RUSSO-TURKISH OPERATIONS

The Russo-Turkish campaign which had developed in Transcaucasia, the Caucasus and Persia at the beginning of 1915, proved to be little more than a futile dissipation of energy for the best part of a year. To Russia it was more of an inconvenience than otherwise, while for the Turks it was the only point besides Egypt where their geographical position permitted them to strike a blow against the enemies of Germany. Her two nearest neighbors—Greece and Bulgaria—were both neutral at the time. The most interesting feature of this campaign is the fact that it largely influenced the allied operations at the Dardanelles.

On August, 1915, Sir George Buchanan, the British Ambassador in Petrograd, published the following statement in an interview which appeared in the Russian press: "When Turkey declared war Russia turned to Great Britain with a request that she would divert a portion of the Turkish troops from the Caucasus by means of a counterdemonstration at some other point. The operations at the Dardanelles were undertaken with a double object—on the one hand, of reducing the pressure of the Turks in the Caucasus, and, on the other, of opening the straits and so making it possible for Russia to export her grain and receive foreign products of which she stands in need."

The Turkish offensive in the Caucasus, as we found in Volume II, began in the middle of December, 1914, and reached its farthest point toward the end of the year. Although it was subsequently broken by Russia, its renewal was expected when the weather became more favorable. That it was not renewed during the summer of 1915, and that Tiflis was in consequence relieved from further menace, was due entirely to the British attack on the Dardanelles, to which all available Turkish troops were immediately dispatched. Russia had her hands full enough at the time to maintain her long front of 900 miles—from the Baltic through the Polish salient and through the Carpathian line of Galicia. She could therefore ill afford to spare any considerable part of her forces for an extended Transcaucasian campaign.

Turkey's first plan of action in the Great War appears to have been an attempt to recover Ardahan and Kars, both of which places, as well as Batum, had been taken from Turkey and handed over to Russia by the Treaty of Berlin in 1878. To forestall any such aspirations Russian troops had entered Asia Minor on November 4, 1914, and advanced for seventeen miles along the road to Erzerum in Armenia, and on November 8 they successfully resisted an attack by the Turks, armed with heavy German artillery, at Kuprikeui, from which place several mountain paths lead to Erzerum. Further attacks had also been made by the Turks during the rest of the month and in December likewise in the Euphrates Valley without any notable result, until they had reached Ardahan and Sarikamish in an attempt to regain Kars.

In a three days' battle with the Russians, January 1-4, 1915, they were driven back with enormous losses, the whole of one Turkish army corps (the Ninth) surrendering. (See Volume II, Turkey in the War.) The Turks did not get within thirty miles of Kars. In numerical strength the Turks were estimated at three to one against the Russians. Fighting in the deep snow at altitudes of 8,000 to 10,000 feet in a severe winter is an enormously difficult undertaking for the attacking side, and it is evident that the Turkish forces suffered terrible hardships in their attempt to retain a footing on Russian territory.

At the end of January and the beginning of February furious fighting raged in the neighborhood of Sarikamish, when the Russians inflicted another defeat on the Turks. During a blinding snowstorm the former had crossed a mountain and, after heavy fighting, captured the commanding general and the staff of the Thirtieth Turkish Division and a large quantity of war material. The roaring of the wind was so great that the Russian approach could not be heard, while the thickly blowing snow rendered the troops invisible.

At the same time the Russian squadron bombarded the Turkish barracks at Trebizond and Rizah from the Black Sea, also sinking some Turkish sailing vessels used as transports. Under the superintendence of German engineers the Turks hurriedly set about constructing a branch railroad from Angora to Sivas, Asia Minor, intended to replace the Trebizond water route as a line of communication for the Turkish troops on the Caucasus front. Meanwhile another Russian column pushed out from Julfa along the Tabriz road to force battle upon the Turkish army invading the Persian province of Azerbaijan. The Turks advanced northward from Tabriz to Marand, where a stubborn battle was fought. They were commanded by Djevet Pasha, who was considered one of their best tacticians and most aggressive fighters, but after a series of unsuccessful frontal onslaughts his army broke in disorder, abandoning cannon, colors (standards), and all their dead and wounded. To the Russians the victory was more of political than military value, for it dealt a severe blow at Turkish and German influence in Persia.

