many of these Pontic Greeks had been ardently anti-Abdul Hamid II, they worked together with the CUP during the 1908 Revolution that brought democracy back to the Ottoman Empire. They supported the CUP throughout the 1909 countercoup attempt but had fallen out with the CUP after the CUP turned towards radical Turkish nationalism as their ideology. Nonetheless, the Pontic Greeks remained one of the empire’s most pro-democratic populations and as democracy became ever the more strengthened in the empire, turned increasingly pro-empire as well.
Governor Matthaios Kofidis of Trabzon
It was therefore approved on January 2nd, that Deputy Matthaios Kofidis, a Pontic Greek by ethnicity and a member of the chamber of deputies would become the next governor of the Trabzon Vilayet. Kofidis was an important man in politics from the Pontic steppes of the empire. Kofidis was a well liked man, even in the muslim population of Trabzon who lovingly called the man ‘Kofidis-Effendi’. He was involved in the state as a businessman running the tobacco industry of the area and was an avid historian as well. Writing on the Trebizond Empire turned out to be his niche so to speak and he wrote multiple books about the Trebizond Empire.
logo of the Ottoman Socialist Party
Kofidis was politically a member of the Ottoman Socialist Party. He had once been a part of the Committee of Union and Progress, however had fallen out with the party over religious and ethnic issues as the party turned towards Turkish nationalism as its ideology. Instead Kofidis joined the Ottoman Socialist Party and rose during the 1912 Ottoman General Elections as a member of the Ottoman Socialist Party, where he won the mandate of his constituency and became a deputy in the Ottoman Chamber of Deputies.
His assignment to the governorship of Trabzon was an important move forward by the ottoman government, which had always been quite hesitant to appoint non-muslims to governor roles in the past. It was a message being sent by Grand Vizier Ali Kemal which was basically saying that religion no longer was required for becoming a part of the government; competence instead was required. It marked an important day for both the Ottoman Empire and the Pontic Greek community of the Ottoman Empire.” A History of the Ottoman Pontic Greek Community: Unity in Diversity. University of Trabzon, 1998.
“It would take a fool in the early 1900s in Europe to say that relations between the great powers were fine. The empire was split between two major alliances, that of the Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance. But even within these two alliances there was factionalism present. Austria and Italy distrusted each other in the Triple Alliance, and Britain and Russia could rarely see eye to eye in the Triple Entente. Nonetheless, both alliances were united in their opposition to the other alliance. Tensions were rife, and a single trigger could spark a Europe wide conflict. Sad fact of the matter however was that many of the powers wanted a war. France wanted a war to regain its lost territories in Alsace and Lorraine, Britain wanted a war to gobble up Germany’s precious colonies of South West Africa and East Africa, Russia wanted a war to annex Galicia and Volhynia, the Germans wanted a war to achieve their dream of European hegemony and their colonial ambitions of mittleafrika, the Austrians wanted war to put the pesky slavs in their place, and the Italians wanted war to regain the honor that they had lost in the Italo-Ottoman War.
The European Alliance System
Frankly put, no one was really interested in long term peace, and everyone knew that a big war was coming. And the Ottomans knew this as well, they would have been fools not to see the tensions riding high in Europe. The Moroccan Crisis’s had led the continent to a point of no return so to speak in terms of diplomatic relations. The Ottomans were friendly with Germany, Austria Hungary and Britain, however they wanted no part of a European wide continental conflict.
The new Ottoman Senate convened in early January to discuss the issue of the current tensions in Europe and the senate voted overwhelmingly, around 81 to 19 to isolate itself from tensions in Europe, instead furthering their own diplomatic interests by acting as a mediator between the Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance. The Ottomans also had look in the Balkans to make this strategy. Greece was pro-Entente, with its favorable pro-British policies. Serbia and Bulgaria by default of having its patron as Russia were pro-Entente as well. Romania on the other hand was a pro-Triple Alliance nation and Montenegro often drifted between the two. Austria-Hungary obviously was pro-Triple Alliance. As a result, the Balkan peninsula was quite divided on the issue. However seeing as the overwhelming majority of the states were pro-Entente, the Ottomans made a decision not to court to the Triple Alliance too much, for fear of turning the Balkan countries against the Ottoman Empire once again. The empire was fairly certain that it could take on one or two countries in the Balkans at the same time pretty fine, however it was sure that it could not take on the majority of the Balkan countries all at once.
