Jihad The First World War

This programme contains some strong language

The call goes out for jihad - holy war.

Germany hoped her new ally, Turkey, would just do what it was told

and the Allies thought Turkey would be a pushover.

But the war in the Middle East went its own wild way.

The Kaiser had been cultivating the Ottoman Empire long before the war began.

He wore a fez on state visits. He was nicknamed Hajji Wilhelm,

following rumours he'd become a Muslim and made the pilgrimage to Mecca.

The 300 million Muslims scattered across the globe

can be assured the German emperor is, and will at all times remain, their friend.

Part of Germany's interest in Ottoman Turkey

was that they shared a common enemy - Russia.

Turkey's position, controlling the Dardanelle Straits,

gave her the power to lock Russia up in the Black Sea.

And Turkey shared a volatile border with Russia in the Caucasus.

Russia is the hereditary enemy of the Ottoman Empire

and her greatest desire is possession of Constantinople.

The Ottoman Empire once stretched from the Arabian peninsula

to the gates of Vienna,

but it had lost a third of its territory in a run of disastrous wars.

The Ottoman Empire was "the sick man of Europe" - broke and on the verge of collapse.

The great powers have grasped us by the throat.

The Government can't pay monthly salaries,

all the public services are under the control of privileged foreign capital.

It would be very easy for a patriot to go out of his mind.

But one group of nationalist reformers planned to stop the rot -

the Young Turks.

In 1909, they replaced the Sultan with his brother as a puppet

and started a programme of modernisation.

They looked for an ally, to ward off predators and bankroll the future.

The ambitious Minister of War favoured Germany.

Just 32 years old, Enver Pasha had risen through the ranks,

married the Sultan's niece and lived in splendour in Constantinople, also known as Istanbul.

Enver Pasha had been military attache in Berlin.

The Germans had the power his country needed.

I watched a parade of 33,000 German soldiers.

It was so excellent, it makes one's mouth water.

The reason I love Germany is not sentimentality,

but the fact she is not a danger to my beloved country.

On the contrary, our two countries' interests go hand in hand.

Chief of the German general staff Helmuth von Moltke

ruled out Turkey as an ally.

Turkey is militarily a nonentity.

If Turkey was described before as a sick man,

it must now be described as a dying man.

Flamboyant Baron Max von Oppenheim made the Kaiser think again.

Archaeologist and consular official,

Oppenheim passed himself off as an Islamic expert.

He was also a German agent.

He advocated a holy war to bring down the British Empire.

When the Turks invade Egypt, and India blazes with flames of revolt,

only then will England crumble...

..for England is at her most vulnerable in her colonies.

By the outbreak of war the Kaiser saw jihad as a way to foment revolution

among the millions of Muslims under British rule.

Our consuls and agents in Turkey and India

must inflame the whole Mohammedan world to wild uprising.

For if we are to be bled to death, at least England shall lose India.

The Ottoman Empire had found its ally - Germany.

Enver bypassed the Turkish cabinet,

secretly signing an alliance on 2nd August 1914,

while maintaining a public stance of neutrality.

Constantinople became the jump-off point for subversion, to set the East ablaze.

The German embassy became a hive of Oppenheim's raffish spies.

One group arrived from Berlin disguised as a travelling circus.

The word was the Emir of Afghanistan

had 50,000 Muslims ready to invade India.

The circus slipped out of Constantinople,

bound for Afghanistan,

if only they could find it.

One of the Turks on the mission was Huseyin Rauf.

What do we know about Afghanistan beyond its name?

I can't visualise its place on a map.

I don't know how to get there. Do I go via America?

The irony was Enver Pasha and the Young Turks weren't fanatical believers at all.

They went along with Germany's jihad idea out of opportunism.

What Enver really wanted to draw together the Turkic peoples of

the East into a new empire.

MUSIC: ROUSING PATRIOTIC SONG

Enver had an army of 800,000,

mainly from Anatolia, but also Arabs, Macedonians, Kurds.

It was thought to be a spent force,

but Enver had reformed it, Germany trained it.

Considerable progress is being made in the Ottoman army's efficiency.

Turkish forces must now be regarded as a factor

to be taken seriously into account.

But Turkey still had not publicly declared herself as Germany's ally

and her cabinet was split over whether to fight,

but Turkey was desperate for money.

So the Germans decided to sweeten the deal and force the Turks' hand.

