|
© 2008 ARMENICA.ORG
|
Print
|
|
|
The Caucasus Front and American Consul F. Willoughby Smith
During the weeks that followed the March Revolution, the Caucasian front remained relatively firm. The Turkish Third Army defended a line extending from Tripoli on the Black Sea Down to Kemakh, south-west of Erzinjan, while the Second Army held positions from Kighi to the south-west of Lake Van. Winter conditions claimed many victims. Lack of adequate provisions augmented the already alarming number of both sick and deserting. Fifty thousand soldiers are reported to have fled from the Third Army alone, 61 adding to the nearly half-million Turkish desertions since the beginning of the World War. 62 Third Army Commander Vehib Pasha attempted to consolidate his undermanned contingents by altering the structure of the V, IX, X, and XI corps. 63 By combining the three divisions of each into single units and adding two other divisions, he created the I and II Caucasian corps, consisting of the 9th, 10th, 36th and the 5th, 11th, 37th divisions, respectively. 64
To better coordinate activities along the front, Enver, in March, 1916, combined the Second and Third armies into the Caucasian Army Group, commanded by Izzet Pasha and headquartered at Kharpout. Mustafa Kemal replaced Izzet as head of the Second Army. 65 Taking advantage of the Russian soldier's reluctance to fight after the March Revolution, he directed a limited Turkish advance which resulted in the reoccupation of the Bitlis regions as far as Moush. 66 The rapid termination of this May manoeuvre was due in part to the inability of Kemal's army to conduct a major campaign. It might also be attributed to the request made to Enver by German Quartermaster General Erich von Ludendorff that further Ottoman military initiative on the Caucasus front be avoided in order to impress upon the Russian government that the German allusions to the desirability of peace were sincere. 67
The Russian Caucasus Army, though in men and material superior to the Turkish forces, also suffered from the effects of the harsh winter. Even more damaging, however, was the malignancy of demoralisation and unrest. Soldier's soviets often refused to comply with orders, insulted ranking officers, and expressed impatience with the Petrograd government for not concluding immediately a "no annexations-no indemnities" peace settlement. General Iudenich, Commander of the Front since the March Revolution, was suspected of tsarist sympathies and discredited because of the Russian evacuation of the Bitlis-Moush area. With the approval of the clamouring revolutionary societies, he was replaced in June by General Przhevalsky, veteran from the 1914 Sarighamish campaign. 68
Mustafa Kemal's manoeuvre at Moush and the widespread disaffection among the Russian troops alarmed the repatriated Western Armenians. On their behalf, Zavriev, Armen Garo, and members of the Moscow-Petrograd Armenian committees conferred with the Provisional Government. They attempted to convince Kerensky, first in his capacity as Minister of War and later as Minister-President, of the importance of maintaining a solid Caucasus front and requested transferral of thousands of Armenian soldiers in Europe to the Armenian Plateau. 69 The withdrawal of these men from the European theatre would have no significant repercussions on that front, but their presence in Western Armenia would be a decisive factor in the retention of Russian-occupied territory. Kerensky accepted the proposal but attempted to effect the move inconspicuously so that this action would not establish a precedent for similar requests by other peoples of the Empire. 70 On the eve of the Provisional Government's collapse in November, 1917, an indeterminate number of Armenian troops, at lest thirty-five thousand, had received orders to transfer to the Caucasus. Only several thousands, however, had actually departed. On the latter, most travelled the primary southern routes as far as Baku, whence they were to entrain to Tiflis and the military lines. 71 Unfortunately, by that time the tensions between the Baku Soviet and most Tatars of the guberniia had reached dangerous proportions. The Moslems, controlling most of the territory through which the Baku-Tiflis railway passed, often forbade trains to proceed until they were checked for undesirable element. As the Ottoman orientation of the Transcaucasian Moslems increased, the Armenian troops moving toward the front were labelled as undesirable and denied transit. Throughout the reminder of the year and most of 1918, this force remained stranded in Baku, where, under the direction of the Armenian Council, it assisted the city's Soviet administration. 72
|
|
61) Joseph Pomiankowski, "Der Zusammenbruch des Ottomanischen Reiches: Erinnerungen an die Türkei aus der Zeit des Weltkrieges" (Leipzig, 1928), p. 225; W. E. D. Allen and Paul Muratoff, "Caucasian Battlefield: A History of the Wars on the Turco-Caucasian Border, 1828-1921" (Cambridge, 1953), p. 436.
