1915 insurgency in the Ottoman Empire

Ottoman counter-insurgency operations (1915)
Part of the Middle Eastern theatre of World War I
Date Spring 1915 – Fall 1915 Location Anatolia
Belligerents
Armenian national movement Supported by: Russian Empire	Ottoman Empire
Commanders and leaders
Boghos Nubar Manukian (Van) Ter-Minasian (Sasun) Murad (Sivas)	Enver Pasha Süleyman Askerî Vehip Pasha Kerim Pasha
Units involved
Militia of ARF	Special Organization 3nd Army 4rd Army

1915 insurgency in the Ottoman Empire also unconventional warfare of Ottomans was the Ottoman counter-insurgency warfare during World War I. It was waged in the 3nd Army and 4rd Army operational areas in Anatolia between the Ottoman military and special units against the Armenian militia – historically the Armenian fedayi – of the Armenian national movement. The irregular forces on both sides were also engaged at the battles of the Caucasus Campaign, but 1915 insurgency in the Ottoman Empire is limited in the Ottoman controlled lands behind the Russian and Ottoman Armies. The Ottoman Empire used special forces of Special Organization, which was established in 1913, designed to fight insurgency and function as an intelligence service. Ottoman operations against the Armenian insurgency evolved into an operational existence, “General Counter-Insurgency Campaign,” over a six-month period from April to mid-September 1915. Insurgency in the Ottoman Empire is not limited to 1915 which Armenian rebellions extends the story.

The 1915 Ottoman campaign against the Armenian national movement was the last counterinsurgency campaign waged by the Ottoman Empire prior to its collapse and partition. The significance of Ottoman operations from the military history perspective was only a small proportion of a population, if actively encouraged and armed by outside nations and forces, is necessary for the conduct of an insurgency operations. Ottoman Armenians as a population did not revolted against the Ottoman Empire.

Foreign Support

The Russians exploited inter-communal strife in the Ottoman Empire in the service of their goals. At the onset of the World War One, Russian Empire was arming Armenians, Assyrians, and Kurds to fight against Ottomans.

One of the Russia's aims in the First World War was stated in August 1914 by Sergey Sazonov "Armenians and Assyrians would be great help in the [Russian] war effort as long as they were under Russian control". The Russian high command also prepared its operations on “arming Armenians and encouraging them to rise in rebellion” The idea of an independent and united Armenia was the main goal of the Armenian national movement during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Russia used that goal. The insurgency/counter-insurgency waged in an area where vast territories were contiguous and populations overlapped. Kurds, Armenians, Circassians, Greeks, Tatars, Caucasian Turks, Assyrians, and Cossacks among others inhabited both empires and moved back and forth between them. Aram Manukian was born in Russia, Russian Armenian, but in fact he spend most of his life in the Empire as activist and known as Aram Pasha. Before the war, a representative meeting of Armenians assembled in Tiflis. Tsar asked Armenian's loyalty and support for Russia in the conflict. On 20 September, convinced that war with the Ottomans was inevitable, Sergey Sazonov approved Illarion Ivanovich Vorontsov-Dashkov’s request to arm the Ottoman Armenians and “provoke their uprising at an opportune moment.” Count Illarion Ivanovich Vorontsov-Dashkov consulted with the Mayor of Tbilisi Alexandre Khatsian, the primate of Tbilisi, Bishop Mesrop, and the prominent civic leader Dr. Hakob Zavriev about the creation of Armenian volunteer detachments. Russians provided 200,000 rubles to the Dashnaks (Armenian Revolutionary Federation, ARF). Russia thought these armed units also help “palliative to the Armenian population in Russia, and give advice [military assistance] on the Ottoman terrain and more important it was a stimulus [signal] to the Ottoman Armenians to take up arms”.