Two of Germany's cruisers, the Goeben and the Breslau,

were being chased across the Mediterranean by the Royal Navy.

Rather conveniently,

they took refuge in Constantinople on 11th August 1914.

The presence of two German cruisers,

riding proudly at anchor by the Golden Horn,

undermined the Turks' pretence at neutrality.

So they shrugged and told the world they'd bought the ships.

Their German crews were given fezzes to wear.

Their fancy-dress antics were the talk of Constantinople.

The Goeben sailed up the Bosphorus, in front of the Russian embassy.

Officers and men solemnly removed their Turkish fezzes

and put on German caps.

The band played Deutschland Uber Alles.

MUSIC: "Deutschland Uber Alles"

After an hour or two serenading the Russian ambassador,

they put on their fezzes then picked up anchor,

leaving in the ears of the Russian diplomat the dying strains

of German war songs.

The Turkish fleet,

led by the Goeben and the Breslau, steamed out of the Bosphorus.

On 29th October 1914, they attacked several Russian ports.

Enver Pasha had the gateway to the Black Sea mined.

The Germans paid over £5 million in gold, securing Turkey as their ally.

Turkey had joined the First World War

pretty much on her own terms and with her own agenda.

The Persian Muslims are threatening trouble.

There is a dry wind blowing through the East

and the parched grasses wait the spark

and the wind is blowing towards the Indian border.

Fiction by novelist John Buchan,

but based on real fears of an Islamic holy war.

By late 1914, Enver was looking east.

He had big ideas, both for jihad and for uniting the Turkic peoples.

Beyond the frontiers there are brethren to be liberated,

bits of fatherland to be redeemed.

Nearly 40 years before, Russia had stolen a chunk of eastern Turkey

along its Caucasian border.

Enver was desperate to kick the Russians off Turkish soil,

but it was an area riven with ethnic friction -

Russians, Turks, Georgians, Kurds,

and on both sides of the frontier, Armenian Christians.

Loyalties in the Caucasus were hard to read, hard to be sure of.

Here, at Erzurum Castle, in November 1914, encouraged by the Germans,

Enver Pasha took a key decision.

Though winter was closing in, he threw his army at the Russians.

Now he played the Islam card.

300 million Muslims are sighing under their chains

and our former fellow countrymen are praying for our victory and success.

Happy is he who falls for religion and fatherland.

Forward, always forward for victory and fame and martyrdom

and paradise!

In December 1914, the Turkish 9th Corps

marched through the high passes of the Ohuekberd mountains.

The aim was to sweep down on the town of Sarikamis

and encircle the Russians.

The Russians at first panicked and retreated.

Enver's bold gamble nearly paid off.

But then the temperature plummeted

and the Turks struggled into worsening conditions.

Enver tried to reassure them.

I see you don't have shoes or coats, but the enemy is afraid of you.

The Germans complained about our slowness,

but the snow was so deep.

Soldiers got lost at night, some tried to light fires,

but many fell asleep, never to wake again.

We realised in the morning that half the division had frozen to death.

The weather and terrain killed 25,000 Turks before they even made contact with the Russians.

The soldiers were terrified of seeing the frozen corpses

and began deserting their posts.

We tried to fire at Russian troops,

but the mechanisms of the guns had iced up.

We tremble to think what we lived through during those long and deadly days.

The scenes made one shudder.

The depressing sound of the trembling ox carts.

The corpses, mouths open,

eyes staring.

Thrown into the greedy stomach of the soil.

THEY PRAY IN TURKISH

On the Ohuekberd mountains, local men still say prayers for the dead of Sarikamis.

HE PRAYS IN TURKISH

In 1919, Imdat Demir helped bury the bones.

THEY ALL CHANT

Enver's grand offensive had ended in catastrophe.

He addressed his soldiers before leaving the front.

My friends, for almost a month I have seen

with my own eyes how you have attacked the enemy.

In spite of the harshness of the weather

and all kinds of shortages you broke their resistance.

The sultan and the whole nation congratulates you.

I am returning to Istanbul.

I pray that you will get more victories

and not let the enemy rear his head any more.

I entrust you to the safekeeping of Allah.

Now the search for scapegoats began.

THEY CHEER

Enver blamed defeat not on himself, but on Turkish Armenians

serving with the Russians in the Caucasus.

Tension between Turks and their Armenian population was nothing new,

but now Turkey feared the Armenians were bidding for independence.

From all countries, Armenians are entering the glorious Russian army.

