Of all the major navies of the 19th century, that of the Ottoman Empire is least known. Modern Turkish archives preserve a quantity of material upon which the authors have drawn.
At the start of the 20th century the Ottoman Navy was a shadow of its former might, a reflection of the empire as a whole the "Sick Man of Europe". Years of defeat, nepotism, and neglect had left the Ottoman Navy with a mix of obsolete vessels, whilst the list of prospective enemies was ever-growing. An increasing Russian naval presence in the Black Sea and the alarming emergence of Italy and Greece as regional Naval powers proved beyond all doubt that intensive modernization was essential, indeed, the fate of the Empire as a naval power depended on it. So the Ottoman Navy looked to the ultimate naval weapon of the age, the dreadnought, two of which were ordered from the British. But politics intervened, and a succession of events culminated in the Ottoman Navy fielding a modern German battlecruiser and state-of-the-art light cruiser instead with dramatic consequences. In this meticulous study, Ryan Noppen presents a fresh appraisal of the technical aspects and operations of the warships of the Ottoman Navy in World War I. It is the first work of its kind in the English language produced with a wealth of rare material with the co-operation of the Turkish Consulate and Navy. Packed with precise technical specifications, revealing illustrations and exhaustive research, this is an essential guide to a crucial chapter in the Aegean arms race.
This book explores Turkish military innovation since the Cold War. The major questions addressed are how Türkiye has been able to innovate, the production of new weapon systems, its philosophical background, how the country overcame bureaucratic and economic obstacles, and how these innovations resonated in military doctrine and organization. Focusing on two main defense industry projects that trigger an overall change in the military doctrine and organization, the text examines the innovative inclinations of the Turkish military realm and reveals the societal, economic and political consequences of military innovation. This book fills a gap in the literature by providing an interdisciplinary and comprehensive overview of Turkish military innovation. Contributors include those involved in and affected by the military innovation process, as well as scholars who monitor the process using primary sources. Military Innovation in Türkiye will appeal to academics, politicians and military professionals interested in understanding the evolution of the Turkish military.
No critical analysis has ever examined the specific reasons for the Ottoman defeat. Erickson's study fills this gap by studying the operations of the Ottoman Army from October 1912 through July 1913, and by providing a comprehensive explanation of its doctrines and planning procedures. This book is written at an operational level that details every campaign at the level of the army corps. More than 30 maps, numerous orders of battle, and actual Ottoman Army operations orders illustrate how the Turks planned and fought their battles. Of particular note is the inclusion of the only detailed history in English of the Ottoman X Corps' Sarkoy amphibious invasion. Also included are definitive appendix about Ottoman military aviation and a summary of the Turks' efforts to incorporate the lessons learned from the war into their military structure in 1914. The Ottoman Empire fought the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913 against the joint forces of Bulgaria, Greece, Montenegro, and Serbia—and was decisively defeated. The Ottoman Army is frequently depicted as a mob of poorly clad, faceless Turks inept in their attempts to fight a modern war. Yet by 1912, the Ottoman Army, which was constructed on the German model, was in many ways more advanced than certain European armies.
Before the twentieth century ships when relied upon visual signaling, vessels beyond range of sight or a cannon shot, were blind, deaf, and dumb in the dark, making night battles at sea rare, and near always accidental. The introduction of certain technologies like the torpedo, the searchlight, radio and then radar, transformed naval warfare by making night combat feasible and, in some cases, desirable. The process by which navies integrated these new tools of war and turned the dark into a medium for effective combat, however, was long and difficult. Fighting in the Dark tells the story of surface naval combat at night from the Russo-Japanese War through World War II. The book is about the process of confronting and mastering problems brought on by technological change during war. It does this by examining seven periods focusing on the Imperial Russian Navy in 1904–1905, the Imperial German Navy from 1914–1918, the Royal Navy from 1916–1939, the Regia Marina from 1940–1943, the Imperial Japanese Navy in 1942, the U.S. Navy in 1943–1944, and the Royal Navy and Royal Canadian Navy from 1943–1944.The chapters are written by authors hailing from Australia, Canada, Italy, and the United States, all recognized masters in their subject.
Fighting in the Dark is a new book about naval combat at night; the title also, however, signifies the overarching theme of the book, of moving from dark to light: in short, the process of mastering technological change during war. The authors start with the proposition that it is hard to hit an invisible target, particularly one in motion. In the nineteenth century, when ships relied upon visual signaling and vessels beyond hailing range were deaf and mute in the dark, night battles at sea were rare and largely accidental. Three inventions changed this: the torpedo, the searchlight, and the radio. These inventions at the end of the nineteenth and start of the twentieth centuries transformed naval warfare by making combat in the dark feasible and in some cases, desirable. The process by which navies used the dark and adapted it into a medium for effective combat was long and difficult, more so for some than others. This book is about that process and about how Russian, British, German, Italian, Japanese and US navies confronted the specific new challenges and adapted to unfamiliar situations and emerging technologies. Fighting in the Dark consists of chapters written by a group of highly respected naval historians, and the book’s approach illuminates how different navies and cultures approached common problems. The fierce night-time battles that are described serve as a metaphor for the larger issues and the reader is led along a fascinating journey of naval warfare from the Russo-Japanese War, through WWI, to the Second World War, and from the Pacific to the English Channel.
This new book explores for the first time the full story of how two Turkish and two Chilean battleships became British capital ships after the outbreak of the First World War. Under construction by the shipbuilding giants of Armstrong and Vickers in August 1914, Sultan Osman I, Reșadiye, Almirante Latorre and Almirante Cochrane became HM Ships Agincourt, Erin, Canada and Eagle. The first three served with the Grand Fleet, fighting at Jutland, while the last was transformed into a pioneering aircraft carrier, which would serve with distinction until sunk while escorting a convoy to Malta in 1942. While two of the other ships had short lives – cut short by the Washington Naval Treaty – the final ship, Almirante Latorre, would be returned to Chile after the war, for a continuing active career that would last into the 1950s. When finally towed away for scrap in 1959, she was the penultimate survivor of Jutland. Drawing on extensive archival research, the book begins with an overview of the warships under construction around Europe for foreign customers in August 1914, and how the four ships featured were acquired by the Royal Navy. It then looks at them as manifestations of the international rivalries which directed much of the national budgets of impecunious South American and Balkan states towards armaments. The focus then switches to the British service of the ships actually completed as battleships, and then to the story of the carrier. Although never finished as a battleship, she would play a crucial role in the development of British carrier aviation. Finally, the author traces the stories of the battleships of the Latin-American naval race from the 1920s down to the 1950s. The stories and back-stories of Agincourt, Erin, Canada and Eagle embrace almost the whole of the twentieth-century battleship era, and they take us down the byways of international naval power, ranging from the Pacific to the Black Sea, and from the line of battle to mutiny and revolution. A fascinating and original story.