On February 8, 1915, the Turkish cruiser Midirli (formerly the German warship Breslau) fired upon the Russian port of Jalta on the Crimean Peninsula, opposite Balaklava. The Russian fleet retaliated by again bombarding Trebizond on the other side of the Black Sea.

About February 20-21, 1915, several small engagements were fought in the vicinity of Chorokh, as a result of which the Turks were driven beyond the river.

On February 22, 1915, news came from Petrograd to the effect that the Turks had indulged in cruel atrocities during their occupation of Ardanuten in Transcaucasia, near the Armenian frontier. The Tiflis correspondent of the "Russkoye Slovo" (the "Russian Word") stated that at first the Turks confined themselves to pillage and killed only fifteen civilians, but that after December 30, 1914, when news of the Russian occupation of Ardaham was received, the local Mussulmans had organized a systematic massacre. A hundred and fifty Armenians were led out into the streets and killed.

Fifty Armenians were removed from prisons, stripped naked, and compelled to leap into the abyss of Jenemdere, the "Devil's Gap," until one victim carried a Turk with him, when the remainder were shot. At Tamvot 250 Armenians were massacred and the women carried into captivity. The Turks did not permit the burial of the corpses, which were left to be devoured by dogs till the arrival of the Russians. Again, it was reported from Urumiah, northwestern Persia, that prior to the evacuation of towns between Julfa and Tabriz the Turks and Kurds, who were retiring before the Russian advance, plundered and burned the villages and put to death some of the inhabitants. At Salnac, Pagaduk, and Sarna orders were said to have been given by the Turkish commissioner for the destruction of the towns. All the Armenian inhabitants of Antvat were collected and, according to this message, 600 males were put to death, and the women, after being compelled to embrace the Islamic faith, were divided into parties and sent to various interior towns.

On March 19, 1915, the Armenian Red Cross fund in London issued some details supplied by an Armenian doctor named Derderian, who testified that the whole plain of Alashgerd was virtually covered with the bodies of men, women, and children. When the Russian forces had retreated from this district the Kurds fell upon the helpless people and shut them up in mosques. The men were killed and the women were carried away to the mountains. The Armenian Red Cross fund stated that there were 120,000 destitute Armenians in the Caucasus at that time.

As war in itself is not far removed from being a wholesale, organized atrocity on a large scale, it is always advisable to accept such accusations with extreme reserve and to consider the probability of their having been perpetrated. In the case of Turk and Kurd versus Armenian, however—and unfortunately—there is little reason to doubt even the most gruesome stories that could possibly be written. It is a feud as old as the hills, and no historic battle field of the world was ever so liberally drenched with human blood as the soil of Armenia.

Having expelled the Turks from the Transcaucasian region toward the end of February, 1915, the Russians again moved forward on the Asiatic front, sweeping aside, destroying and capturing detachments of Turks that opposed their advance.

By March 1, 1915, the Russians were approaching Oltichai along one of the main highroads toward Erzerum from the west. Another column advancing from the east encountered some Turks in the mountain passes south of Alashkort. These they defeated, capturing two guns. On February 28, 1915, the Russian troops operating in the coast region occupied the port of Khopa on the Black Sea, eighteen miles southwest of Batum. This port was of great military value to the Turks.

On March 3, 1915, the Russian Army of the Caucasus, driving the Turkish forces before it, had reached the River Khopachas, the estuary of the Chorokh in Armenia. This move severed the route of Turkish reenforcements and supplies from Constantinople to the Caucasian frontier through Khlopa, Turkish Armenia, thereby isolating a big portion of Turkish territory. From Batum Russian troops advanced near the Turkish border, the Turks opposing them step by step. Russian warships from the Black Sea sprayed their shells over the shore and cleared a fifteen-mile strip of coast of Turkish barracks and troops, successively cutting off several lines of their communications by sea until, after a three days' battle, the last route was effectively closed. A number of Turkish coasting vessels, laden with ammunition and supplies, were also sunk.