Ottoman Embassy in Bucharest
As such, in order to diffuse tensions between the Balkan and ottoman state, the Ottoman Empire decided to start a rapprochement strategy in the Balkans and decided to go on the diplomatic offensive in Belgrade, Sofia and Athens as well as Bucharest. Romania, which no longer had a border with the Ottomans and were more interested in Bulgaria, Russian and Austrian territories, welcomed the diplomatic missions warmly, and several key diplomatic exchanges were made. Bulgaria, which had a sizeable Muslim and Turkish minority welcomed the diplomatic exchanges with some amount of ambivalence, not taking an offensive stance, nor taking a welcoming stance. In Belgrade however, the diplomatic exchanges were received with ill-welcome and the Ottoman delegates sent to Belgrade complained back to Constantinople that the Serbian hosts were ill-treating to the diplomats in hidden manners all throughout the missions. In Athens, in the diplomatic exchanges were simply another round in the growing relations between the two countries, and Venizelos welcomed the Ottoman delegations quite warmly, having hesitantly warmed up to the Ottoman Empire with its recent figurative olive branches. Of course the so called ‘Megali-Idea’ of Greek nationalists and the anti-greek rhetoric of radical ottomans continued to hamper Greco-Ottoman relations, however when it came right down to it, both sides ignored that side of relations and got into business.
Whilst the diplomatic exchanges did serve to lighten tensions, they did not serve to end them. Venizelos in 1914 writes in his diary, properly mentioning this fact as well.
‘The exchanges between the Balkan capitals and the Ottoman Empire were indeed soothing for the war weary populace, and goodwill sprung anew. However these did not stop Bulgarian or Serbian ambitions. In fact they only helped to make them even more coveted. War in that moment became almost inevitable. When and How was the only question left unanswered. And of course with whom? Would Greece take up arms with the Ottomans together against the Slavic invaders? Or would we continue or historic animosity with the Ottomans? Only time will tell.’
His words, would prove prophetic.” Greco-Ottoman Relations: A History of Hurt and Goodwill. Bucharest Publishing, 2003.
“Qajar Persia ever since the 1850s had become the epitome of inefficiency, bad and incompetent rulers, corruption and ill-advised foreign intervention and influence. All of which led to massive resentment against the Qajar Dynasty and its government. It didn’t help that competent Shahs were more interested in fondling women in their harems rather than actually doing their work for once. In the early 1900s revolution had swept the Qajar Dynasty and a semi-democratic government was set up after that. However woes continued to disrupt the country. When the Russian border conflict with Persia started, it was more often than not that tribal groups defeated the Russian forces rather than the actual Qajar Persian army. The economy was in the dustbin so to speak, and capitulations to the Ottomans, Russians and British had angered the Persian population beyond measure.
flag of Qajar Persia
Shah Ahmad and the regency of the Qajar Empire was also seen with a bad light, as the regency was extremely weak and inefficient, and as such the state of the country continued to decline. A small spark was all that was needed for the country to fall in civil conflict.
And this came in the form of the Persian dissidents. These dissidents took the streets throughout the country in early 1914 demanding reform of the government, of the monarchy and of the army, which exercised too much power in the government for the liking of the liberal dissidents. Led by a member of the Qajar Dynasty itself, Prince Abdul-Hussein Farman Farma, the dissidents practiced non-violent measures of protests like sit-ins and slogans to make their point known to the government. Other influential members of the Persian political spectrum such as Zia ol Din Tabatabae and Ahamd Amir-Ahmadi took part in the protests and the marches against the current Qajar government. The Persian Cossack Brigades famously turned against the strong armed Qajar army and supported the dissidents, following their prince in the marches protectively as well.
