Ahmed Djemal
Ahmed Djemal Pasha (
Turkish:
Ahmet Cemal Paşa) (
May 6,
1872 -
July 21,
1922) was born in
Midilli. His father was Mehmet Nesip Bey, a military pharmacist. Between
1908-
1918, Djemal was one of the most important administrators of the Ottoman government. He graduated from Kuleli Military High school in
1890, then from the Military Academy (Mektebi Harbiyeyi Şahane) in
1893 in
Istanbul. Firstly, he served for the 1st Department of the Ministry of Military Issues (Seraskerlik Erkanı Harbiye), and then he worked at the Kirkkilise Fortification Construction Department bound to 2nd Army. Djemal was assigned to the Second Army Corps, in
1896. Two years later, he became the staff commander of Novice Division, in
Salonica.
Meanwhile, he began to sympathise with the reforms of "
Committee of Union and Progress" (CUP) (İttihat ve Terakki Cemiyeti) on military issues. It was in
1905, when Djemal became a major and designated as the Inspector of Roumelia Railways. In
1906 he joined The
Ottoman Liberty Society. He became influential in the department of military issues of the "Committee of Union and Progress". He became a member of Board of the Third Army Corps, in
1907. Here, he worked with
Major Fethi (Okyar) and
Mustafa Kemal.
In
1911 Djemal was appointed Governor of
Baghdad. He resigned however from this duty to join again the army in the
Balkan War . In October
1912, he was promoted to
colonel. At the end of the Balkan War I, he played an important role in the propaganda traced by the CUP, against the negotiations with the
European countries. He tried to resolve the problems occurred in Istanbul after the
Bab-ı Ali Attack. Djemal had a significant role in the
Second Balkan War, and with the revolution of CUP on
January 23,
1913, he became the commander of Istanbul and was appointed minister of public works. In
1914 he became the Minister of the Navy.
When
Europe was divided in two blocks before the
First World War, he supported an alliance with
France. He went to France to negotiate an alliance with the French but failed and sided with
Enver and
Talat Pashas favouring the
German side. Djemal, along with Enver and Talat took control of the Ottoman government in 1913. The
Three Pashas effectively ruled the Ottoman Empire for the duration of
World War One. Djemal was one of the designers of the government's internal and foreign policies, nearly all of which proved disastrous for the Empire.
After the Ottoman Empire declared war on the
Allies in
World War I,
Enver Pasha nominated Djemal Pasha to lead the Ottoman army against
English forces in
Egypt and Djemal accepted the position. Similarly to Enver, he proved unsuccessful as a military leader.
Syria
Djemal Pasha was appointed with full powers in military and civilian affairs in Syria in 1915. A provisional law granted him emergency powers in May of that year. All cabinet decrees from Istanbul related to Syria became subject to his approval. His offensives on both his first
First Suez Offensive and second attacks on the
Suez Canal failed. Coupled with the wartime exigencies and natural disasters that afflicted the region during these years, this alienated the population from the Ottoman government, and led to
Arab Revolt.
At the end of 1915, Djemal started secret negotiations with the Allies for ending the war (he proposed himself to take over the Ottoman government). These secret negotiations came to nothing, in part because the Allies could not agree on the future territory of the Ottoman Empire.
In the spring of 1915, while the
Arab Revolt was rising, Djemal instituted strict control over Syria against Arab opponents of the Ottomans. Djemal's forces also fought against the
Arab nationalists from 1916 onwards. Ottoman authorities occupied the French consulates in
Beirut and
Damascus and confiscated French secret documents that revealed evidence about activities and names of the Arab insurgents. Djemal used this information from these documents as well as from others belonging to the
Decentralization Party. Djemal believed that insurgency under French control was the main reasonon for his military failings. With the documents he gathered, Djemal moved against the insurgency forces which were led by Arab political and cultural leaders. This was followed by the military trials of the insurgents known as "
Âliye Divan-ı Harb-i Örfisi" in which these leaders were punished.
At the end of 1917, Djemal ruled from his post in
Damascus as a near independent ruler of his portion of the Empire. In
1917, following the Ottoman Army's defeats by the English Army under
General Allenby, he resigned from the 4th Army and returned to Istanbul.
III Parlement
In the last congress of
Committee of Union and Progress held in
1917, Djemal was elected to the Board of Central Administration.
With the defeat of the Empire in October 1918 and the resignation of
Talat Pasha's Cabinet on
November 2,
1918, Djemal fled with seven other leaders of the CUP to
Germany, and then to
Switzerland.
Military Trial
A Military Court in Turkey accused Djemal of persecuting
Arab subjects of the
Ottoman Empire, and sentenced him to death
in absentia. Later, Djemal went to
Central Asia, where he worked on modernisation of the
Afghan army. Due to the success of the
Bolshevik Revolution, Djemal travelled to
Tbilisi where he was assassinated, together with his secretary, on
July 21,
1922 by
Stepan Dzaghigian, an Armenian. Ahmed Djemal's remains were brought to
Erzurum and buried there.
His grandson,
Hasan Cemal, is a columnist, journalist and writer who is well-known in Turkey.
* Fromkin, David,
A Peace to End All Peace, Avon Books, 1989, p 214.
*
Young Turks*
Ottoman Empire*
The Sinai and Palestine Campaign, 1915-1917