In the fall of 1914, Armenian national delegation chairmen Boghos Nubar was instrumental in coordinating with the British government regarding Alexandretta, Mersin and Adana. ARF theoretician Mikayel Varandian made similar overtures regarding “self-defense” structure (military branch) of ARF (Armenian Revolutionary Federation, ARF). Armenians had volunteered to “support a possible disembarkation at Alexandretta, Mersin or Adana” and, moreover, promised “valuable assistance could also be provided by the Armenians of mountainous districts, who, if supplied with arms and ammunition, would uprise.” The British consul at Aleppo reported that “... [they] welcome with joy a swift British or even French occupation,” on October 1914. Winston Churchill's Dardanelles Campaign is widely known. British planed to invade amphibiously near Alexandretta before Dardanelles operation. Idea originally presented by Boghos Nubar in 1914. It was planned as a landing in the Alexandretta to severe Capitol from Syria, Palestine, and Egypt by Field Marshal Lord Horatio Kitchener. Alexandretta was an area with a Christian population and was the strategic center of the Empire's railway network — its capture would have cut the empire in two. Kitchener was working on logistics, local connections, intelligent development with local support, as late as March 1915. Planning for Alexandre landing was also the beginning of Britain’s successful effort to start an Arab revolt. The reasons for the Alexandre landing replaced by Dardanelles was well argued position. Alexandria landing dropped from announcements beginning in March 1915. Two main reasons cited; militarily the amphibious landing required more resources which France could not allocate, and politically France did not want British in their sphere of influence, which Britain agreed to this position in 1912. French Minister of Navy was dispatched to London to express the objection. Later in 1916 there was an French-Armenian agreement in which Armenians' contribution linked to Cilicia region being given to Armenians.

Formation

There were Armenian military officers, such as Tovmas Nazarbekian and Movses Silikyan, also ethnic units (Georgians, Armenians, Greeks) which fought regular warfare in the Russian Caucasian Army of the Caucasus Military District. These units engaged in the Caucasus Campaign. However, Russia also operated units which used guerrilla tactics, such as Armenian volunteer units. Armenian volunteer units were established by ARF (Armenian Revolutionary Federation, ARF). Unit commanders were ARF's most famous military operatives, such as Andranik Ozanian, Drastamat Kanayan, Karekin Pastermadjian who was an Ottoman Deputy before the war , Hamazasp Srvandztyan, Arshak Gafavian, Sargis Mehrabyan. At the establishment units had nearly 20,000 Armenians responded to the call (Armenian volunteer units also known as druzhiny), of which only 7,000 were given arms. Hunchaks (Social Democrat Hunchakian Party) opposed to the structure and belatedly formed Grigor Avsharian (Gagik Avsharian) legion of 1,500 men and Pandukht legion of 350 men. The numbers were initial establishment values. The Armenian units were small, mobile, and well adapted to the semi-guerrilla warfare. Russia also established same formations from Assyrian population in Urmia further south of Russia. Urmia was a Persian Empire town but Russia established a foot in the region during Persian Constitutional Revolution just after signing Anglo-Russian Entente. As units of semi-guerrilla warfare they blend to population when they were not in combat and did not have unique identification (uniform). The type of weapons (Russian military weapons) separated Armenian volunteer units from ethnic militia of Armenians (Armenian fedayi) which also operated in the same region.

The ethnic militia of Armenians, historically called Armenian fedayi, operated in the region. In March 1915, Entente questioned the size and shape of the Armenian fedayi inside the Ottoman Empire. The Armenian National Defense Committee produced a report in July, “rely on 25,000 Armenian insurgents in Cilicia and could rely on 15,000 more from nearby provinces.” American Ambassador in Constantinople by a confidential report [cabled in May] to Washington:

It would seem as Van Armenian insurrection to help the Russians had broken out at Van. Thus a former deputy here, one Pastormadjian who had assisted our proposed railway concessions some years ago, is now supposed to be fighting with the Turks with a legion of Armenian volunteers. These insurgents are said to be in possession of a part of Van and to be conducting guerrilla warfare in a county where regular military operations are extremely difficult. To what extent they are organized or what successes they have gained it is impossible for me to say; their numbers have been variously estimated but none puts them at less than ten thousand and twenty-five thousand is probably closer to the truth.

— Henry Morgenthau, Sr.

The Ottoman Empire used special forces of Special Organization, which was established in 1913, designed to fight insurgency and function as an intelligence service.

Information operations

Russia made sure Ottoman Empire knew the agreements, declarations, official visits to Armenian clergy and national offices . The Tsar promised autonomy to six Ottoman Armenian vilayets as well as the two Russian-Armenian provinces. Russian promises were trumpeted by ARF leaders, and Armenian solidarity was invoked in the press. The promises were circulated as a report into Ottoman territory for their [Armenians in the Ottoman Empire] uprising. There was some response to Russian dissemination [propaganda?]. Ottoman accusations of widespread desertion of Armenian soldiers and civilians passing to the Russian side were corroborated by German, Austrian and American sources even by Boghos Nubar The morale generated by these activities on the Ottoman side was destructive. Talat Bey claimed before the war 'if war is declared Armenian soldiers will not fight against [at best be inactive], and if ottoman army retreats they will remain behind the conflict to hinder transport and communication”.