According to an official Russian report issued on March 3, 1915, the number of Turkish prisoners who had passed through Pyatigorsk on their way to the interior of Russia (since Turkey entered the war) up to February 13, 1915, amounted to 527 officers and 49,000 men.

During February, 1915, the Turks had been nibbling at Egypt through the Sinai Peninsula. On the 25th of that month the allied squadrons had begun heavy firing on the Dardanelles. This decided the supreme Turkish war council early in March to recall most of the troops from Egypt and the Caucasus to defend the straits. By March 16, 1915, the Turks had lost so many important points in the Chorokh region that they completely abandoned to the Russians what positions they still held on the river.

On March 20, 1915, Petrograd announced that the Russian advance to the sea had deprived the enemy of all means of operating in the Transchorokh region or of transporting troops and munitions to Erzerum, and that the Turks had been put to flight near Olti. The road between Archava and Khopa, to the eastward, was strongly defended by the Turks in a series of stubbornly contested battles. The Russian advance created a panic throughout the Chorokh Valley; the inhabitants fled to the mountains, abandoning farms and villages. The mountain heights in the district of Ardanuch, however, were strongly fortified and still in Turkish possession. These fortifications had been built under German supervision, and the defense thereof was conducted by a German officer.

Hostilities were resumed in Persia during the last week in March, 1915, and on the 25th the Russians defeated the Turks in a violent, sanguinary battle at Atkutur, north of Bilman in northwestern Persia. The Turks were stated to have lost 12,000 in killed, wounded, and prisoners, as well as many guns. Preceding the Russian occupation of Salmac Plains in Azerbaijan province, northwest of Urumiah, hundreds of native Christians were rounded up by the Turks in the village of Haftdewan and massacred. Many of them were dragged out from the homes of friendly Mohammedans, who tried to hide them. The Russians on entering the village found 720 bodies, mostly naked and mutilated. The recovery of bodies from wells, pools, and ditches, and their interment kept 300 men busy for three days. The wailing of women intensified the horror of the scene. Surviving widows who were able to identify the bodies of their husbands insisted upon digging graves and burying the bodies. "Some of the victims had been shot. In other cases they were bound to ladders, and their heads, protruding through, were hacked off. Eyes were gouged out and limbs chopped off."

Messages from Urumiah confirmed earlier reports that more than 800 persons had already been killed in the neighborhood, and that more than 2,000 had died of disease.

A dispatch from Tiflis, Transcaucasia, dated April 24, 1915, stated that refugees who had reached the Russian line reported that the massacre of Armenians was being continued on an even greater scale. All the inhabitants of ten villages near Van were stated to have been killed. On being advised of massacres at Erzerum, Berjan, and Zeitun, and of the conditions at Van, the Katolikos, head of the Armenian Church at Etchmiadzin, near Erivan, cabled to President Wilson an appeal to the people of the United States to act on behalf of the Armenians.

The village governments or relief committees had managed to issue eight pounds of flour to each refugee in six weeks. A journey through Salmac three weeks after the outrages revealed unmistakable signs of the slaughter. Pools of blood still marked the "execution" places in Haftdewan. The caps of thirty-six victims lay where a mud wall had been toppled over them. A young Armenian named Hackatur related the story of his escape from a well in which the bodies of the dead had been crammed. He had fallen with the others and was flung into the well, but he managed to wriggle through the bodies lying on top of him, and escaped at nightfall.

