Talk:Battle of Sarıkamış

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Contents

[edit] Comments

[edit] My recent edits

Firstly in order for there to be a rethreat there has to be an attack, although as unsucessfull it is Turkish troops did attack russians. So there is no reason to remove that.

Turkish troops were too weak to fight. After all they marched through snow (blizzard) and extreme cold in summer clothes.

"Armenian Genocide" is not relevant to this battle. Weather this campaign let to that is a matter of debate as well as is an opinion and hence is not encyclopedic. Its political as far as I care. The incident had taken place months after the conclusion of this battle. See Armenian Genocide which reflects the incidents beginging as "24 April 1915". Sarikamis operation had taken place roughly between 21 December 1914 - 5 January 1915. Hence is not relevant.

I am also removing the Battle of Erzurum (1916) Battle of Erzincan as it is in the infobox and is redundent.

--Cool CatTalk|@ 20:05, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Figures and Casualties

Inanna and Khoikhoi, please stop edit warring and let's discuss this calmly and in a civil manner. The numbers of both initial army strengths and casualties seem to be very ambiguous. A bit of googling got me these two references:

  1. An article by prof Jere W. Roberson University of Central Oklahoma, College of Liberal Arts.
  2. from Encyclopædia Britannica Online.

I think both of them can be considered neutral, third party, reliable sources. Since Khoikhoi objects to Turkish language sources, I suggest we restrict ourselves to these.

According to the first article we have the following figures:

Russians: 100,000 before, ?? casualties
Turkish: "slightly fewer than the Russians" before, 30,000 casualties in battle and "thousands more froze to death in the retreat".

According to the second article we have:

Ruassians: ?? before, ?? casualties
Turkish: 190,000 before, 12,400 survived, 30,000 battle casualties and the rest (that would make 147,600 people) died in the retreat.

Now, the figure 190,000 sounds bloated to me. It contradicts the other source that says that Turkish forces were slightly fewer than 100,000. But, if we guess that it is a typographic mistake and assume that the initial number of Turkish forces were 90,000 that would make more sense and not contradict the first source. I am making a wild guess here, so if anyone disagrees I withdraw that proposal!!

In the light of the above I ask you to share opinions, calmly. --Michalis Famelis 01:38, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Your assessment sounds reasonable to me, at first glance here anyway. CNN puts the Turkish death toll somewhat higher: In 1914, the battle of Sarikamis began between Turkey and Russia. Although superior in numbers, the Turks were defeated in five days of fighting, losing 77,000 men. At any rate, there are some good books on the subject that really resolve this issue. Ordered to Die: A History of the Ottoman Army in the First World War by Edward J Erickson and The First World War: The War to End All Wars by Geoffrey Jukes, Peter Simkins, Michael Hickey would probably answer all of our questions better than anything on the web. Tombseye 02:56, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Why I go with the 100,000 figure

In Fromkin's book "A Peace to End all Peace" he references the 12th edition of the E.B. article on the battle which was writen by one of the German staff officers who was there on the campaign (Major Franz Carl Endres). This officer (who had the location and reason to know the facts) provided the figure of 90,000 effectives with just 12,500 returning to the Ottoman base at Erzurum. This is a source who was thought good enough by the E.B. back in 1924 and was in a position to know the actual figures. Perhaps part of the confusion is related to the idea of "soldiers" vs "everyone". The everyone category can include a great many people who are driving animals, pushing artillery, etc. Porters. I've seen figures for the British army in Mesopotamia where they had about 100,000 soliders and 400,000 total men.

Also, I absolutely see the connection between this battle and the Armenian Genocide. Enver - thinks he is the greatest general - has his army shattered by a weaker force. He needs someone to blame because it surely isn't HIS fault that he lost. Who does he pick? We know who he picked - those traitorous Armenians, that's who. He's got some reason, some Armenians did fight for the Russians, perhaps some Armenians living on the Ottoman side of the frontier actually did help the Russians (they had good reason, see the Hamidian_massacres from 20 years earlier). In any event, Enver then orders the removal of all Armenians from the Ottoman army (and they likely all subsequently died, look how well the Ottomans treated the 8,000 POWs from Townshend's division). So, Enver doesn't trust the Armenians, thinks they screwed up his lovely war plan and then, when the Russians launch their offensive into Ottoman Armenia, and the Armenians at Van revolt in Russia's favor... time for the hammer to come down.

How is this battle NOT related to the Armenian Genocide? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cglassey (talk • contribs) .