Ottoman Empire proclaimed the 'holy war' on 13 November 1914 at a ceremony in the Sultan Mehrned V's presence and with the relics of the Prophet. Text was carefully crafted to state territories. Five juridical opinions legitimized the call, for the first time called for all Muslims—those in territories ruled by the colonial powers of Britain, France and Russia—to rise against. The Sharif of Mecca's,Sharif Husayn, support on this fetwa was critical. Sharif Husayn refused to associate himself by stating that it may provoke a blockade, and possibly bombardment, of the ports of the Hijaz by the British. In Egypt and India juridical opinions asserted that it was obligatory to obey the British. The reaction from the wider Islamic world was muted. Russian army did not have problem getting conscripts from Muslim communities in Azerbaijan.

Counter-insurgency campaign

The Ottoman Empire intelligence put the distribution of Russian arms to Armenian volunteers on 7 September 1914. Armenian units began their operations earlier than Russian Caucasian Army. Ottoman Empire and Russia were in state of war before the official decleration of war.

It is fair to say that in September and October of 1914, the irregular forces of Russia and the Ottoman Empire were in an undeclared, but active, state of war in the Black Sea frontier provinces of their empires.

The first conflict was inside the Ottoman Empire at Hopa on October 5, 1914. The sides were Ottoman Special forces commanded by Riza and other side was a guerrilla group. Ottoman intelligence service named one segment as "Armenian çete," which corresponds to Armenian guerrilla, and the other segment as a “Russian force”. The guerrilla force was 800 militia armed with Russian weapons. At the same day, Ottoman Special forces under Sakir and Yakup Cemil battled Russian-organized Armenian guerrillas around Erzurum. A fact of irregular warfare war was difficulty in decoding the opposing force.

In the early October, The Third Army intelligence reported “Russian-born Armenians who had military experience in the Russian army, were crossing over into the empire with money, maps, and weapons” [semi-guerrilla warfare]. The 4th Reserve Cavalry Regiment uncovered a cache of "Russian rifles" hidden in Hasankale in the Armenian home on October 20. Armed caches were not unique, but the reported size and type of rifles were unique. An Ottoman summary report correctly identified that the Armenians were moving into Mus, Bitlis, Van, from Erivan on October 23. Size and location matches the Yudenich report who was traching Vorontsov-Dashkov engagement plan at the time and confirmed that Dro was positioned for operations against Dogubeyaz-Van and Vardan was toward the frontier (aim to cut the link to Van) opposite Van.

In November 1914, The Armenian volunteers indeed assisted Anatolian Armenian communities in preparing for their 'self defense.'

The “official” Ottoman entry into World War I came in November 1914, after three months of neutrality. The Ottoman Navy destroyed a Russian gunboat on 29 October 6:30 A.M. at Battle of Odessa (1914). Russia declared war on November 1, 1915. The first conflict with Russia was the Bergmann Offensive of Caucasus Campaign on November 2, 1915. Ottoman official State of war is November 2, 1915. The war drew in all the world's economic great powers, which were assembled in two opposing alliances: the Allies and the Central Powers. Russia was among the Allies. The agrarian Ottoman Empire entered the Great War among the Central Powers.

On December 13, 1914, Vice Admiral R. H. Peirse, East Indies Station, ordered Captain Frank Larkin of HMS Doris to Alexandretta. At the same time, in the same area, Russian cruiser Ækoid and the French cruiser Requin were performing similar operations. Captain Frank Larkin began his operations on December 19 in which effectively destroyed communication lines, derailed trains (military-civilian) and most notably closing the junction “Duert Yol” assisted by “the Ottoman Armenian railway officials themselves smashing the electric batteries on the lines.” These activities continued into 1915. The Doris and her plundering were known by staff of the 4 Army, such that in some cases watched activities from a distance due to lack of available force to intervene. Ottomans combined these (Doris, Ækoid and Requin) with the internal reports about Armenian committee activities, which reinforced the notion that a significant threat existed to the vulnerable southeastern coast. Plundering, destruction and cooperation, Allied special forces units accompanied by Armenians, in the coastal zone was also visible to local population (non-Armenian) who used these facilities to transfer their goods.