Zia ol Din Tabatabae
All it took was a single decision. A single decision to open fire on the protestors and dissidents shook the Persian nation to its very core. It is not known who ordered the army and the gendarmerie to fire at the protestors at Qom, Tehran and Isfahan, since the Regent Ali Reza Khan Al-Molk who an honest politician fired half of the cabinet on the spot when he heard the news, and the Shah was still a minor. It could easily have been a panicked officer ordering his troops to fire, however the damage was done.
The dissidents were radicalized in the ensuing chaos in the Persian cities, and many of them formed guerilla bands and attacked the Qajar army bases throughout the country. In Bandar Abbas, Zia ol Din formed a new government with the political members of the dissidents and declared his cabinet to be the legitimate government of the Persian nation. He appealed to Qajar dynasty itself and asked the more liberal minded members of the royal family to defect over to their side and to reform the Sun-Monarchy’s imperial throne. Prince Abdul-Hussein answered the call, and ordered the 25,000 strong Persian Cossack brigades to protect the Zia government, the vast majority of which agreed to do as such. In Bandar Abbas, Prince Abdul-Hussein was welcomed to the city by the population and the dissidents, where he was proclaimed to be Shah of Iran.
Shah Abdul-Hussein Farman Farma Qajar, the declared new Shah of Persia
With two governments opposing each other, two claimants to the Sun throne opposing each other, and the country divided on these two lines, the stage was set for the Persian Civil War. The Dissidents controlled the southern area of the country whilst the loyalists of the regime controlled the northern half of the country in majority. As news of civil war broke out into London, Constantinople and St. Petersburg, the governments of all three nations immediately worked in a flurry of diplomatic works.
The Ottoman delegation, Russian delegation and the British delegation met each other at Alexandria in Egypt on February 18, two weeks after civil war erupted in Persia to discuss the civil war. The Ottomans proposed that the Ottomans, Russians and British to withdraw all troops until the end of the civil conflict. Russia proposed that St. Petersburg and Constantinople to use this conflict as a way to end the Russo-Ottoman competition for northwestern Iran and supported the idea of withdrawing troops from the region. Britain however did not. Britain needed the lucrative Anglo-Persian Oil Company and the Abadan Oil Fields, and proposed that all troops would remain where they were, but they would practice full neutrality in the civil war, and not interfere with it. Not wishing to loose influence in Persia if they were the only ones to withdraw troops, Russia and the Ottomans reluctantly agreed, and all sides declared neutrality in the Persian Civil War, and ordered their troops to stay put.
side of the Persian Civil War. Purple represents the Zia government.
However in secret, the three powers had already picked sides. The Russians found the old government easy to control, inefficient and quite feeble, and wanted to keep Persia in that manner. Britain who had its own financial woes from Persian inefficiency tacitly supported the Zia government, as the Zia government was made up of, perhaps the most competent men and politicians from all over Persia, including the pretender Shah who was a capable royal in his own right. The Ottomans threw their lot in on both sides, wishing to play both sides. They sent information and intelligence to both the loyalists and the dissidents and managed to cultivate a good relation with both sides. The Qajar/Persian Civil War had started in full swing.” The Rise of the New Qajar Dynasty: A Memoir. Qoms Publishing, 1976.
“Libya had been a battleground in 1911 and 1912 for the Ottomans and the Italians. The former tried to and was successful in retaining its influence and power in the region whilst the latter tried to and failed to conquer the region. Regardless of result however, it was undeniable that the area was devastated by war. Refugees had fled in land, and several parts of important cities had been destroyed in the war. The strength of the army in the region increased, and manpower used for productivity became diverted for the army.
flag of ottoman libya
For two years, the situation had been ignored in favor of solving the more important questions of the empire, however finally in early 1914, the empire turned its head back to the Libyan Vilayets of the Ottoman Empire. The Vilayet of Tripolitania was the most important and the richest of the Libya vilayets, and it was decided that this region would get the least amount of development. Cyrenaica would receive a good amount of investment from the empire whilst Fezzan would receive the most.
