Extra Credits
Published on 6 Apr 2019Mehmed IV wanted to live up to, and even surpass, the legacy of his forefather Mehmed II, who had secured the Ottomans’ inheritance to the Roman Empire through his conquest of Constantinople. So the current Mehmed decided to target Vienna — but Emperor Leopold dismissed these threats…
Over a hundred thousand Ottoman troops are heading for Vienna. Only 15,000 men defend the walls. They have only six days to prepare the city. How long can they hold?
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April 9, 2019
Siege of Vienna – Opening Bombardment – Extra History – #1
January 25, 2019
The Greco-Turkish War and Legalisation of Ethnic Cleaning | Between 2 Wars | 1922 Part 2 of 2
TimeGhost History
Published on 24 Jan 2019When the Ottoman empire is torn apart by the Treaty of Sevres, ethnic conflicts in the old empire that have been boiling for almost a century lead to war between Greece and the parts of the Empire that will soon become the Republic of Turkey. A war that will have lasting effect on the world as both sides proceed to carry out stunning actions of ethnic violence, which is shockingly also sanctioned by international treaty after the fact.
Special thanks to Jonas Yazo Srouji and Valantis Athanasiou, who helped us with the research and image research for this episode. This behemoth of an episode is with 27 minutes the longest Between Two Wars episode yet. We really wanted to do the events justice. To deliver an unbiased, full telling of this eventful and controversial part of history, we couldn’t and didn’t want to make it any shorter.
An important note about the difference between ‘nationality’ and ‘ethnicity’: While ‘nationality’ is merely the relationship between an individual person and a state, someones ‘ethnicity’ depends on the racial, cultural, or religious group that a person is part of or identifies with. While these can overlap, they don’t necessarily have to.
Extra note: we recorded this way back in 2018, when our sound was not optimized. We apologise for the varying audio quality.
Cheers, Joram.
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Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Directed by: Spartacus Olsson
Written by: Spartacus Olsson
Produced by: Astrid Deinhard
Executive Producers: Bodo Rittenauer, Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Joram Appel
Edited by: Wieke Kapteijns
Research by: Spartacus Olsson and Jonas Yazo Srouji and Valantis Athanasiou.Thumbnail depicts Ataturk colorised by Olga Shirnina aka Klimbim.
Colorized Pictures by Olga Shirnina and Norman Stewart
Olga’s pictures: https://klimbim2014.wordpress.com
Norman’s pictures https://oldtimesincolor.blogspot.com/Video Archive by Screenocean/Reuters http://www.screenocean.com
A TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH
November 7, 2018
QotD: Gandhi and the fall of the Caliphate
… it should not be thought for one second that Gandhi’s finally full-blown desire to detach India from the British empire gave him the slightest sympathy with other colonial peoples pursuing similar objectives. Throughout his entire life Gandhi displayed the most spectacular inability to understand or even really take in people unlike himself — a trait which V.S. Naipaul considers specifically Hindu, and I am inclined to agree. Just as Gandhi had been totally unconcerned with the situation of South Africa’s blacks (he hardly noticed they were there until they rebelled), so now he was totally unconcerned with other Asians or Africans. In fact, he was adamantly opposed to certain Arab movements within the Ottoman empire for reasons of internal Indian politics.
At the close of World War I, the Muslims of India were deeply absorbed in what they called the “Khilafat” movement — “Khilafat” being their corruption of “Caliphate,” the Caliph in question being the Ottoman Sultan. In addition to his temporal powers, the Sultan of the Ottoman empire held the spiritual position of Caliph, supreme leader of the world’s Muslims and successor to the Prophet Muhammad. At the defeat of the Central Powers (Germany, Austria, Turkey), the Sultan was a prisoner in his palace in Constantinople, shorn of his religious as well as his political authority, and the Muslims of India were incensed. It so happened that the former subject peoples of the Ottoman empire, principally Arabs, were perfectly happy to be rid of this Caliph, and even the Turks were glad to be rid of him, but this made no impression at all on the Muslims of India, for whom the issue was essentially a club with which to beat the British. Until this odd historical moment, Indian Muslims had felt little real allegiance to the Ottoman Sultan either, but now that he had fallen, the British had done it! The British had taken away their Khilafat! And one of the most ardent supporters of this Indian Muslim movement was the new Hindu leader, Gandhi.
Richard Grenier, “The Gandhi Nobody Knows”, Commentary, 1983-03-01.
November 2, 2018
Austria-Hungary Disintegrates – The Ottoman Empire Leaves the War I THE GREAT WAR Week 223
The Great War
Published on 1 Nov 2018The Ottoman Empire has been on the retreat in the Middle East since the renewed British offensive in September and now, as the allies are threatening the Turkish heartland and also Constantinople, the Ottoman Empire calls for an armistice. The Armistice of Mudros is signed as the remaining Central Powers also struggle to keep their Empires together.