In January 1915, the disaster at Battle of Sarikamish left around 52,000 soldiers spread over a 600-km front The Ottoman military activities seized under this dire fact. However General Viladamir Liakhov took a significant step in January 1915 by moving his forces against the small units left in the region, but he also ordered his Cossacks to kill Muslim natives on sight and burn every mosque and village, and reduced Artvin and the Chorokhi valley to a cinder. Cossacks had Armenian militias along them. Ottoman officials estimated that up to 30,000 Muslim males had been killed and thousands more women and children left without shelter in the winter. The case also reported by David Lang which stated that the only in the Chorokhi valley 45,000 Muslims died, leaving just 7,000 alive. Russia’s cabinet ministers, majority, backed the idea of deporting all Muslims from the provinces of Kars and Batumi and then stripping them of citizenship. Vorontsov-Dashkov ordered the deportation of some 10,000 Muslims living along the border into the interior of Russia. Later it was found that deportees were not ethnic Turks but in fact Ajars. The report prompted an investigation. The investigation found out that the deportees had not been guilty of hostile acts but, to the contrary, had been victims of Cossack and Armenian pogroms. This case was not isolated as there were Muslim villagers and nomads alike fleeing from the east in front of Russians [that is regular army and volunteers] during the spring 1915 advance.

On February 25, 1915 operations division of the Ottoman general staff send a cable to the field armies titled “increase security precautions.” What was the significance of this cable? Why did not Enver Pasha ordered security precautions at the onset of the war? Enver Pasha first time established an operational architecture that the army would use for dealing with the Armenian insurgency. What was the military meaning of this?

..In essence, the non-engaged army corps in the west had the capacity to manage internal threats in their areas of operation, while those in the east did no [so] (a) cipher alerted the armies [west] to increased dissident Armenian activity in Bitlis, Aleppo, Dörtyol, and Kayseri, and, (b) further more, identified Russian and French influence and activities in these areas. In particular, secret encoding books in French, Russian, and Armenian were discovered in Armenian homes in the city of Kayseri. (d) Moreover, commanders were ordered to disarm Armenian soldiers, (e) and remove them entirely from important headquarter and command centers. (f) The final measure fits a report that the Armenian Patriarchate of Constantinople was transmitting military secrets and dispositions to the Russians.

On February 26, 1915, a series of events that end up being the first "Armenian relocation". Alexandretta landing was not scrapped yet. Armenian insurgents were using a 34 kilometers strip along the railway from Alexandretta to communicate with the British navy. Ottomans acquired detailed operational information from the captured three Armenian insurgents on 12 February. Insurgents were blended into the local population. A military device “Heiostata” used by the Armenian insurgents, which required training in British military signaling. Ottomans reinforced the region with troops. Ottomans began to relocate the local Armenian population along 34 kilometers of the railway to prevent further incidents in early March. The population relocation drastically limited the insurgency activity. Small-scale deportations of Armenians had begun in February.

In early March 1915, the continuous rise in insurgency activities begun to effect operations. A sample set; (a) [east] The Third Army was concerned of the possibility of armed insurrection in Van Vilayet that they shifted forces to meet the threat, leaving Russian forces unchecked. (b) [west] Armenians in Tekirda established local cells by using the stored guns and ammunition for use in arming Armenian deserters. (c) [south] In the Fourth Army area, Armenian activity in Zeytun pinned the 22nd Regiment all through the month. (d) [All around] a common story "Armenian deserters from Maras created a cell and killed six gendarmes. The same cell hide into a monastery on March 23. When the army tried to capture them from the monastery, Monk's resisted and it turned into an uprising. The army forced the surrender of some 130 army deserters leaving the rest untouched on March 29, 1915, ending the uprising."

March 1915. The Russia was also unwilling to accommodate Armenian national movement's goal (sovereign Armenia). Russia wanted Armenia without Armenians. In March 1915, Minister of Agriculture Krivoshein stated to Sazonov that Van, Erzurum, and parts of Bitlis (limits of to the Russian advance in 1915) were suitable for Russian colonists. In April 1915, Nikolai Yudenich reported the following to Count Illarion Ivanovich Vorontsov-Dashkov:

The Armenians intend to occupy by means of their refugees the lands left by the Kurds and Turks, in order to benefit from that territory. I consider this intention unacceptable, because after the war, it will be difficult to reclaim those lands sequestered by the Armenians or to prove that the seized property does not belong to them, as was the case after the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78. I consider it very desirable to populate the border regions with a Russian element... with colonists from the Kuban and Don and in that way to form a Cossack region along the border.

On April 1, 1915, governor of Van dispatched a 19 page March report detailed with captured Armenian insurgency correspondences, summarized March insurgency activities, also outlined the insurgency arms and money smuggling operations, also included an insurgency plan [of a rebellion] beginning in Van, extending Bitlis, Erzurum, and Sabin Karabsar.

In April 1915, governor of Sivas Vilayet reported tracking the movements of large number of armed Armenian insurgents in the mountains. Insurgents required food and supply, which they could not acquire legally. The Governor's report to the military stated that unguarded Muslim villages were under threat and need assistance. Diyarbakir erupted in a rash of bombings later in the month and another uprising broke out in Zeytun.