On February 27th, 1914, the Libyan Development Scheme was unveiled by the Ottoman Government. The LDS was a wide ranging development scheme, and mainly focused on bringing the Libyan Vilayets upto continental Ottoman standards. The slipway and dockyard projects from the NEP was thrust into Libya as well, with the intention of remodeling and remaking the ports of Benghazi and Tripoli to accommodate more ships and to make it capable of building warships in the future as well.
the Tripoli railway station built by the Ottomans in 1914.
Perhaps the most important part of this developmental scheme was the project to construct a railway line connecting Tripoli to Tobruk with Benghazi along the way. A railway line from Sirte would be diverted to the south and become connected with Sabha, the de-facto capital of Ottoman Fezzan in the region. This developmental scheme was aimed at increasing the transportation services of Ottoman North Africa, and in return increasing the productivity of the area. A Hospital Scheme was also introduced by the scheme. During the war, the lack of proper medical services in Libya had been felt and it was time to rectify it. The scheme called for the construction of 5 major new hospital centers in Libya, and some 20 smaller hospitals throughout Libya. Small scale industrial estates were also introduced in the scheme to make sure that industrial productivity in the region could be stimulated. An irrigation system was also proposed in Libya which was approved. An irrigation system was to be built to increase agricultural productivity in the region.” Development of Ottoman Libya: An Economical History. Benghazi Publishing, 1999.
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The Ottomans have to be extra careful in the Persian civil war, since if the fact known that they are playing both sides, that would bite them back in the ass. Nevertheless, it is going to be a hard war for both sides. The reformers control much of the Persian Gulf coasts, but it seems that most major cities such as Tehran, Qom, Isfahan, Ahvaz, and Mashhad is under the 'real' monarch's control. Revolutions within those urban centres are not unlikely though.
The Zia Government needs to win. Maybe the UK can get on the side of progress in Iran for a change from OTL.
Well forgiveness of debt and end of capitulation i think. Or if they are really that desperate return of Kars province or Kuwait.
Minor nitpick but Venizelos did not write down a diary. That said Greece is in a... convenient diplomatic position at the moment of essentially holding the balance between the Ottomans and Serbia-Bulgaria. How so? If she is neutral or on the side of the Ottomans, then Ottomans can ship troops directly from Beirut for example straight to Thessaloniki and Kavala, nor do they need to commit troops to deal with potential Greek landings. Plus of course come 1914 she can throw into the fray at least a quarter million troops of her own. Reverse alignments and Greece is the only power with a navy and the right geography for that to be of use, if Russia was actively in the war her navy would still be in the Black Sea.
Now the next question is what are the Ottomans willing to offer to get the Greeks on side? In OTL 1912 they came up with offering parts of Epirus and Macedonia in addition to recognising union of Greece and Crete on the eve of the war. TTL this could be a problem for internal political reasons, read Albanian nationalist claims to the same territory. On the other hand there is a set of territory that is overwhelmingly Greek in population and of limited economic value to the empire... namely Cyprus and the East Aegean islands (Lemnos exempted) Lets put this in some perspective.
1. This is the time of the Anglo-Greek entente negotiations which were initiated by Britain in OTL. In short, the British offered Greece Cyprus and an alliance in exchange for naval facilities in Cephallonia in the Ionian sea (deemed necessary to keep an eye on the Italian and KuK navies. TTL such negotiations are likely much further along. George is still alive and king of Greece and he was very much pro-British and anti-German and there is no crisis in Greek-Ottoman relations. Where do the Ottomans come into this? Why technically they had leased Cyprus to the British indefinitely. Giving their blessings to the deal costs them nothing, the island is a British colony after all and the deal IS happening the British have not bothered to ask, while further improving their relations with Greece.
2. Samos. The island since 1830 was autonomous as following the Greek war of independence it was controlled by Greek rebels but was not made part of Greece. By 1912 there was trouble as the Young Turks tried to meddle in its internal affairs, then it proclaimed union with Greece as soon as the war was on. Again a low cost option, the island is outside direct Ottoman control since its revolt in 1821...