At the end of April, 1915, after a slight lull, fresh activity broke out again in various regions of the Caucasian front. The campaign had almost come to a standstill owing to typhus. On the average, 150 men succumbed daily. The epidemic raged for a while under indescribably awful conditions. Every available doctor was hurried out, and several of them died of the disease. The Russians had cleared the Kurds out of the Alashkart valley and were now pushing forward in the direction of Olti. The fight for the valley centered on the possession of Klichgjaduk Pass, which would have been extremely useful to the Turks, could they have held it securely for a few days to enable them to complete a junction with their separated forces. The Russians "lay low" in strongly protected positions. The Turks came on, first obviously for reconnaissance, and were easily repulsed without the Russians making much display of force. Whatever may be said of the Turkish soldier, he is at all times a brave and self-reliant fighter. They advanced to make the real attack, supported by some mountain guns. But the Russian artillery continued to lie silent, and the Turkish attack developed with misplaced confidence and swept boldly up to the line of the Russian wire entanglements. Only sixty yards separated the combatants when, suddenly, a perfect tornado of fire rattled out from the Russian intrenchments. Maxims, mountain guns and rifles poured a deadly shower of shells and bullets into the closely packed thousands of Turks. With extraordinary courage the Osmanli still rushed into the trap, uttering fierce shouts of "Allahoo Akbar!" The Russians then broke from cover and some terrible bayonet work completed the task of securing the pass for the Russians.

By May 10, 1915, the Turks had been driven back to the southwest, leaving a large quantity of tents and munitions behind them. Farther south, from Sarikamish, a number of insignificant conflicts were kept up. Turkish stragglers formed partnerships with local professionals and organized companies of banditti; the Russians were kept busy clearing out the villages where these bands had established their headquarters, driving them into the hills. To the southeast, the pursuit of Halil Bey's defeated army continued during the first week in May. The battle had begun at Hantahta, near Urumiah, on April 29, 1915. Both sides lost heavily. In the beginning the Russians had held the Turks at bay, but the latter received reenforcements and on April 30, 1915, the Russians had to withdraw from Dilman. They intrenched themselves at Magonzhio, the first village on the way to Khori, whence they battered the Turks with their heavy artillery until the arrival of Russian reenforcements.

On May 14, 1915, it was announced from Washington that replies were being prepared at the State Department to a flood of communications from various parts of the country urging that steps be taken to protect Christians in Armenia and other regions under Turkish control. Assurance was given that the Department was doing all in its power to aid the Armenians. Mr. Morgenthau, our Ambassador at Constantinople, was instructed to make representations to the Turkish Government. It was at his request that Turkish regular troops were sent to Urumiah, Persia, to keep order.

The Russian consul at that place reported on May 15, 1915, that 6,000 Armenians had been massacred at Van, which has been the scene of so many similar outrages during the last twenty years. On May 23, 1915, a detachment of Russian soldiers occupied the town of Van, in Asiatic Turkey, thus bringing the eagerly expected relief to the Armenians, who were besieged by the Turks—besieged in their own country by their own countrymen. Upon the arrival of the Russians the Turks retreated in the direction of Bitlis.

The Russian successes in the Van region included the occupation of Baslan; in the capture of Van itself they took twenty-six guns, a great quantity of war materials and provisions, as well as the Government Treasury. A considerable part of the town was destroyed by fire. All the foreigners residing there were reported as safe. By June 6, 1915, the Russians had the whole Van region and part of the Sanjak of Mush in their hands. They had practically annihilated Halil Bey's original corps and cleared the Turkish troops out for many miles around. A Turkish offensive in the Province of Azerbaijan ended in a complete breakdown. On their right wing the Russians occupied Turkish territory between the old frontier and the line of the rivers Chorokh and Tortun and the mountain range of Tchakhir Baba. A violent counterattack made by the Turks at Zinatcher was repulsed. In the course of an engagement in the valley of Oltichai 200 Cossacks charged on horseback to the trenches, where they dismounted. Leaving their well-trained horses to look after themselves, the Cossacks dashed into the Turks and put them to the sword. Two days later a Turkish official report from Constantinople via wireless to Berlin and London very briefly announced: "On the Caucasian front we occupied enemy positions in the district of Olti, on the Russian border of Transcaucasia."