On April 19, 1915, Ottoman fears were realized when the Armenians of Van Vilayet rose and seized control of the City of Van in fierce urban warfare. The conflict between Ottomans and Armenians began on 15 April at surrounding villages in the Vilayet. A Vilayet was an Ottoman administrative unit, province, which had a city with the same name. The lightly equipped forces and gendarmes were unequal to the task of building security, forcing the Army to divert regular units from an offensive in Iran to invest in the city. The urban warfare in and around City of Van was merciless. While Ottoman regulars and Kurdish militiamen besieged the town, Kurdish tribesmen roamed the outlying areas. Inside the town the well-armed Armenians held the advantage, and they, too, gave no quarter, exacting retribution on Muslim women and other non-combatants. The mixed population district called “old city” (downtown) and Muslim quarters were turned into rubble. The historical Ottoman military barracks and the Muslim architecture in the old city was dynamited. The rest of the Muslim quarters were burned down. The destruction in the Muslim part of the town File:Van bird’s eye view 1915.png and mixed region File:Van 1915 bird’s eye view.png “old city.” The size of the destruction in the region reported by American investigative mission and Vilayet Van begins on page 1839 at File:Report of Niles and Sutherland - Investigation through Eastern Turkish Vilayets.pdf.

General counter-insurgency campaign

Late April became a turning point in the counter-insurgency campaign.

Ottoman counter-insurgency policy was re-defined such that the threat definition included not only actuated but also also the potential. Beginning with April Ottomans began to react on various levels to Armenian insurgency; that included active conflict with the military (actual) and silent in the hideouts (potential). After April, there is a “General Counter-Insurgency Campaign.” The Ottomans believed that what happened in the Van vilayet was about to be repeated elsewhere. Ottoman operations against the Armenian insurgency evolved into an operational existence over a six-month period from April to mid-September. What was the reason in changing the military operation from specific counter-insurgency to general counter-insurgency campaign?

Kayseri Province was a “nodal point” and “most important cross road in Anatolia” for the Third Army. Ottoman Third Army could not survive without the Sivas to Erzurum supply route, which was designated as “northern line of communications”. The best way to kill Ottoman soldiers was to deprive them from supplies. Kayseri was the weak point, bottleneck, in that supply chain. By mid-April 1915, the Ottoman army possessed convincing and genuine intelligence that Armenian insurgents intended to disrupt “northern line of communications.” Since the October 1914, there was a constant intelligence that Armenian forces created caches of military supply in hideouts. In mid April, Ottoman intelligence analyzed the information on discovered and possible (unknown location) weapons, including rifles, bombs, pistols, and military explosives and concluded majority lay astride or adjacent to the northern line of communications.’ To point out the size and location “almost 5,000 rifles and tons of explosives were hidden in the cities of AkaIe, Bayburt, Elaziš (Harput), Kayseri, Erzincan, Erzurum, Malatya, and Sivas” For the Fourth Army situation was not different. Southern route was equally threatened by armed insurgency. In the Adana-Alexandretta (Dörtyol)-Aleppo area, Armenian insurgents were in direct contact with the British and French fleets. The prospect of an amphibious invasion [Ottomans did not know in mid-April that in mid-March Alexandretta landing was replaced with Dardanels] was an ever-present concern. Since the autumn of 1914, there had been frequent clashes between Ottoman gandermarie and Armenian insurgents in the areas of Adana, Bitlis, Malatya, Maraç, Urfa, and historically unstable region Zeytun had a large insurrection. Insurgent activities until mid April was low intensity conflict which insurgency applied selectively and with restraint to enforce compliance with the policies or objectives of Armenian national movement.

The military situation in mid-April summarized as

The intelligence reports, and associated message traffic, in the first four months of 1915 between the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of War, and the staffs of the Third and Fourth Armies show a joint appreciation that Armenian rebellion, terrorism, and weapons collection had erupted into a full-blown insurrection.

April – Begin

On April 24, 1915, Talat defined the Armenian insurrection as an existential threat to the Empire. This day is recognized as Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day. The Minister of the Interior Mehmed Talaat Bey with his order of April 24, 1915 requested arrest and detain at holding centers to be later court-martialed. The original position was stated in the s:Circular on April 24, 1915:

Armenian committees with their political revolutionary organizations (referring to Armenian national movement) ... The immediate closing down of the branches of the Nubar’s (referring to Boghos Nubar the chairman of the Armenian National Assembly and one of the founder of the AGBU), Hinjack (referring to Social Democrat Hunchakian Party) and Tashnak (referring to Armenian Revolutionary Federation) committees as well as of the similar organizations in the capital and in other provinces, seizing of all the documents and the material without any loses, arresting of the leaders and the members of the committees, of the people who have taken part in the activities, of the Armenians who are well known by the police forces, gathering of the suspicious people in an area in the towns so as to prevent their escape, launching of researches for weapons in suitable places have been found appropriate...