Let peoples remaining under the Turkish yoke receive freedom,

let the Armenians of Turkey, who suffer for the faith of Christ,

receive resurrection for a new free life

under the protection of Russia.

The Russians advanced and the Turks fell back through Armenian areas.

Local Armenian resistance was more imagined than real.

The Turks responded with disproportionate, pre-emptive action.

Turkish Minister of the Interior, Mehmet Talaat,

issued the following decree on 26th May 1915.

Because some Armenians living near the war zones

have attacked military forces and the innocent population,

certain measures are being adopted,

among which is the deportation of the Armenians.

The German ambassador in Turkey, Baron von Wangenheim,

warned Berlin of the imminent disaster.

A mass deportation to a destination many hundreds of kilometres away,

without sufficient means of transport,

via areas that offer neither accommodation nor food

and are plagued with epidemic illness such as typhus,

will cost many lives, especially women and children.

The town of Harpout - key transit point of the forced Armenian exodus.

Thousands passed through here to exile in Syria,

then part of the Ottoman Empire.

American missionary Tracy Atkinson saw terrible sights in Harpout.

Thousands herded together, mostly women and children,

sick lying everywhere.

They had been on the road six weeks, not knowing where they are to go.

They have been attacked, robbed and killed.

Armin T Wegner, a German medical officer stationed in Turkey,

photographed the plight of the Armenians.

The American consul on the spot reported to his ambassador.

Sir, I have to report one of the greatest tragedies in all history.

A revolutionary movement by some of the Armenians was discovered

and severe measures taken to check it,

little distinction being made between the innocent

and those suspected of being participants in the movement.

The Armenians were marched across these mountains.

Even those who survived were not safe when they reached Syria,

as a German diplomat in Aleppo reported.

Out of 2,000 to 3,000 peasant women from the Armenian plateau, brought here in good health,

only 40 or 50 skeletons are left.

The prettier ones are the victims of their jailers' lust,

the plain ones succumb to blows, hunger and thirst.

Every day, more than 100 corpses are carried out of Aleppo.

Perhaps 800,000 Armenians died in all.

Whether this was centrally-directed genocide is still a matter of furious debate.

The Turks deny the charge, saying the Armenians died of exposure, famine

and the actions of bad officials.

In June 1916, Mehmet Talaat, the Minister of the Interior who'd issued the deportation order,

spoke to a newspaper about Turkey's role in the disaster.

The removal of the Armenians was a military necessity.

Unfortunately, due to bad officials,

grave excesses occurred when this order was being executed.

At this point the minister paused and covered his eyes with his hand,

as if to avoid the contemplation of the terrible vision.

After which he continued.

We are no savages. Care for the security of Turkey

had to predominate over all other considerations.

On 3rd January 1915, the Russian czar, panicking at the Turkish advance on Sarikamis,

urged the Allies to attack Turkey.

The British agreed.

This is one of the greatest campaigns in history.

Think what Constantinople is to the East -

more than London, Paris and Berlin all rolled into one are to the West.

Think what its fall will mean.

This was the battle which might turn the war,

cut Germany's route to the East,

unlock the Balkans and open up Russia via the Black Sea.

First, the Navy had to force its way through the Dardanelle straits.

The French insisted on being involved, not wanting the British to dominate the Mediterranean.

On 18th March 1915,

a combined French and British fleet attacked the straits.

The flagship was hit by a number of high calibre shells.

A turret was put out of action and the crew killed

The flames didn't spare anything.

Our young men, a few minutes earlier so alert and courageous,

were all skeletons lying on the bare steel.

lacquered, carbonised.

The Turkish guns survived the naval bombardment.

The Allied ships were sitting ducks.

I told the battery commander to increase fire.

He replied, "Shells are exploding on the decks of the enemy ships,

"there is considerable damage."

The French battleship Bouvet hit a mine.

Three battleships were sunk that day, three crippled, four damaged.

The Allies lost over 700 men.

It was a remarkable victory for the Ottoman Empire.

The Allies tried again.

This time, the Navy would support an amphibious landing of troops.

The Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, known as Anzacs,

joined French and British soldiers.

Contrary to myth, the Anzacs weren't tough diggers from the outback.

They were mostly city dwellers,

many first-generation immigrants, fighting for the mother country.

Turks, like Behzade Kerim,

knew this would be a fight for their country's survival.

I will sacrifice myself for my faith, my country, my dear Istanbul.