3. Lesbos, Chios and the Dodecanese. Here we go into more high stakes territory. But I think the advantage of offering this instead of anything on the mainland to get the Greeks on side when the Balkan war comes should be obvious. The islands are 90-95% Greek or more, no competing nationalisms, from the Ottoman point have little economic weight, but for a maritime power like Greece are much more important... and given their geographic proximity to Anatolia will be a constant reason in the future to want to maintain good relations both for economic and purely political reasons... namely the Greeks keeping them safe.
Now the next question is what are the Ottomans willing to offer to get the Greeks on side? In OTL 1912 they came up with offering parts of Epirus and Macedonia in addition to recognising union of Greece and Crete on the eve of the war. TTL this could be a problem for internal political reasons, read Albanian nationalist claims to the same territory. On the other hand there is a set of territory that is overwhelmingly Greek in population and of limited economic value to the empire... namely Cyprus and the East Aegean islands (Lemnos exempted) Lets put this in some perspective.
1. This is the time of the Anglo-Greek entente negotiations which were initiated by Britain in OTL. In short, the British offered Greece Cyprus and an alliance in exchange for naval facilities in Cephallonia in the Ionian sea (deemed necessary to keep an eye on the Italian and KuK navies. TTL such negotiations are likely much further along. George is still alive and king of Greece and he was very much pro-British and anti-German and there is no crisis in Greek-Ottoman relations. Where do the Ottomans come into this? Why technically they had leased Cyprus to the British indefinitely. Giving their blessings to the deal costs them nothing, the island is a British colony after all and the deal IS happening the British have not bothered to ask, while further improving their relations with Greece.
2. Samos. The island since 1830 was autonomous as following the Greek war of independence it was controlled by Greek rebels but was not made part of Greece. By 1912 there was trouble as the Young Turks tried to meddle in its internal affairs, then it proclaimed union with Greece as soon as the war was on. Again a low cost option, the island is outside direct Ottoman control since its revolt in 1821...
3. Lesbos, Chios and the Dodecanese. Here we go into more high stakes territory. But I think the advantage of offering this instead of anything on the mainland to get the Greeks on side when the Balkan war comes should be obvious. The islands are 90-95% Greek or more, no competing nationalisms, from the Ottoman point have little economic weight, but for a maritime power like Greece are much more important... and given their geographic proximity to Anatolia will be a constant reason in the future to want to maintain good relations both for economic and purely political reasons... namely the Greeks keeping them safe.
a lot. The Russians and British won't have to worry about a new front and neither will Austria.
it is not that revolutionary feeling is not present in the cities. It is only that the qajar army is nearer to the cities making it easier for them to squash. However yes you are right, the Qajar Civil War will have far reaching consequences.
I have already written that. Like otl how the Brits supported the Pahlavis, the Brits are secretly aiding the Zia government.
Also, no Gallopili - which could have serious butterflies for Australia/New Zealand down the road.
As I've understood it (and please correct me if any of you disagree), the casaulties sustained by the ANZAC troops in the campaign have often been seen as one of the defining moments in Australia and New Zealands emergence as nations in their own right - a baptism of blood, as I think it has been described.
Indeed, Greece is an extremely peculiar and advantageous position diplomatically and militarily right now. Her participation will change the tides for the team she goes for.
True enough, and interesting analysis by the way
True i can see Constantinople 'transferring' the protectorate from Britain to Greece (though probably with a clause of the Cypriot Turks being allowed freedom and other things) and allowing involving themselves in the negotiations
Indeed, you are correct on the issue of Samos. However the other islands...
I can see the Ottomans giving up Chios and Lesbos, i do not see them giving up the dodecanese. The dodecanese controls one of the sealanes into the Aegean Sea and is strategically an important place to hold onto, which the ottomans would not be willing to give up. On the other islands though i agree.
rise of aussie and kiwi nationalism from what i understand. They just called themselves overseas brits before it seems (at least in majority)