— Interior Minister Talat Bey

The order of April 24, 1915 also accompanied with the Ministry of War April 24 directive stated “the Armenians were a great danger to the war effort, especially in East Anatolia.” This directive ordered “localized” evacuations of Armenian fedayi and supporter s ('evacuations on engagement). Armenian fedayi, who did not have uniform, was actually be differentiated by being in the conflict ('engagement'). Beginning from April 24, 1915 Third and Fourth Armies gained the power to relocate Armenians from areas where insurgents engaged with them. Ministry of War used “Engaged” requirement on April 24, but this was revisited with more detailed definition of what defines the “conduct of rebel elements” and how to respond on 27 May.

April 24, 1915

Interior Minister Mehmed Talaat Bey

Mehmed Talat Bey's order on April 24, 1915

Mehmed Talat Bey to Martial Law Court

May

In early May 1915, conflict at Van vilayet was evolving, the the Russians were entering from the east, the British pushing on Baghdad from the south, and, most ominously, the British and French were storming ashore at Gallipoli. The simultaneous attacks on the military supply routes by insurgents stretched and faltered the Ottoman army and brought the military to the breaking point. Matters became alarming when in mid-May a Russian-Armenian army reached to city of Van driving out the garrison and massacring the population before setting up an Armenian government (in article Republic of Van). The Armenians declared their own state, and Armenians congregate in a large group.

In late May 1915, the CUP , majority at the parliament, were debating how to handle the Van uprising, an Ottoman colonel pointed to Russia’s expulsion of Muslims into Ottoman territory and urged a reciprocal expulsion of the rebels and their families either into Russian territory or into the interior of Anatolia. He suggested also that, barring objections from others, Muslim refugees be resettled in and around Van.

On 26 May 1915. Military requested interior ministry a decree on the relocation of Zeytun Armenians. The relocations before were performed along the .. policy. Talat did not respond to request. Instead, Talat sought the enactment of a legislation so that relocations would not be performed by only interior minister's signature. Just two days before on 24 May Entente declared Ottoman officials will be responsible from war crimes on Armenians. Following the reportage by US Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, Henry Morgenthau, Sr., about the events in the city of Van, the Triple Entente formally warned the Ottoman Empire on 24 May 1915 that:

"In the view of these ... crimes of Empire against humanity and civilization ... the Allied governments announce publicly ... that they will hold personally responsible ... all members of the Ottoman Government and those of their agents who are implicated in such massacres."

— Triple Entente, 24 May 1915

On 27 May 1915. The government passed the final form of ‘Deportation Law’ (in article Tehcir Law), whereby the military authorities were authorized to relocate the Armenians.

[on Tehcir Law] The conduct of such rebel elements rendered it necessary to remove them from the areas of military operations and to evacuate the villages serving as bases of operations and shelters for the rebels. To achieve this, a different course of action has begun to be implemented. Within that framework, the Armenians living in the provinces of Van, Biths, Erzurum, with the exclusion of the centers of Adana, Sis, and Mersin; the sanjaks of Adana, Mersin, Cebel-i Bereket and Kozan; the sanjaLt of Maras with the exclusion of the center of Maras; the towns and villages of Iskendurun, Bilan, Cisr-i Sugur and Antalya of the province of Aleppo; with the exclusion of the central district of Aleppo have begun to be rapidly transferred to the southern provinces.

— Sultan Mehmed V

Tehcir, 27 May 1915

Mehmed V, signed

Tehcir Law

Order from council of ministers to governors

June

Russians forces reach the City of Van in waves; [east] on 18 May, [north] on 23 May, and General Trukhin entered city on 31 May 1915. At his arrival, in June, General Yudenich received the keys to the city and citadel and appointed the leader, Aram Manukian, as governor of the Armenian provisional government. Manukian promptly decried the Russians’ decision in June 1915 to permit the return of Kurdish tribesmen [in June they were behind the Russian line] to Van Vilayet. Manukian reminded Yudenich that, just a month earlier, Russia, together with Britain and France, “[referring May 24, 1915] had declared all the participants in the massacre and plundering of Armenians personally responsible for their crimes before the whole civilized world. Yet now Russia was welcoming these criminals back.” In his response General acknowledged Manukian’s “irreconcilable feelings toward the Kurds” for their “barbarous, savage, and traitorous reprisals against the Armenian population.” However, General refused Manukian's position.