The 90,000 minus the 12,500 gives us approximately 77,500 so that figure seems to back the CNN history link I found. As for the relation to the Armenian Genocide, well sure the connection between the conflict between Russia and the Ottomans is the main reason for the Armenian Genocide, but I'm not sure what point it would serve to put that in this article. It'd probably be better served, written in a manner that isn't POV as with the sarcasm regarding Enver, to mention it in the Armenian Genocide article. Tombseye 18:07, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
Tombseye, what is the CNN history link you refer to? Could you please place it here? --Michalis Famelis 19:17, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
Oh yeah sorry, I forgot to add the link.[1] It's that CNN Almanac thing that talks about major events in history. It seems to back the unsigned guy's figures so I'm in favor of the 77,500 figure or thereabouts. Tombseye 19:32, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, so far it seems we have gathered these horrid pieces of evidence:

Ottoman Forces before the battle: 90-100,000 plus possibly another 100,000 as "auxilliary population"
Ottoman Forces casualties due to the battle: 30,000
Ottoman Forces casualties due to the retreat: 47,500
Ottoman Forces survived: 12,500

(a note: I feel sick, I'm counting thousands of human lives as if they were Euros, or crackers...)
There is still the issue of the Russian forces. So far we have

One source stating 100,000 men (which is more than the Ottomans).
Another source stating they were less than the Ottomans.
And we have no numbers with regard to casualties.


Remarks?? Sources mentioned so far:

  1. Jere W. Roberson University of Central Oklahoma, College of Liberal Arts
  2. Encyclopædia Britannica Online
  3. CNN Almanac


--Michalis Famelis 19:53, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, someone's going to have to hit the library to get the info. as neither my encyclopedia or my other book 'A History of Russia' by Riasanovsky goes over the war casualties and barely alludes to the battle itself. The internet sources are pretty weak, nationalistic, or outwardly biased, so we'd be better off is someone looked up some of the books I've mentioned or other books about the battle or World War I to get exact figures on the Russian casualties and troop strength. Tombseye 23:02, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
I had a very long edit war with Inanna because she refused to cite sources, and after like a week when she finally did, they weren't even in English. I don't trust her sources because they don't seem to be very neutral. --Khoikhoi 23:53, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

I supposed "svenska" is not english.But you put it.

Battle of Sarikamis is a important battle in our history.We usually call it "Sarıkmış Tragedy".Enver Pasha's party(who became leader by revolution) had done very bad things about Ottoman Empire.Then he escaped to russia...etc.

They sent the Turkish Army there by simply uniforms.And then, 90,000 soliders freezed in -40c at the battle area...Inanna 00:30, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Inanna, what do you think of the casualties figures? It seems from the above sources that we have collected that Ottoman casualties were approximately 77,000 which is different from the figure you give. And in your recent edits you give a magnitude of Enver Pasha's troops before the tragedy as 160,000. Would you care to comment on these numbers? Also, I do not by any means want to sound offencive, but do you think we could have the Turkish language phrase for "Sarikamis Tragedy" at the top of the article, right after the initial statement? I think it would be informative. -- Michalis Famelis 00:54, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Russians had 160,000 troops.Turkish troops were 120,000.I have always heard and read as 90,000 casualties.I think both name should be used for this article...Inanna 01:00, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Would you care to provide some source on these figures? The figures as are presented before come from in my opinion reliable, third party sources, such as Encyclopedia Brittanica and the CNN. Also, since you speak Turkish could you please say how "Sarikamis Tragedy" is told in the Turkish language? Is it "Sarıkmış Trajedi" (a wild guess here, just because Tragedy interlinks to tr:Trajedi). --Michalis Famelis 01:06, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

No, it's "Sarıkamış Faciası".I showed a source about that.But's in Turkish.However, you can see the numbers here...Inanna 01:38, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for that, I put it in the article. Apart form that, I understad you cite this link from karsardahanigdir.net as your source for the figures you provided, correct me if I am wrong. Again, correct me if I am wrong but karsardahanigdir.net does not seem as a historical research website, rather a tourist one? Are you sure this is a reliable source, reliable enough to compete with, say Encyclopedia Brittanica? -- Michalis Famelis 14:53, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
That's the problem, some tourist source can't be held to the same standard as Encyclopedia Brittanica. I say we go with the Brittanica source for the figures on the Turks we do know. Reliable sources are needed and unfortunately everything can't be found on the web regarding this particular battle. Tombseye 19:45, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
I don't know if it really is a tourist information site, I can't read Turkish. I'm only saying it looks like one. Maybe Inanna could help clarify this. Innana, what is this website? --Michalis Famelis 21:52, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

