Jay Winter, Yale Üniversitesi

“The Great War and the Revolution in Violence, 1914-1918”

The industrialization of warfare exponentially increased the lethality of all weapons and in particular, that of artillery, which killed 80 percent of the ten million men who died in the war. My subject is this revolution in violence and its manifestation in changing the character of combat and in blurring, if not obliterating, the distinction between military and civilian targets in war. Long-range artillery shelling, bombardment of urban centres from the air, and submarine warfare all ensured that increasing numbers of civilians would die in the 1914-18 war. And in an imperial war, the subversion of empires was a tactic used by both sides, further endangering ethnic minorities whose loyalties were, in the eyes of the high command, suspect. The emergence of concentration camps for interned civilians and the removal of civilians in war zones on both sides of the conflict accelerated the totalization of war and further endangered civilians in the violent post-war period.

 

 

Burak Gülboy, İstanbul Üniversitesi

“Considering the First World War in the Context of Clausewitz's 'Absolute War' Dystopia”

Until 1914, the international system has functioned within a framework of European centered values. Within this scope, both state of war and state of peace represented times of “continuation of politics with different tools” constituting a meaning in Clausewitzian sense. In other words, when diplomacy fails in resolving a problem, war was the continuation. However war was made only for forcing the opponent to sit on the table for diplomatic negotiations. So it could be argued that both diplomacy and war were the basic tools of the European system until the First World War. In his most famous book “On War”, Clausewitz names this version of war as “real war” and in his sense, war is a mean  that the states use to construct the peace which they could as much as possible. On the other hand in order to define the real war Clausewitz followed a philosophical path through explaining what real war was not by using the term “absolute war”. For that purpose he designed a dystopia, in which war cease to be a mean but becomes an end within itself, thus war is not made for continuation of relations but made for pure destruction of the opponent. Such war, would be not the tool of the states, as they will be dictated by the needs of motivation and material which would serve for the destruction. In such a state of dystopia, all the states would get lost in fighting until one of the opponents is totally destroyed. The means for building the state of peace gets totally lost and forgotten. In general, the First World War is called as a “total war” in the literature of history. However, the concept “total war” has been conferred to the literature by Eric von Ludendorff. According to this definition of the concept, a nation whose existence and survival is under threat should prepare and fight with all of their resources at hand to counter the existing threat and earn the right to prevail. In such a struggle, the citizens would sacrifice their basic luxuries and their liberties for the goodwill of the state and the forces of the state should be put under the management of strong decision makers who would lead the fight for survival. It could be argued that the First World War, which can be labeled as a novelty in the history of war, has both demolished the set of values of the international system which had evolved before and reestablished the structure of the future system of international relations. In that sense both pre and post eras of World War supplements important fields of research for the political scientists. This study aims at analyzing the First World War within the context of Clausewitz’s dystopia of “absolute war”.

 

 

Feroze Yasamee, Manchester Üniversitesi

“The Ottoman Decision for War: a Fresh Look”

 

The Ottoman Empire’s decision to enter the First World War on the side of the Central Powers was a complex affair, the product of three months of internal debate, and of calculation and re-calculation in the face of a rapidly changing war situation in Europe. Detailed explanation is hampered by the dearth of reliable Ottoman sources of information. At the same time, the decision needs to be placed in the context of the Ottoman Empire’s exceptional external weakness and insecurity in 1914, resulting from its defeats in the Tripolitanian and Balkan wars, its inability to secure foreign allies or partners, and its exposure to a Concert diplomacy which posed a growing threat to its independence and territorial integrity. Given this, the outbreak of war between the European Powers furnished an opportunity for escape, from diplomatic isolation and the tutelage of the European Concert to the security of a German-led alliance. Critics then and since have argued that the Ottoman Empire would have done better to remain neutral, but this claim is open to question: neutrality was not a risk-free option, and there was no guarantee that Ottoman neutrality would be respected. The decision to join the Central Powers was reasonable. This raises another question: what kind of war did the Ottoman leadership expect? How long would it last? Where would it be fought? What contribution could the Ottoman Empire make to the Central Powers’ military victory, or at least, to the achievement of an acceptable compromise peace? What gains (not just territorial) could the Ottoman Empire hope to make? All these aspects require elucidation if the decision for war is to be explained and evaluated. Even after the conclusion on 2 August 1914 of the German alliance which bound it in principle to enter the war, the Ottoman Empire faced numerous practical obstacles to belligerency. These were domestic, in the shape of divisions within the Ottoman political leadership; diplomatic, in the shape of the uncertain intentions of the Ottoman Empire’s Balkan neighbours, Bulgaria and Rumania in particular; military, in the shape of the Ottoman Empire’s naval vulnerability, and uncertainty as to how and where its military forces should be deployed; and financial, in the shape of its inability to fund a major war, or even a protracted mobilisation, from its own resources. Explaining how these obstacles were overcome is crucial to understanding Ottoman participation in the war. Finally, attention should be paid to the prospects facing the Ottoman Empire when it eventually entered the war at the end of October 1914. By then, the war was developing in ways which had not been anticipated in early August. Hopes of a rapid German military victory in Europe, and of a war fought with limited Ottoman participation, were giving way to new uncertainties: regarding the war’s duration, its geographical scope, possible hostile interventions by the Balkan states and Italy, and the military, political and diplomatic challenges which the Ottoman Empire might have to face.

