page_title: Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
section_title: First World War (1914–18)
hierarchical_section_title: Mustafa Kemal Atatürk / Military career / First World War (1914–18)
caption_attribution_description: Türkçe: Anafartalar Komutan Gazi Mustafa Kemal ve silah arkadaşları, Çanakkale Savaşı 1915.
context_page_description: Kemal Atatürk was a Turkish field marshal, revolutionary statesman, author, and the founding father of the Republic of Turkey, serving as its first president from 1923 until his death in 1938. He undertook sweeping progressive reforms, which modernized Turkey into a secular, industrial nation. Ideologically a secularist and nationalist, his policies and theories became known as Kemalism. Due to his military and political accomplishments, Atatürk is regarded as one of the most important political leaders of the 20th century.
  Atatürk came to prominence for his role in securing the Ottoman Turkish victory at the Battle of Gallipoli during World War I. Following the defeat and dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, he led the Turkish National Movement, which resisted mainland Turkey's partition among the victorious Allied powers. Establishing a provisional government in the present-day Turkish capital Ankara, he defeated the forces sent by the Allies, thus emerging victorious from what was later referred to as the Turkish War of Independence. He subsequently proceeded to abolish the decrepit Ottoman Empire and proclaimed the foundation of the Turkish Republic in its place.
context_section_description: In 1914, the Ottoman Empire entered the European and Middle Eastern theatres of World War I allied with the Central Powers. Atatürk was given the task of organizing and commanding the 19th Division attached to the Fifth Army during the Battle of Gallipoli. He became the front-line commander after correctly anticipating where the Allies would attack, and held his position until they retreated. Following the Battle of Gallipoli, Atatürk served in Edirne until 14 January 1916. He was then assigned to the command of the XVI Corps of the Second Army and sent to the Caucasus Campaign after the massive Russian offensive had reached key Anatolian cities. On 7 August, he rallied his troops and mounted a counteroffensive. Two of his divisions captured Bitlis and Muş, upsetting the calculations of the Russian Command.
  Following this victory, the CUP government in Constantinople proposed to establish a new army in Hejaz (Hicaz Kuvve-i Seferiyesi) and appoint Atatürk to its command, but he refused the proposal and this army was never established. Instead, on 7 March 1917, Atatürk was promoted from the command of the XVI Corps to the overall command of the Second Army, although the Czar's armies were soon withdrawn when the Russian Revolution erupted.
  In July 1917, he was appointed to the command of the Seventh Army, replacing Fevzi Pasha on 7 August 1917, who was under the command of the German general Erich von Falkenhayn's Yildirim Army Group (after the British forces of General Edmund Allenby captured Jerusalem in December 1917, Erich von Falkenhayn was replaced by Otto Liman von Sanders who became the new commander of the Yıldırım Army Group in early 1918.) Atatürk did not get along well with General von Falkenhayn and, together with Miralay İsmet Bey, wrote a report to Grand Vizier Talaat Pasha regarding the grim situation and lack of adequate resources in the Palestinian front. However, Talaat Pasha ignored their observations and refused their suggestion to form a stronger defensive line to the north, in Ottoman Syria (in parts of the Beirut Vilayet, Damascus Vilayet, and Aleppo Vilayet), with Turks instead of Germans in command. Following the rejection of his report, Atatürk resigned from the Seventh Army and returned to Constantinople. There, he was assigned with the task of accompanying the crown prince (and future sultan) Mehmed Vahideddin during his train trip to Austria-Hungary and Germany. While in Germany, Atatürk visited the German lines on the Western Front and concluded that the Central Powers would soon lose the war. He did not hesitate to openly express this opinion to Kaiser Wilhelm II and his high-ranking generals in person. During the return trip, he briefly stayed in Karlsbad and Vienna for medical treatment.
  When Mehmed VI became the new Sultan of the Ottoman Empire in July 1918, he called Atatürk to Constantinople, and in August 1918, assigned him to the command of the Seventh Army in Palestine. Atatürk arrived in Aleppo on 26 August 1918, then continued south to his headquarters in Nablus. The Seventh Army was holding the central sector of the front lines. On 19 September, at the beginning of the Battle of Megiddo, the Eighth Army was holding the coastal flank but fell apart and Liman Pasha ordered the Seventh Army to withdraw to the north in order to prevent the British from conducting a short envelopment to the Jordan River. The Seventh Army retired towards the Jordan River but was destroyed by British aerial bombardment during its retreat from Nablus on 21 September 1918. Nevertheless, Atatürk managed to form a defence line to the north of Aleppo. According to Lord Kinross, Atatürk was the only Turkish general in the war who never suffered a defeat.
  The war ended with the Armistice of Mudros which was signed on 30 October 1918, and all German and Austro-Hungarian troops in the Ottoman Empire were granted ample time to withdraw. On 31 October, Atatürk was appointed to the command of the Yıldırım Army Group, replacing Liman von Sanders. Atatürk organized the distribution of weapons to the civilians in Antep
caption: Atatürk with Ottoman military officers during the Battle of Gallipoli, Çanakkale, 1915
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