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Mapping the Turkish Offensive in the War of Independence, August–September 1922
Abstract
This paper and the accompanying presentation aim to visualize the background and the execution of the Turkish offensive that started on 26 August 1922. Drawing on various primary and secondary sources, the presentation uses animated icons and charts on a physical map of Asia Minor, to depict the Greek and Turkish orders of battle, deployments, and troop movements. I will be using Tableau, Carto, and Q-GIS software programs in the realization of the project. This offensive, which is referred to as Büyük Taarruz (“The Great Offensive”) in Turkish historiography, was the decisive military action of the Greek-Turkish War of 1919-1922. In the summer of 1921, the Greek Army launched its own major offensive to destroy the Turkish armed resistance, which emerged under Mustafa Kemal’s overall political and military leadership. The Turks stopped the Greek onslaught after a series of bloody battles, and then the Greek army entrenched itself in Western Anatolia. For the next eleven months, the Ankara government tirelessly rebuilt and enlarged its armed forces for a decisive push. However, the Turks could not establish the superiority in number of soldiers (except for cavalrymen and officers) and equipment. By August 1922, the opposing sides possessed similar number of troops in total, deployed around a rectangle-shaped frontline through ?znik, Afyon and Aegean Sea. To avoid a costly and fruitless stalemate, Turkish command concentrated more than half of its forces in the south of Afyon, thanks to rapid night marches, secrecy, and the incompetence of the Greek command, which failed to respond to this massive redeployment. The Turkish goal was to defeat the smaller Greek force dug in in a smaller sector, and thus throw the remainder of the Greek Army off balance and ultimately block its potential routes of retreat towards ?zmir. The plan worked brilliantly. “The Great Offensive” has a huge presence in Turkish collective memory and national identity. Yet the Turkish public usually has a superficial understanding of its planning and execution, which is also ridden with popular nationalist tropes. The historical division of the Turkish armed forces has studied the offensive thoroughly, but its highly technical publications are not very suitable for the general reader. The fundamental goal of this project is to create an animated presentation in an online electronic format that the general public will find accessible as well as accurate.
Discipline
History
Geographic Area
Turkey
Sub Area
19th-21st Centuries