 

 

Feroz Ahmad, Yeditepe Üniversitesi

“Unionist Failure to Stay out of the War in October–November 1914”

 

After the catastrophe of the Balkan Wars for the Ottoman Empire, The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) was determined to have an alliance with a Great Power. The Unionists’ preference was Great Britain, then France and even Russia. Having failed to get an alliance with one of the Entente Powers they turned to German. Berlin only signed the alliance on 2 August after the European war had broken out.

Like the other Powers, the CUP was hoping for a short war and had no intention of becoming a belligerent. Having signed the alliance with Germany it had included an escape clause that it would enable it to stay out of the conflict. But Britain’s decision on 2 August to confiscate two battle ships being built for it in British yards, the arrival of the two German war ships in the Marmara on 10 August, weakened its position. But the Unionists were determined out of the war even though they had handed over the army and the navy to Berlin.

The crucial problem was one of the Ottoman treasury: it was bankrupt. The Unionists turned to Britain for a loan. But they were turned down because the Entente failed to take the CUP seriously. The Unionists were forced to turn to Berlin for the desperately needed loan. Berlin agreed to provide the money providing Istanbul because a belligerent. The CUP was evenly divided between the war faction and peaceniks. The war faction led by Enver and Cemal Pashas agreed to permit the Ottoman navy commanded by a German admiral to sail into the Black Sea and attack Russian ships so that the Porte could claim that the Russians had attacked Ottoman ships. But Admiral Souchon, taking his orders from Berlin, attacked Russian ports. The Entente Powers then declared war on Istanbul and she could no longer stay our of the World War.

 

 

Gül Tokay, Bağımsız Araştırmacı

“Ottoman Diplomacy and the Origins of the Great War: A Reinterpretation”

 

This paper investigates the origins of the World War I through the correspondence of Ottoman diplomats between 1912 and 1914. The emphasis, however, is on how Ottoman officialdom interpreted the internationalization of the Adrianople Question during the course of the Balkan Wars and after, leading to the Great War.

Within this framework the article has threefold. Firstly, it briefly reassesses the negotiations prior and during the Balkan Wars and discusses why a local war was the only option for all by October 1912. Secondly, it discusses the crisis over the Ottomans’ regaining Adrianople during the Second Balkan War. Many, especially, the British Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey believed the origins of World War I were in the Balkan crisis, more so, in the negotiations around Ottomans’ regaining of Adrianople. Despite, Grey’s efforts, with the Russian threat on entering Ottoman Armenia, when Ottomans refused to return Adrianople, Russo-German antagonism became irreversible.

Lastly, the article discusses the views of the Ottoman envoys and highlights the split in their opinion on the eve of the WWI. When the war became more or less inevitable, while the Ottoman envoys serving in London, St Petersburg insisted on strict neutrality to avoid worse from happening, the ones in Berlin and Vienna were convinced that the Ottomans should join the war with Central Powers without any delays.

Within this framework, the present article discusses the origins of the World War I and hopes to partially fill an existing gap not only in the historiography of the late Ottoman period but it also tries to contribute to the current debates on the Great War.