I will crush the dirty, loathsome hands threatening my old father's happiness,

my innocent baby's life, my beloved wife's honour.

I shall be as hardhearted as an Englishman.

I salute you, o, apple of my eye, Istanbul.

Those who are about to die bid you farewell.

On 25th April 1915,

70,000 Allied troops went ashore on the peninsula of Gelibolu - Gallipoli.

A post-war film reconstructed the battle.

Private Robert Atkinson witnessed what was then the greatest seaborne invasion ever.

Troops in small boats were towed ashore.

Terrific bombardment, awful noise rolling round the cliffs. Surprised the Turks.

Splendid gunnery by the Navy.

Awe-inspiring scene, my first experience of battle.

The Anzacs were landed in the wrong place.

8,000 men struggled ashore on a narrow strip of sand,

hemmed in by steep hills.

GUNFIRE

The men christened it Anzac Cove.

The Turks welcomed us with shrapnel, and sprayed up the sea,

but few of us got hit.

There didn't seem much organisation.

In fact, it was disorganisation.

Breaking out of Anzac Cove, the casualties soared.

New Zealander William Malone blamed the folly of Australian officers.

General Braund had no defensive position, no plan,

nothing but a murderous notion that the only thing to do

was to plunge troops over the ridge into the jungle beyond.

It was on these Turkish hills that Australian and New Zealand national identities were forged.

We were singing "This bit of the world belongs to us".

We charged up a hill so steep we could only just scramble up.

Clean over a machine gun we leapt, men dropping all around.

It was mad, wild, thrilling.

They would have had an easier time

if it had been left to German General Liman von Sanders.

He held troops back for an attack nine miles away that never came.

But a 34-year-old Turkish officer, Mustafa Kemal,

climbed the peak of Chanak Bayir and saw Anzac troops approaching

and his own men fleeing.

"Why are you running away?" I asked. "The enemy, sir," they said.

"You mustn't run from the enemy." "We've no more ammunition."

I ordered them to fix bayonets and lie down.

As they did so, the enemy, too, lay down.

We had won time.

Mustafa Kemal issued a stark command.

I don't order you to attack, I order you to die.

By the time we are dead, other units and commanders will have come up to take our place.

He sent an angry letter to Enver Pasha, damning their German allies.

Von Sanders did not know either our army or our country,

he had no time to study the situation properly.

Do not rely on the ability of the Germans headed by von Sanders,

whose hearts and souls are not as engaged as ours are in the defence of our country.

The Turks contained the Anzac break-out at the cove.

Gallipoli made a hero out of Mustafa Kemal.

Within eight years he became his country's leader,

earning the name Ataturk - father of the Turks.

The British landing at V beach went badly.

The plan was to run the ship River Clyde onto the shore,

her hold no longer full of coal but men.

But she went aground further out,

exposing the British to withering Turkish fire.

MACHINE-GUN FIRES

The enemy commanders were sending the men down the ramps.

But they could not escape the Turkish bullets.

Our fire was very effective, knocking the enemy into the sea.

GUNFIRE

The shore at V beach was full of enemy corpses, like shoals of fish.

The colour of the sea changed with the blood from their bodies.

Other landings went well, but initial success was not quickly exploited.

The Allies under General Sir Ian Hamilton were cursed by poor coordination.

As on the western front, the two sides dug in to a bitter trench war.

Here, an Australian cameraman scrambles back

to help his assistant under fire.

GUNFIRE

French officer Jean Giraudoux watched the war turn brutal.

The Australians massacre the Turks.

One Australian told me that the Turks are their national enemy.

The conditions at Gallipoli were terrible -

intense heat, bitter cold, little water.

Major Burge wrote home to his mother.

Respected madam, sitting fearlessly 200 yards from two million bloodthirsty Turks,

I take up my pen.

I forgot to mention, I have six feet of solid earth between me and them.

The sun is very hot and I am very thirsty.

The only thing to drink is water from a nasty well,

which tastes as if it had a dead mule in it.

However, we are given purifying tablets, which are very good

and make the water taste as if it had two dead mules in it.

To my high-born royal wife, Ayesha,

from your husband, Mustafa Mahomet, captain, 13th Turkish Infantry.

Oh, Ayesha, my morning star, I pray God to bring this all to an end.

I see lovely Constantinople in ruins and our houses burnt to the ground.

These English are very persistent, there is no fear of death for them.

They are very cruel, they watch us like wolves at night

and are upon us like the devil in the day.

