Otto Liman from Sanders

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Liman by Sanders 1916

Otto Viktor Karl Liman von Sanders , until 1913 Otto Viktor Karl Liman (born February 17, 1855 in Stolp , † August 22, 1929 in Munich ) was a Prussian cavalry general and Ottoman marshal .

Life

Origin and youth

He was the son of Carl Leonhard Liman, businessman and secret commissioner, owner of the manor in Schwessin, and his wife Emma, ​​née Michaelis. There are divergent claims about his alleged great-grandfather: B. Wolff Nathan Liepmann was the great-grandfather on his father's side, a Jewish trader who was born in Halberstadt around 1740 and whose son Heinrich (born in Hamburg 1788), Otto's grandfather, was baptized in 1807. The Neue Deutsche Biographie notes that the great-grandfather was Isaak Nathan Liepmann, a Berlin banker of the Jewish faith (1762–1819), whose son Victor was then the grandfather of Otto Liman von Sanders. Another great-grandfather variant is Wolff Nathan Liepmann, born this time in Berlin in 1763, whose son Victor was Otto's grandfather.

Otto Liman von Sanders as a cavalry officer

After graduating from the Friedrich-Wilhelm Gymnasium in Berlin Liman came on 13 March 1874 as an ensign in the Life Guards Infantry Regiment (1st Grand Duchy of Hesse) No. 115 a. From 1878 to 1881 he attended the War Academy and switched to the Guard Dragoon Regiment (1st Grand Ducal Hessian) No. 23 . In 1885 he was promoted to first lieutenant and in 1887 he was assigned to the general staff . In 1889 he became a captain and in 1891 squadron chief . As a major he commanded the 2nd Silesian Hussar Regiment No. 6 in 1900 , in 1904 he became a colonel and in 1908 major general . As a lieutenant general he was in command of the 22nd division until his departure for Turkey in December 1913 .

On June 16, 1913 Liman was raised to the hereditary Prussian nobility on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the reign of Kaiser Wilhelm II . As a title of nobility, he chose the maiden name of his late first wife Amelie von Sanders (1858-1906), whom he married in Darmstadt in 1877 . From this marriage there were three daughters.

Military mission in the Ottoman Empire and World War I

After his appointment as head of a military mission on June 30, 1913, Liman von Sanders was sent to the Ottoman Empire in December to reorganize the Ottoman army , which was in extremely poor condition. The rank he held in the Prussian army until his departure for the Ottoman Empire was lieutenant general. According to the contract of the military mission, like the other German officers, he had received a rank higher within the Ottoman army and thus became an Ottoman general (Birinci Ferik). As a result of the conflict about his appointment as corps commander in Constantinople ( Liman von Sanders crisis ), the same was canceled and Liman von Sanders was promoted by the German emperor to general of the cavalry - and thus to marshal of the Ottoman army (osm. Müschir , Turkish. Mareşal). At times he was honorary chairman of the German-Turkish Association .

Liman von Sanders as Turkish commander (1916)
Sanders inspected with Hans-Joachim Buddecke its aircraft
Buddecke, Liman von Sanders and Boelcke (from left)

On March 24, 1915, Liman von Sanders took command of the 5th Ottoman Army on the Gallipoli peninsula, which was newly formed to defend the Dardanelles, and was able to successfully repel the Entente's attempts to land in the Battle of Gallipoli . The commandant of all coastal fortifications in the Dardanelles and in the Bosporus was the German admiral Guido von Usedom . The German Vice Admiral Johannes Merten acted in Çanakkale as the delegate of the fleet command and in command of all floating equipment .

From February to November 1918 Liman von Sanders commanded the German Asia Corps . At the request of the Ottoman war minister Enver Pasha he took over in early March 1918, command of the until then with little success by General von Falkenhayn led Army Group F (= "Yilderim" Turk. Yıldırım) with the Ottoman 7th and 8th Army and the 4 Army in Palestine and Syria . In view of the British superiority of man and material, he only agreed on the condition that he would be supported with enough troops in his task. But contrary to this agreement, he received no significant reinforcements, while the Ottoman advance initiated by Enver Pasha on the Caucasus front tied up valuable troops. Liman von Sanders was initially able to slow the British advance into Palestine, but ultimately the defensive front could not be held and collapsed completely after the lost Palestine battle.

After the war

After the end of the First World War he was responsible for the repatriation of the German troops from the Ottoman Empire. On January 28, 1919, he started his return journey; on February 3, he was detained by the British in Malta for war crimes against the Armenians and Greeks in the Ottoman Empire. Although this allegation could not be proven and even Sir Ian Hamilton , his main opponent in the Battle of Dardanelles, is said to have stood up for him, he remained in custody until August 21 (including 2½ months in solitary confinement). He arrived in Berlin on September 4, 1919 and was put up for disposition on October 10 .

Liman von Sanders settled in Munich and married Elisabeth, née Alberti from Budapest, for the second time. He was buried in Darmstadt in the old cemetery next to his first wife (grave site: II N 28).

Effect and evaluation

Liman by Sanders (1919)

Although Liman von Sanders laid the strategic basis for the significant victory over the Entente in the battle for access to the Dardanelles, which, as a sign of the effective reorganization of the Ottoman army, effectively counteracted the moral depression in the army and the public, this became undiplomatic in his Procedure for many Germans and Turks alike, for various reasons, unpopular Prussians are hardly given adequate appreciation.