Early June 1915, the Fourth Army apprehended and placed total 349 insurgents in the Urfa Vilayet. This operation began a set of clashes in the region that would turn into an elongated conflict on August 9, 1915. Elongated conflict was tracking a group from one conflict to another and that may be at different places or joined by other groups.

On June 15 1915, in Sivas Province a group of Armenian insurgents unsuccessfully attacked a military jail to rescue their members.

July

In July Russian advance reached it's maximum depth for 1915. At this time, Russia tried to prevent the return all but only 10,000 of the 250,000 Armenian refugees from Ottoman Empire who are at Caucuses. The Russia did not only prevent Armenians, it uprooted, expelled, Kurdish villagers in the occipied lands from their villages Russian Army claimed expelled Kurds from their homeland only on tactically significant locations. All this population movements happened just into first half of the 1915. An Armenian priest who witnessed the destruction of his own people also witnessed the Turks and Kurds, “the survivors of the hundreds of thousands of Muslims who had fled the Russian armies and the Armenian volunteer regiments”, he continued:

Decimated by starvation and epidemic, these Muslims would die in the seventies of the coming winter. I passed through the Turkish neighborhoods along the river and came upon thousands of Turkish arid Kurdish refugees - women, girls, and children — on the flagstone pavements in front of the mosques. They were living ghosts, reduced by starvation to skeletons; for clothing they had only rags hanging from their shoulders, and the dirt that covered them rendered them unrecognizable. There was no visible difference at all between these refugees and Armenian exiles in the deserts of Der Zor.

On July 17 1916, The Diyarbekir Stationary Jandarma Regiment and the Midyat Seyyar Jandarma Battalion fought against 500 insurgents [non-local] in Ziyor Village.

On July 29, 1915, governor of Adana Vilayet requested support. Provincial forces failed to subdue the activities of Armenian insurgents. Conflicts begin early July at Ayvalik plateau which later insurgents joined forces from Zeytun and Hadjin. On August 1, 400 Armenians joined the previous group and fortified the village Fendejak. 4th Army engaged in an urban warfare at the Siege of Fendejak.

On July 29, 1915, the Musa Dagh conflict occurred at the southwest of Antioch of Hatay Vilayet. The conflict was highly reported by both sides. The region has been reported to have 37 conflicts between Ottomans and Armenians in the last century, one of them being the Zeitun Rebellion (1895–96). The conflict at Van Vilayet began in the villages than extended to city of Van. The conflict began in three villages. Ottoman's reported that the village was so heavily fortified they failed to break it up on July 29, 1915. Ottomans dispatched a unit specialized in counterinsurgency on August 7, 1915. The dispatched unit of 400 infantry was trapped between two Armenian trench lines. Unit retreated. Ottomans used 870 infantry in two wings against 1500-1800 Armenian insurgents on August 9. The fierce conflict occurred between 18–19 August. On 20 August conflicts subsided in the villages. The fighting moved to the surrounding mountains from 20 August to 31 August. At the same time Ottomans were tracking French agents from Battleship Victor Hugo. The tracked French agents located the Armenian insurgents in the Musa Dag on 7 September . French also had naval demonstrations in the same region. French cruisers Guichen and Jeanne d'Arc picked up up the Armenians. Ottomans left the same unit in the region until end of the war.

August

In August 1915. An Armenian soldier in Russian Army was [falsely?] accused of stealing from a Kurdish prisoner of war. After a court-martial Russians hanged him in front of Kurdish and Turkish prisoners of war companied with a message “That is how we deal with those who harm imprisoned Turks. He who does harm to one of you will be sentenced to death and shot. We Russians always act this way and will always act this way.” The prisoners were then released to carry out the message. Russians told Ottomans about the decreased significance of Armenians to Russian war effort.

On August 9, 1915, village of Germü (Urfa area) became a center of elongated conflicts. Initially, local Ottoman forces were ineffective. On August 19 1915, governor asked military assistance. In late August response came in the form of a letter. The Ministry of the Interior directed the governor to relocate the group within the sanjack. There was no military assistance. On September 16, conflict reopened when a gendarme patrol killing two and wounding eight members of this group. Later in the month, Muslim mobs began to assault the group. Military response arrived on June 20-21 with heavy weapons.

September

Mid-September 1915, conflicts in the city of Urfa reached to a point that the Fourth Army was forced to send in reinforcements to assist the 41st Infantry Division. This conflict ended in October 23.