 

 

Iskender Gilyazov, Kazan Üniversitesi

“The First World War in Contemporary Russian Historiography: New Areas of Research”

 

For a long time in the Soviet (Russian) historiography the First World War was named as the "forgotten war" (this definition was given by the famous historian Mikhail Pokrovsky). Historians indeed were more interested in the revolution and the civil war that came after. Therefore it can be said that in Soviet times the history of the World War I was studied formally in many respects. In the last 15-20 years, however, this topic is experiencing a true renaissance in Russia. This can be seen in the publication of a considerable number of sources (documents, memoirs) and in expanding the perspectives of modern historiography—historians start to study topics that have almost never been examined until recently. The centenary of the First World War had a certain influence on the growth of the research interest in the First World War–-at the state level we can notice an attempt to revive the historical memory of the events happened a century ago.

In this report major trends of the contemporary Russian historiography of the First World War are examined and analyzed. A particular emphasis is placed on such issues as the history of captivity and the history of the peoples of Russia in the war.

 

 

Mehmet Ö. Alkan, İstanbul Üniversitesi

“Preperations for War: Nationalism, Militarism, Youth, Friends and Enemies”

 

 

 

Odile Moreau, Montpellier Üniversitesi

“Ottoman Military Reforms at the eve of World War First”

 

In my paper I propose an approach to the Ottoman Military reforms on the eve of World War First. In fact, the unexpected heavy defeats experienced during the Balkan Wars (1912-1913) provoked urgent military reforms to promote a Military Renaissance.

In a first time, I will shed light on the reforms taken immediately after the Balkan Wars in 1913 and the official ask for a German military mission. The contract between the Ottoman Empire and Germany was officially signed in October 1913 and consequently the German military mission led by Major General Liman von Sanders arrived in Istanbul in December 1913. However, the arrival of the German military mission generated a diplomatic incident among the European countries and a quite uneasy situation.

In a second time, I will examine the Ottoman Military organisation in 1914 and the last reforms undertaken before the war. In January 1914 Enver Pasha became Genelkurmay başkanı and initiated strong reforms to restore discipline and order among the Ottoman army and to make it more efficient. Ottoman recruitment system had been updated by means of a new law for military service in May 1914, which aimed to introduce radical changes. After the declaration for Ottoman general mobilization on August 2, additional changes were introduced to face the recurrent lack of manpower.

 

 

Tilman Ludke, Freiburg Üniversitesi

“(Mis-)using Political Islam: German Expectations from an Alliance with the Ottoman Empire and their Disappointment during and after World War”

 

Of all the alliances concluded during the twentieth century, the German-Ottoman one of August 1914 has to be regarded as one of the most unusual. It was an alliance between an industrialized European Great Power and a non-industrialised Muslim-run Empire. What made it particularly strange was that it was an alliance between a potential colonizer and the Ottoman Empire that had long been subjected to European colonial encroachment.

The Ottoman government in 1914 was convinced that the empire needed a strong ally: no other course would be able to guarantee the Empire’s continued existence during and after a European war that, for much of 1914, did not seem imminent, but certainly conceivable. The Ottoman view of alliance thus was defensive. Offers of alliance to Russia and France being rejected, the Ottoman government at last turned to Germany. The offer was initially rejected, too, but later accepted: Germany and the Ottoman Empire concluded an, at first, secret alliance on August 2, 1914. It is not difficult to explain why Ottoman endeavours failed: the Empire was weak, both internally and externally. Why, then, did Germany accept this alliance, given the fact of Ottoman economic and military weakness, which to boot was well known to German military and political decision-makers? The answer was, curiously, Islam – that is to say, the supposed existence of a global Pan-Islamic movement that could be harnessed in Germany’s interests. An Ottoman-declared jihad thus was the supposed “secret weapon” Germany hoped to acquire by an alliance with the Ottoman Empire.

German hopes were soon dashed. Jihad was indeed proclaimed in Istanbul in November 1914, but the proclamation utterly failed to produce the expected results. A protracted German Pan-Islamic propaganda campaign involving both traditional means of propaganda (leaflets, placards, pictures etc.) and expeditions sent to Muslim rulers and religious leaders did little to improve the situation. Expectations from the revolutionary and stirring potential of Pan-Islam seemed to have been greatly exaggerated.