Why did we join in this wicked war?

Ayesha, I must take my leave of you and I must away to my devotion.

God bless you, Ayesha. I wish I were at home to give you my adorations.

But Ayesha never received Mustafa's letter.

It was found on his dead body by a British soldier.

The Turks lost 10,000 men in one afternoon.

As spring turned into summer, the stench of the dead became unbearable.

Eventually an armistice was called, to bury the dead.

Many Turkish soldiers were illiterate -

their experiences were reflected in their songs.

SOULFUL TURKISH SONG PLAYS

Disease became a major killer, particularly typhus and dysentery.

My old pal, he was smart and upright as a guardsman.

After ten days, to see him, crawling about, his backside hanging out.

We lowered him into the latrine,

but he simply rolled into this trench.

We couldn't pull him out, we didn't have any strength.

He drowned in his own excrement.

Allied resolve was weakening, as Lieutenant Colonel Fahrettin realised, writing to his father.

The morale of his troops has sunk so low as to be beyond description.

These fellows will have to embark their troops and remove them one of these nights.

On 20th December 1915, they did just that.

Turkish officer Izzettin Bey was woken by the duty officer at 3am.

They had spotted many frigates and transport ships,

they thought it was a new invasion.

But the British were running away, their situation had become hopeless.

What had happened was victory and the will of Allah.

Turkish troops enter abandoned Allied trenches.

They did not fire on the retreating Allies, happy just to see them go.

After nine terrible months, the hills of Gallipoli fell silent.

Both sides suffered around a quarter of a million casualties,

but for the Turks it was a triumph.

MUSIC: ROUSING TURKISH SONG

When the enemy withdrew, Constantinople was decorated from one end to the other.

The minarets were lit with oil lamps - everyone was full of joy.

Pale faces began to smile, Constantinople came back to life.

The Germans were still trying to ignite a holy war, jihad, in the Middle East.

In the mosques, fiery speeches are made against the English.

Excitement is increasing.

60,000 Afghan riders are ready to march.

German agents who'd slipped into the Ottoman Empire as a travelling circus

were now crossing Persia, disguised as tribesmen.

On 19th August 1915,

they evaded Russian patrols and entered Afghanistan.

Their mission, to raise a Muslim army against the British and invade India.

They'd been on the road for nine months,

spending much of their time arguing over the route and who was in charge.

The answer to that was German spy Oskar von Niedermayer.

Then Enver Pasha had second thoughts.

The Germans, in stirring up revolt against Russian and British masters,

encouraged ideas of independence.

This clashed with Enver's vision of uniting all Muslims

in an expanded, all-Turkic empire.

Enver pulled the Turks out of Niedermayer's mission,

leaving the Germans to go it alone.

When they reached Kabul,

the Emir kept them waiting another two months before even seeing them.

His Excellency told us why he could not receive us earlier.

Of course, it had nothing to do with anything political.

He compared us with tradesmen, with lots of wares he could pick from.

Everything seemed to be a business transaction for him.

The Emir played the Germans off against the British.

Great riches, even his country's independence, were at stake.

He hit Niedermayer with a demand for £10 million and 100,000 rifles and guns.

While they waited for the Emir to decide whether to invade India,

they blundered about, offending Muslim sensibilities.

In order to enjoy forbidden alcohol, soldiers secretly brewed schnapps.

The first drunkard, a sight never before witnessed in Afghanistan,

as it is religious blasphemy caused severe public anger.

The Emir had long been on the British payroll.

Now they upped the bribe to keep Afghanistan on side.

There were rumours of huge money transports from India.

We worked it out that the closer this caravan got,

the icier our relationship with the Emir became.

Niedermayer and the Germans realised they were pawns in the Emir's game

and abandoned the operation.

Jihad wasn't setting the East ablaze,

but it still had the power to petrify the British

and Enver had no intention of halting his expansionist plans.

He sent Colmar von der Goltz, a distinguished German field marshal,

to take command in Iraq and drive the war through Persia into India.

Then 72 years old, von der Goltz kept in touch with his family.

I never imagined that in my old age

fate would take me so far out into the world

and I would travel in the steps of Alexander the Great

through countries that filled our imaginations when we were young.

Britain decided a show of strength was needed in the Middle East

to persuade the Arabs that the British were the masters there, not the Germans or Turks.

The capture of Baghdad would create an immense impression,

especially in Persia, Afghanistan and on our own frontier,

and counteract the unfortunate impression

created by want of success on the Dardanelles.

