Battle for Mosul (1918-19)

## Overview

The Battle for Mosul was a series of military engagements that took place primarily in and around the city of Mosul between the Republic of Assyria Land Forces and armed elements of the Turkish National Movement and Kurdish paramilitary units. The battle lasted from October 30th 1918 to May 15th 1919, and resulted in an Assyrian victory.

Upon the Armistice of Mudros on October 30th 1918, newly formed units of the Republic of Assyria Land Forces began to occupy the southern neighborhoods of the city, whilst Ahrun Ishtar issued the Assyrian Declaration of Independence over radio and through other mass-media, such as newspapers. Shortly afterwards, Kurdish paramilitary units began to spring up in activity within the central neighborhoods of the city, beginning to move southward whilst units of the Turkish National Movement began arriving in Mosul by rail.

Firefights started between Assyrian and Turkish-Kurdish forces at around early noon, whilst the new national government under Ishtar began to get in contact with the newly formed Republic of Armenia to discuss jointly attacking Turkish and Kurdish forces in Eastern Anatolia. The Ishtar Administration received reports that war had broken out between the fledgling Armenian and Azerbaijani states, and any and all Armenian military units would have to stay in Armenia to fight the Azerbaijanis.

The Ishtar Administration contacted the government of Ahmad Shah Qajar's Sublime State of Iran. Discussions went back and forth; the young Shah was eager to prove his legitimacy in a war-torn empire, which had been dealt a severe blow by the Persian Campaign during the Great War. From then forth, the Shah agreed to stage an invasion of Azerbaijan in support of Armenia and Assyria, beginning to frame the campaign northwards as "reclamation of lost territory", as much of Transcaucasia and Ciscaucasia had been provinces of Iran for much of the 18th and 19th centuries.

The battle continued in spite of diplomatic success for Assyria. From October to December 1918, fighting was fairly self-contained within city limits, mostly in street-to-street firefights. However, for much of these months, the governments of Greece, Armenia and Assyria had been organizing a massive in-scale multi-pronged campaign into much of Anatolia: the Epiphany Offensive.

On January 6th, Assyrian and Iranian units began heavy and tenacious counterattacks into Mosul. Initially, the offensive appeared to have great success; by March, much of the Turkish-Kurdish forces had been limited to suburbs and the outskirts of the city, and in the meantime, the Iranian campaign into Azerbaijan had caught the Turkic nation completely by surprise, and was quickly shaping up to be a joint Iranian-Armenian victory.

Hasty, but extensive networks of trenches, reminiscent of the Great War that ended only months prior, had been dug in the suburbs and outskirts of Mosul. By April, Azerbaijan had fully been finished off, and Armenia could commit it's forces to help take Mosul. Over the course of the next month, trench after trench would fall to Assyrian, Armenian and Iranian assaults, with the last few firefights of the battle occuring into mid-May, with Turkish-Kurdish forces officially abandoning the city and fleeing deeper into Central Anatolia to link up with fellow Turkish National Movement forces by May 15th.

## Outcome

* Assyrian victory; - Mosul renamed Nineveh, - Mass Turkish-Kurdish exodus from much of Upper Mesopotamia, - Assyrian independence retained, - International recognition of Assyrian independence.
* Iranian-Armenian intervention; - Armenian-Azerbaijani war ends in Armenian victory, - Iranian forces invade Azerbaijan and annex it's territory (excluding Nagorno-Karabakh), - Armenia annexes much of Eastern Anatolia, gaining Mount Ararat, Van and Erzurum, - Armenia and Iran recognize Assyria has an independent country.