October – End

The last counter-insurgency operation extended between late September to October 28, 1915 in the region Mersina and Tarsus. The last conflict happened among the Second Battalion of the 23rd Infantry division and the guerrillas around the city of Tarsus on October 28, 1915. The 1915 Ottoman campaign against the Armenian national movement ended on October 28. It was the last counterinsurgency campaign waged by the Ottoman Empire prior to its collapse and partition.

Analysis

During 1915, the Ottomans, the Russians, the Germans, the Americans, the Armenians themselves, and even an independent Venezuelan observer indicated that a large number of Armenians, who possessed large numbers of weapons, revolted in the eastern provinces of Anatolia in support of a Russian offensive.

General uprising

Erikson doesn't think there was an general Armenian uprising [population level] in the summer of 1915. The significance of Ottoman operations from the military history perspective was only a small proportion of a population [Hinjack and Tashnak], if actively encouraged and armed by outside nations and forces, is necessary for the conduct of an insurgency operations [full-blown insurgency does not necessitate/require a general uprising].

The allies encouraged and supported the Armenian committees to revolt against the empire in the spring of 1915, and that the Ottomans believed that what happened in the Van vilayet was about to be repeated elsewhere. The events in Van Vilayet was important in Ottoman response. The events in the city of Van was also important factor in the Triple Entente's formally warning of the Ottoman Empire on 24 May 1915. Both sides agree that there was an attempt to overthrow the authority [Devjet Bey] of the Ottoman state. Armenian side claims Devjet Bey was murdering them, so it was self-defense. Turkish side claims, Maniquan's goal was to transfer the vilayet to Russians to establish an Armenian state. Since then, it is hotly debated the nature of the events in Van Vilayet. Reynolds presents a third view:

The debate about whether the revolt at Van was an act of self-defense (Armenian) or collaboration (Ottoman) is thus pointless, because it assumes that a meaningful distinction can be made between the two. Self-defense amounted to collaboration, whether intentionally or not. The relationship of fear between Ottoman and Armenian was not static, but dynamic, and is better understood through the concept of the “security dilemma.”

Coordinated insurgency

Was this insurgency coordinated by Allies?

The fact that Armenian insurgency activities were sequential, rather than simultaneous, argues against the idea of coordinated effort. However, reciprocally, the depth and resilience of the well-armed and well-organized Armenian fedayi cells and organizations, as well as their known links to external Armenian groups, one being Armenian volunteer units, fighting with the allies, argues for the idea of coordinated effort.

Russian involvement

Russia played an important role in the (Ottoman's entry to war) mobilization process and also designs for partitioning of the Ottoman Empire.

Russian scheming in the Armenian forces fostered the fear, hostility, and violence that sparked the counter-insurgency operations. As Russian invaded and occupied parts of Ottoman territories in 1915, they showed little interest in the aspirations of the Armenian national movement, and their plans for the annexation of the area suggest the Armenian national movement would have gained nothing by trading Ottoman for Russian overlords.

Russians did nothing as Ottomans and Kurdish irregulars crushed their allies [during general counter-insurgency operations] in Armenian national movement.

The tsarist administration could not avoid getting drawn into the bitter rivalry between Kurds and Armenians. The bitter result of supporting insurgency operations realized by Russians after occupying the region:

As those officials who worked with one or the other grouping gradually became partisans of their contacts, they bickered and conspired against each other. By the time imperial Russian rule collapsed, pro-Kurdish and pro-Armenian officials were resorting to false accusations and frame-ups, each charging the other with betrayal of the empire’s interests for the sake of their clients.

Bibliography

• "VOA Armenian: Ottomans and Armenians - presentation by Ed Erickson" on YouTube
• Erickson, Edward J. (2013). Ottomans and Armenians: A Study in Counterinsurgency. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 1137362200. Search this book on
• Ishkanian, Armine (2008). Democracy Building and Civil Society in Post-Soviet Armenia. New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-203-92922-3. Search this book on
• Reynolds, Michael A. (2011). Shattering Empires: The Clash and Collapse of the Ottoman and Russian Empires 1908–1918. Cambridge University Press. p. 324. ISBN 0521149169. Search this book on
• Nicolle, David (2008). The Ottomans: Empire of Faith. Thalamus Publishing. ISBN 1902886119. Search this book on
• Bloxham, Donald (2008). Genocide, the world wars and the unweaving of Europe. Vallentine Mitchell. ISBN 0853037205. Search this book on
• Shaw, Ezel Kural (1977). History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-21280-4. Search this book on
• Finkel, Caroline (2007). Osman's Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire. Basic Books. Search this book on

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