62) Carl Mühlmann, "Das deutsch-Türkische Waffenbündnis im Weltkrieg" (Leipzig, [1940]), p. 184.
63) M. Larcher, "La guerre torque dans la guerre mondiale" (Paris, 1926), p. 411, states that the Third Army dwindled to 36,000 men.
64) Joseph Pomiankowski, "Der Zusammenbruch des Ottomanischen Reiches: Erinnerungen an die Türkei aus der Zeit des Weltkrieges" (Leipzig, 1928), p. 224; W. E. D. Allen and Paul Muratoff, "Caucasian Battlefields: A History of the Wars on the Turco-Caucasian Border, 1828-1921" (Cambridge, 1953), p. 437. Felix Guse, "Die kaukasusfront im Weltkrieg bis zum Frieden von Brest" (Leipzig, [1940]), p. 93, is apparently mistaken in stating that the reorganisation occurred in 1915.
65) M. Larcher, "La guerre torque dans la guerre mondiale" (Paris, 1926), p. 415; W. E. D. Allen and Paul Muratoff, "Caucasian Battlefields: A History of the Wars on the Turco-Caucasian Border, 1828-1921" (Cambridge, 1953), p. 437. The joint comment was dissolved at the end of the year.
66) Carl Mühlmann, "Das deutsch-türkische Waffenbündnis im Weltkrieg" (Leipzig, [1940]), p. 133; M. Larcher, "La guerre torque dans la guerre mondiale" (Paris, 1926), p. 415.
67) Carl Mühlmann, "Das deutsch-türkische Waffenbündnis im Weltkrieg" (Leipzig, [1940]), p. 134.
68) W. E. D. Allen and Paul Muratoff, "Caucasian Battlefields: A History of the Wars on the Turco-Caucasian Border, 1828-1921" (Cambridge, 1953), p. 450; M. Larcher, "La guerre torque dans la guerre mondiale" (Paris, 1926), pp. 412-413.
69) In May, 1917, Lvov had formed a coalition cabinet that included Social Revolutionary and Menshevik representatives. Because of a serious crisis in Russian politics, the two parties had compromised their decision not to participate in the government. Popular demonstrations against the Foreign Minister Miliukov's declarations about "war to decisive victory" and the conquest of Constantinople had compelled Miliukov and Minister of War Guchkov to resign. The Petrograd Soviet agreed to coalition government in order to save the country from the spreading political anarchy but allowed its members to take only secondary positions in Lvov's cabinet. For documents and discussions of the period, consult Frank Alfred Golder, "Documents of Russian History, 1914-1917" (New York and London, [1927]), pp. 320-358; Donald W. Treadgold, "Twentieth Century Russia" (2nd ed.; Chicago, [1964]), pp. 128-129, 131; William H. Chamberlin, "The Russian Revolution, 1917-1921" (New York, 1935), pp. 143-148.
70) G. Pasdermadjian, "Why Armenia Should Be Free" (Boston, 1918), p. 35. Bertha Papazian, "The Tragedy of Armenia" (Boston and Chicago, 1918), p. 124, claims that 35,000 troops had been transferred by November, 1917, but this seems a gross exaggeration.
71) Archives of the Republic of Armenia Delegation to the Paris Peace Conference [now integrated into the archives of Dashnaktsoutyoun, Boston, Massachusetts], File 379/1, "H. H. Vashingtoni Nerkayatsoutsitch yev H. Amerikian Karavaroutyoune, 1917-1918" [R. (Republic) of A. (Armenia) Washington Representative and the Government of North America, 1917-1918]. In this memorandum sent to Secretary of State Robert Lansing, the Armenian diplomat representative stated that there were 18,000 Armenian troops in Transcaucasia.
72) The Baku Soviet did not assume full control of the city's administration until April, 1918. See chapter VIII.
|