September 28, 2018
The Meuse-Argonne Offensive – Bulgarian Collapse I THE GREAT WAR Week 218
The Great War
Published on 27 Sep 2018This week, the biggest American military operation in history kicks off with 1.2 million American soldiers trying to take the Krimhilde Stellung. At the same time the Army of the Orient advances into Bulgaria and the Ottoman 7th and 8th armies collapse in Palestine.
September 21, 2018
Allied Breakthroughs In Palestine And Macedonia I THE GREAT WAR Week 217
The Great War
Published on 20 Sep 2018In a turbulent week of the First World War, the Allies break through at the Macedonian Front during the Battle of Vadar and in Palestine during the Battle for Palestine. At the same time, the Ottoman defeats the last defenders of Baku.
August 7, 2018
QotD: Sailing past Byzantium
To those who know nothing about the mediaeval, “byzantine” East of Christendom (and what do I know about anything?) a book by the respectable Oxford scholar, Averil Cameron, is worth mentioning. It is a short survey of developments in her academic field, entitled, Byzantine Matters (2014). It poses five basic questions on which our common assumptions are mostly wrong, and provides succinct directions for thinking again.
Mediaeval Greece, the Byzantine dynasties, and Orthodox Christianity: these are far from interchangeable concepts. Moreover, “Byzantine art” — the focus of enthusiasm in the anglosphere through the last century or so — is misunderstood. The term “Byzantine” itself — conceived from late antiquity as a deprecation — persists in the academy as an intelligence neutralizer. The vanity of “the West” gets in the way of appreciating a parallel Christian realm, which flourished for more than a thousand years, and never succumbed to the Arabs. (It finally succumbed to the Turks.) We disdain what amounts to an alternative universe of Christian witness and high culture, of great variety and depth, even more obtusely than we disdain our own Middle Ages.
We are narrowed and prejudiced by the attitudinizing of Edward Gibbon, and the inheritance (or disinheritance) of our Western “Enlightenment,” to view as backward a civilization in most ways superior to our “modern” own, from pride in the tinsel of technology. From AD 330 (the founding of Constantine’s capital) to 1453 (when it fell into Ottoman hands), we see only a continuous story of “decline.” But there were many declines over this vast period, and in the intervals between them, many recoveries.
David Warren, “Sailing past Byzantium”, Essays in Idleness, 2016-11-07.
July 31, 2018
German Asia Corps In The Ottoman Empire During WW1 I THE GREAT WAR Special
The Great War
Published on 30 Jul 2018German-Ottoman military cooperation predated World War 1 by a few decades. But their alliance during the First World War meant that German (and Austrian) troops would actually fight in and with the Ottoman Empire.
June 29, 2018
The Run For The Baku Oil Fields I THE GREAT WAR Week 205
The Great War
Published on 28 Jun 2018While the Ottoman Army of Islam is marching on Baku and the Caspian Sea, multiple other players are trying to stake their claim of the Baku oil fields.
June 15, 2018
The French Counter Attack At Matz I THE GREAT WAR Week 203
The Great War
Published on 14 Jun 2018The French have cracked the German radio code on the Western Front and use their advantage for a counterattack at Matz. The already hastily planed German attack during Operation Gneisenau is called off after just 4 days. Meanwhile Austria-Hungary plans another offensive in Italy and German and Ottoman forces fight each other in Georgia.
June 12, 2018
The Goeben & The Breslau – Two German Ships Under Ottoman Flag I THE GREAT WAR On The Road
The Great War
Published on 11 Jun 2018How SMS Goeben and SMS Breslau, two German warships in 1914 sailed under Ottoman flag and helped Enver Pasha to get the Ottoman Empire into World War 1.
April 20, 2018
Knocking Out The Hejaz Railway I THE GREAT WAR Week 195
The Great War
Published on 19 Apr 2018While the Germans are still advancing in Flanders (Operation Georgette), the other fronts are not always quiet. In Palestine, the British forces and the Arab Revolt are taking the initiative again. T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) and the Arab Revolt are attacking the vital Hejaz Railway, a major transport factor for the Ottoman Empire.
January 30, 2018
British Special Forces – Bulgarian-Ottoman Relations – Caporetto I OUT OF THE TRENCHES
The Great War
Published on 29 Jan 2018Ask your questions here: http://outofthetrenches.thegreatwar.tv
January 12, 2018
Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points I THE GREAT WAR WEEK 181
The Great War
Published on 11 Jan 2018In the first full week of 1918, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson outlines his points for peace. In the Caucasus, the increasing instability leads to daily skirmishes between the Armenians and Ottomans. Ludendorff continues planning for an upcoming German offensive whilst his countrymen negotiate peace terms with Russia.
December 19, 2017
Transcaucasia in World War 1 I THE GREAT WAR Special
The Great War
Published on 18 Dec 2017The Caucasus region with its many different ethnic groups and its resources was always of particular interest to the greater powers like Russia, Persia or the Ottoman Empire. In the late 19th and early 20th century, the idea of ethnic self determination and resulting national movements, the fluctuating powers situation caused by World War 1 created a unique situation for Georgians, Azerbaijanis and Armenians.