The Ottoman Army, 1914–1918

In this book, Hikmet Özdemir explores the dismal health and sanitary conditions generated throughout the Anatolian landscape starting with the Balkan Wars (1912) and ending with the Turco-Greek War (1922). By using the prism of health to map out the activities and movements of the Ottoman military, the author strives to establish the relationship between wars and epidemics during the period concerned. The emphasis has been placed on World War I, when the Ottoman army fought on multiple fronts. The central argument of the book is that the Ottoman territories, especially Anatolia, and more specifically its eastern sections, were ravaged by numerous epidemics and continuous warfare during World War I that vastly contributed to the production and spread of various diseases throughout the Ottoman lands. The microbes borne on the battlefield quickly spread as a major cause of high mortality not only among soldiers, regardless of rank, but also among the civilian populations of Anatolia, regardless of ethnic or religious affiliation. Taken as such, the book is engaged with a novel and highly relevant subject. That the issues of disease and epidemics have altogether been neglected in the study of late Ottoman history makes them even more appropriate for the subject of a scholarly book

Ancient history · Archaeology · Argument (complex analysis · Artillery · Battlefield · Ethnic group · First world war · Geography · Military history · Political science · Spanish Civil War · Subject (documents · Health and Conflict Studies · History · Law · Medicine