The operations in the Dardanelles apparently had but little effect on Turkish activity in the Caucasus, for by June 19, 1915, they had replaced the Ninth Army Corps which had been captured by the Russians at Sarikamish, and had also restored and supplied with ammunition the Tenth and Eleventh Corps, which were seriously reduced in numbers by fighting and disease. The main Turkish concentration was taking place about this time against Olti, Melo, and Kiskin, outside of which line the First and Sixth Corps and the remainder of Halil Bey's army were drawn up. Here the Turks undertook some cautious offensive maneuvers, besides attempting to prevent the Russians from outflanking Erzerum. Some of the Kurdish leaders who were responsible for the Armenian massacres in the Van district voluntarily surrendered to the Russians and were deported to the interior with their dependents.

On June 20, 1915, in a battle near Olti, fifty-five miles west of Kars, 200 Russians were killed and prisoners and war materials were taken. By June 24, 1915, the Russians had occupied Gob, a town twenty-five miles north of Lake Van. A general movement of Russian troops toward Bitlis, where the armies of two Turkish commanders were concentrated, pointed to a favorable situation in the Caucasus from the Russian standpoint. Gob and Bitlis are connected by several comparatively good roads. But matters now began to quiet down somewhat—activities on both sides decreased. Russian sentiment had grown strong in North and Central Persia, a fact accentuated by the spirit displayed among the Moslem sects. Various isolated mountain tribes met the Russians with declarations of allegiance—obviously the safest policy to adopt with a powerful conqueror. Disease and famine stalked through the smoldering district of Van; only one doctor was available for 40,000 people—a large number of them in dire need of medical assistance.

In the first week of July, 1915, lively fighting was reported to have occurred north and south of Lake Van and south of Olti. A Turk force of 30,000 men, concentrated to the east of Bitlis, were being hard pressed by the Russians. Organized massacre of Armenians in Bitlis was regarded as an indication that the Turks intended to retreat from that point. They had also distributed 40,000 rifles among Kurds in the Mush Valley for use against Armenians.

Up to July 6, 1915, there had been only an artillery duel in the coast region, and a Russian motor boat sank a Turkish sailing vessel. South of the Kara Dagh range a Russian detachment encountered a regiment of Turkish infantry with artillery, machine guns, and two squadrons of cavalry. The Turks were again reported as coming off second best with considerable damage inflicted upon them. A Turkish offensive west of Ahlavat also failed.

After the Russians penetrated to Mush (eighty-three miles south of Erzerum), and Plian, Halil Bey, commander of the Turkish forces in the Caucasus, reorganized his army, bringing its strength up to 90,000, including six divisions of infantry, one of cavalry, and a large body of Kurds. General Eudenitch, the Russian commander, thus found himself confronted with the alternative of hastily attempting to concentrate his forces in the face of a strong Turkish army, or to retreat and thus expose a large Armenian population to Turk and Kurdish revenge. The main Russian army withdrew along the right bank of the Euphrates, the Turks occupying the left bank, July 22-25, 1915, being held in partial check by rear-guard actions.

On August 1, 1915, Halil Bey's forces came into contact with a considerable body of Russians at Palantchen, on the left bank of the Euphrates, twelve miles southwest of Kara Kilissa. The Russians had taken positions on a line extending from the northeast to the southwest from Darabi, six miles north of Kara Kilissa, to Djamschato, six miles southwest of the important Akhtunski Pass, covering the roads to Erivan, in Transcaucasia. In opposing this front the Turks exposed their communications, then 150 miles long, to attack from the direction of Sarikamish. The violent and picturesque fighting that developed during the first week of August will be described in the next volume.

The Turkish and Persian borders had meanwhile settled down to comparative quiet. Up to this stage the Russian commander had made no attempt to advance to Erzerum, though there were strong grounds for belief that the defenses of that fortress were by no means so strong as had been supposed or represented.

Russia was waiting her time in this theatre of war: her object was merely to hold the gate. She had just suffered severe reverses in Galicia and the Carpathians, and was now fighting desperately to avoid the great enveloping movement engineered by all the skill and weight of Von Hindenburg and Von Mackensen on her own territory of Poland and Russia itself.[Back to Contents]