By May 1915, a British division under Major General Sir Charles Townshend

was advancing up the Tigris, through Iraq,

then part of the Ottoman Empire.

Just 25 miles short of Baghdad, they were halted by the Turkish 6th Army.

The British fell back on Kut, a town on a loop in the Tigris.

The Turks surrounded them and the British settled in for a siege.

Major Dunn, who drew this map, wrote home on Christmas Day.

A very good dinner today - mutton, Scotch broth, salmon mayonnaise,

chicken conflet, roast duck and green peas, Italian eggs, chocolate.

And, of course, we toasted all our dear ones at home.

The British were up against Colmar von der Goltz,

now in charge of the besieging Turkish army,

his conquest of India on hold.

Unfortunately, the English have dug in well

and we don't have the technical means to get rid of them.

Whether we will meet again in good health is in God's hand.

Townshend was optimistic they'd all be rescued within days,

but by January, food running out,

their own cavalry came reluctantly to the rescue.

Three weeks ago, the first horse fell under the butcher's knife.

Since then they have been slain daily, about 20 a time.

We have it in steak-and-kidney pie, horse mince, horse rissoles,

potted horse, horse soup, stuffed horse meat etc, ad nauseam.

Hundreds of British soldiers died trying to save Townshend's garrison.

This morning there was a strong English attack.

Between the battle lines, the field is covered with English corpses.

The relieving force downstream again failed to get through.

General Townshend has issued a communique.

The eyes of India and England are on us, we shall go down as heroes,

which doesn't do us much good.

I'd sooner not be a hero in Kut and have plenty to eat.

The men are dying off fast from starvation, scurvy, pneumonia.

The Tommies are sticking it out better than the Indian troops,

who refuse to eat mule or horse.

On 24th April, in the last, desperate days of the siege,

a gallant attempt was made to send a ship carrying 270 tons of food

up the Tigris to Kut.

Ali Ihsan was one of a group of Turks who stretched a cable across the Tigris, ensnaring the ship.

We confiscated an English boat which contained all kinds of food,

enough to feed 5,000 for two months.

It was called Jullenar. We renamed it Kendi Gellen - the Godsend.

A desperate Townshend made an offer to Turkish General Halil Pasha

for the freedom of the garrison.

General Townshend offered me one million pounds

for the freedom of the English army.

Had the offer been made in other circumstances,

my answer would have been one word out of the barrel of my rifle.

Trying to keep my calm, I replied that I took this offer as a joke.

Finally, on 29th April 1916, after 146 days of siege,

Townshend surrendered.

An even more humiliating defeat than Gallipoli.

All up now, a terrible pity.

Never shall I forget that morning of surrender.

We settled down to the melancholy task of destruction.

Poor gunners. Some were in tears as the guns they were so proud to have tended were blown to pieces.

The Turks marched in at noon and took over the place.

By the waters of Babylon, we sat down and wept.

Von der Goltz died of typhus just before the Turkish victory at Kut,

but it was in line with something he wrote, an unusually modern and prophetic view.

For me, this war is only the beginning of a long, historical development

at whose end will stand the defeat of England's world position.

The hallmark of the 20th century

must be the revolution of the coloured races

against the colonial imperialism of Europe.

THe evening after the fall

Turks and Arabs moved through the narrow streets of the city

to where we had buried the much-loved field marshal a few days earlier.

The Turkish commander wanted to bring the news of the fall

of Kut to the dead leader whose achievement it was.

Townshend sailed off to a comfortable captivity in Constantinople.

During the siege, 1,750 British and Indian soldiers had died,

but the worst lay ahead.

12,000 men were marched through the desert to Baghdad.

A large percentage of men were quite done for

and couldn't march another inch.

They lay on the ground, suffering from fever and dysentery,

smothered from head to foot in filth and covered with flies.

By the war's close, over 4,000

veterans of Kut had died in prison camp,

victims of wilful neglect by both Turkey and Britain.

Never come back no more, boys, Never come back no more

The camp is becoming a bore, boys, It's becoming a terrible bore

Shut up the old shop window Put a notice over the door

We're packing our kits for the jolly old Ritz And we'll never come back no more

The Allies wrote off the Ottoman Empire from the start,

but then suffered major defeats at its hands.

The Turks would see out the war.

It wasn't Allah or the Germans that kept them fighting,

but self-defence and political ambition.