But, arguably, what Pan-Islam (or “Islam as an ideology”) failed to do externally, it more than made up for internally. The paper argues that “Islam” did serve as an important weapon during the First World War—yet in a way that was completely contrary to German interests. What did materialize was the transformation of Islam into a kind of Muslim nationalism within the Ottoman Empire: it did not only sustain the Ottoman war effort until the armistice of Mudros, but also served as a highly valuable motivating force during the Turkish war of independence – which eventually allowed the Turkish Republic to emerge as one of the few non-colonies, truly independent countries of the Middle East.

 

 

Namık Sinan Turan, İstanbul Üniversitesi

“The Process of Construction of the Pan-Islamism and Its Effects in the Period until the First World War”

 

The economic and political power struggle in the 19th century has changed the relation between Europe and the Ottoman administrators over the empire’s heritage into an existential struggle. As well as diplomatic and economic tools, political language and iconographic elements have a considerable importance within this struggle. Legitimacy crisis is not only a problem of the Ottoman Empire but also the most important problem of Austria-Hungarian and Russian Empires. A need for new ideological tools is felt in order to protect the societal structures of multinational and cosmopolitan empires. It is inevitable that ideologies like Pan-Germenism or Pan-Slavism create an inspiration for reactionary movements of similar quality or political reactions in the Islam world, most of which live under colonial rule. Pan-Islamism becomes an issue of the most heated debates beginning from the second half of the 19th century both in European politics and particularly in Ottoman politics, especially from Abdulaziz’s last years and on. Pan-Islamism, which was used more as a political term starting from the end of 1890’s, carries a rather negative meaning in the Western political life. The translation of the word in Ottoman is İttihad-ı İslam. The background of this policy rests in the colonization of Islamic lands that are out of Ottoman Empire in the 19th century by the European states, the psychological atmosphere in these lands rising from the expectations of the Muslims from the Ottoman Empire, and the New Ottoman opposition’s identity crisis after the Westernization experience which result in seeing adaptation of the Islam ideology as the only survival of the Ottoman Empire. However, the most negative attitude of the Western public opinion caused Babıâli to act precautious. Nevertheless “Islam union” became a frequently used phrase during the Balkan crisis and Russian war in the first years of Abdulhamid’s rule. In 1880s, it was a common attitude to present Pan-Islamism as a thread. No matter it is a politician, an orientalist or a voyager, this anxiety could be felt in any field of the Western literature. Without any doubt, Abdulhamid’s foreign policy had something to do with it. Abdulhamid diplomacy used each and every effort to gain the psychological support of the foreign Muslim public opinion showed a power that did not exist in real, as something real and tried to turn it into a bargaining power. In this presentation, Pan-Islamism concept will be evaluated starting from 19th century, particularly from Abdulhamid II. years to the First World War from the aspects of how it was evaluated, and how it was used as a political and diplomatic tool. Thus, the background and the establishment of Cihad-Ekber and Pan-Islamist discourse in the first years of the war will be evaluated.

 

 

Behlül Özkan, Marmara Üniversitesi

“Ottomanism, Ottoman Vatan and World War I”

 

The presentation chronicles how the spatial consciousness of the Ottoman ruling elite was transformed from an imperial vatan to a national one between 1908 and 1923. The loss of territories was among the foremost factors having a deep impact upon how the physical and mental boundaries of the vatan were imagined. During this turbulent era, three ideologies – namely Islamism, Ottomanism, and pan-Turkism – challenged each other to become hegemonic in politics with the objective of maintaining the Ottoman Empire’s territorial integrity. Although there were major differences among these contested ideologies, all three comprised imperial visions about vatan. With the occupation of various parts of Anatolia after World War I and the subsequent victory of the national struggle, a fourth ideology—Turkish nationalism—emerged with the dramatic objective of establishing a national state within the national borders governed by a national assembly and protected by a national army. Turkish nationalism overcame the major predicament of Islamism, Ottomanism, and pan-Turkism that was saving the Ottoman state and vatan by imagining a new state and vatan. By doing so, it gradually disqualified the other three ideologies and became hegemonic when the war ended in 1922.