From the Middle East Institute,
Friday, March 10, 2017:
March 10-11, 1917: General Maude Takes Baghdad
Following the Second Battle of Kut, in February, the renewed British advance on Baghdad paused
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| Maude |
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| Khalil Pasha |
only briefly. General Frederick Maude (who had been the last man off the
beach at Gallipoli), continuing to show far more speed than his
predecessors, advanced to ‘Aziziziyya, paused there, and on March 5
began his final approach to Baghdad.
The British had been uncertain about the value of taking Baghdad due to
its limited strategic value but eventually saw it as a symbolic goal; in
addition it was seen as a way to close a pincer on the Turks with
British advances from Baghdad and Russia pushing south from Mosul. That
was not to be: at this same moment the February (March New Style)
Revolution was under way in Petrograd.
The defense of Baghdad was commanded by the hero of the 1916 victory at
Kut, Khalil Pasha, who was the uncle of Ottoman Minister of War Enver
Pasha and was both governor of Baghdad and Commander of the Ottoman
Sixth Army. After the war he would take the surname Kut from his victory
and be known under the Turkish Republic as Halil Kut. He had the
Turkish XIII and XVIII Corps defending the Baghdad region....MORE