It's the web-site of Kars municipality.You can ask anyone from Turkey about "Sarıkamış Tragedy".The casualites were 90,000.I think the all numbers of brittanica are not true...Inanna 18:55, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. I think that Brittanica, as a neutral party in the matter and given the fact that its numbers are based on a third party observer (the German officer mentioned by Cglassey above), is a reliable source in this. The 90,000 figure you say that everyone in Turkey would report could be bloated, as such matters often get into "folk history" which tends to exaggerate. After all, don't you agree that a report made by an eye-witness is more credible than a filtered-through-tradition version of the story held by a people 90 years after the events? -- Michalis Famelis 20:43, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
I have to agree. Of the two sources, Britannica has less reason to be 'biased' as opposed to the Kars principality which may, for whatever reason, seek to increase the numbers. I say go with the Britannica figures backed by the German officer. Tombseye 20:51, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

So here is a proposal based on numbers given by Encyclopædia Britannica Online for Ottoman figures and on numbers given by Jere W. Roberson for Imperial Russians:

  • strength Russians: 100,000
  • strength Ottomans: 90,000 (plus aprox. 100,000 auxilliary non-combatant personell)
  • casualties Russians: unknown
  • casualties Ottomans: 77,500

--Michalis Famelis 13:32, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Russian forces: The Russian forces are estimated at 100,000 by John Keegan in his WWI book (as well as other sources, such as DuPuy). I haven't found any sources that contradict this but it doesn't make much sense. The Russians were quite seriously worried about Enver's attack and their urgent appeal for aid from the British and French was the cause of the Gallipoli campaign. Why, if the Russians had 100,000 would they be worried by an Ottoman attack with an army of just 90,000? Why would the commander of the Russian army want to withdraw to Kars (an action which Yudenich did not, in fact, carry out)? The numbers which we have don't make sense. I personally think Enver's army is larger than 90,000 and the Russian army is smaller than 100,000 but I can't offer sources.

2nd point: I can't figure out who Yudenich was taking orders from. Was it Vorontsov, the Governor General of the Cacasus? Or was it this mysterious General Mishlaevski? Perhaps Yudenich took orders from both? Vorontsov was dead within a few months (1915) and the Grand Duke comes in as his replacement in September. -- cglassey 15 February 2006

[edit] About the War

1-) Yes, Enver Pasha blamed Armenians because Armenians were really guilty because of their geurilla attacks on Turkish troops but that, of course, didn't play a critical role in the battle.

2-)Actually the Sarıkamış operation wasn't a military failure. It had to be done because if we would wait until the summer comes, Russians would finish their preparations and they could easily conquer the whole eastern territory of the empire. Sacrafices of Turksih troops made it possible to keep much of our territories(still with losing many important places).

3-)Enver Pasha was a Turkish nationalist and of course he would want to capture the Central Asia where our fathers came from and where our brothers still live but at the time of Sarıkamıs this wasn't his goal. He tried to keep Russians where they are. If the Russian threat could be stopped, Ottoman forces would be transferred to Middle East and Balkans.

With respect, Deliogul 12:09, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

"Yes, Enver Pasha blamed Armenians because Armenians were really guilty because of their geurilla attacks on Turkish troops but that, of course, didn't play a critical role in the battle." This charge has been made before - and has never been proved. It also does not explain why women and children were included... unless the Armenian Genocide actually happened. Which it did. Darkmind1970 16:26, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
We are talking about a battle not about a genocide here. I don't understand why people try to put this genocide thing in every article. At least, first check if the issue is relevant to your "claims". Deliogul 13:22, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The cold made a deal in Russia again

I believe if Russia had won battle in africa some sources would tell it won it because of cold weather. But i wont to say else. It is obvious that the Ottoman 3rd Army failed the attack. Enver Pasha was discharged impartially, incapable to lead attack nor retreat bringing surrender of 9th corpse with its full complement losing practically entire 3rd army that had advantage about 3:2 before. Owing victory of Sarıkamış Russia advanced on Anatolia. What we see in conclusion of this article?
- As a result of the battle, both sides suffered heavy casualties.
It is the frank underestimation of Russian success or Ottoman failure any way one likes. Sources of this article are cold war written so i'm not surprised. We have lack of objectivity here, no manoeuvers and just low-quality.

[edit] Inappropriate Phrase

I think the phrase 'mopping up' is inappropriate. It damages the neutrality of the article. So I suggest changing it. OnurtheAgha (talk) 13:54, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

That's the term that's used in military textbooks. Meowy 18:48, 8 June 2008 (UTC)