During the war, various factors prevented the concentration of forces and reduced the reputation and efficiency of the German mission in the Ottoman Empire.

  • The competencies of the military mission and its head Liman von Sanders and the German embassy and their military representatives were not clearly regulated. The German ambassador in Istanbul was Baron von Wangenheim from 1912 to October 1915 , then (until autumn 1916) Count Wolff-Metternich , (until August 1917) von Kühlmann and from autumn 1917 Count von Bernstorff . Military attaché was Major General von Lossow from the summer of 1915 until the end of the war .
  • On the other hand, several higher-ranking officers and the "chief" of the Ottoman general staff, General Friedrich Bronsart von Schellendorf , later General von Seeckt , played a similarly independent role, which was therefore detrimental to Liman's influence . From a formal point of view, they were actually deputies of the nominal chief of the general staff, Enver Pascha , on whom they were ultimately dependent. Together with Enver, they pursued expansionist motives, which often stood in the way of Liman's efforts to strengthen the military strength of the Ottoman army.
  • Liman von Sanders had also made himself the enemy of many German officers and the target of their intrigues by - unlike Enver - according to the contract of the military mission, his general staff in Gallipoli was practically exclusively occupied by Turkish officers, whose training he conscientiously pursued to become independent, especially since he saw a Turkish general staff as a guarantee for a functioning connection to the troops.
  • At the beginning of the First World War Liman was one of only three German officers with the rank of general or admiral of Jewish origin. The considerable anti-Semitic mood in bourgeois circles in Germany, especially among the conservative officers and civil servants, had a negative effect .
  • Under the Young Turks with the Minister of War Enver Pascha , both Liman's merit and that of Mustafa Kemal were kept secret or downplayed. Later, under the Gazi Mustafa Kemal (from 1934: Kemal "Ataturk") as president and founder of the Kemalist republic, the memory of Mustafa Kemal's outstanding troop leadership and tactical successes in the battle of Gallipoli was preferred, but not of strategic and military reform activities of the German military mission.

“There can be no doubt that the main credit for the successful land defense of the strait goes to Marshal Liman. His military knowledge, energy, drive and perseverance had proven incomparably superior to the abilities of his English opponent. However, as has happened to many deserving men, Liman received neither the recognition nor the reward for his services due to him. He just had too many enemies and envious people both among the Turks and among the Germans. His arrival in Istanbul [after the Gallipoli victory ] was silent and unnoticed; At the station only Enver Pascha and some official personalities [...] had met to greet them. In my opinion, a man who at that time had to be seen as the savior of the Ottoman Empire should have received a completely different reception. "

- Joseph Pomiankowski : Austro-Hungarian field marshal lieutenant and from 1909 to 1918 military representative in the Ottoman Empire, 1928.
  • After all, the population that received protection and help from Liman von Sanders and against the resistance of the Turks and especially revered him during the war - for example the Greeks from Smyrna (Turkish İzmir) and the rest of the coastal region of Asia Minor - rose up after the Armistice suddenly the most serious accusations against the Germans and the head of the military mission. While Liman von Sanders emphasized the unpretentiousness, tenacity and loyalty of the common Anatolian soldier several times in his war memories, he did not understand the allegations of this Levantine population, who ultimately wanted to hold him unjustifiably responsible for the persecution of the Armenians . Liman had been the only high-ranking German military man who had opposed the mass arrests and deportations in connection with the genocide of the Armenians - also for military-political reasons (with success for the Smyrna area; on his threat to the Vali that he would become To oppose deportations of the Armenian civilian population by force of arms, these were stopped in November 1916). In the magazine 20th Century , Liman von Sanders described it as a shame that German officers had been charged with “Massacres des Arméniens” in front of the whole world, while on the contrary they dutifully stood up for the Armenians wherever this was possible.

Honors

German awards

  • Order Pour le Mérite with oak leaves on January 10, 1916
  • Dr. phil. hc from the University of Jena in August 1918
  • Medal of Honor from the Art Nouveau artist Max Lange .
  • 1916 silver medal, 33.3 mm. Half-length portrait in uniform en face. Back: ON DEC 18. 1915 u. a. 9 JAN. 1916 WAS THE CLEANING OF GALLIPOLI. Medalist: Albert Moritz Wolff. Literature: Zetzmann 4118.

Ottoman awards

Fonts (selection)

  • Five years in Turkey. From General of the Cavalry Liman von Sanders. August Scherl, Berlin 1920 (French 1923, English 1928).

Movie

literature

  • Ulrich Trumpener: Liman from Sanders and the German-Ottoman Alliance. In: Journal of Contemporary History , Vol. 1, No. 4, pp. 179-192 (1966).
  • Buğra Atsız: Liman von Sanders, Otto Karl Victor . In: Biographical Lexicon on the History of Southeast Europe . Volume 3. Munich 1979, p. 35
  • Franz Menges:  Liman von Sanders, Otto. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 14, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1985, ISBN 3-428-00195-8 , pp. 563-565 ( digitized version ).
  • Wolfgang Gust (Ed.): The genocide of the Armenians 1915/16. (Documents from the Political Archive of the German Foreign Office) Zu Klampen, Lüneburg 2005, ISBN 3-934920-59-4 .
  • Taner Akçam: A Shameful Act. The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility. Metropolitan Books, 2006.

Web links

Commons : Otto Liman Von Sanders  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. E. Letter mO, D, U. Grosses Palais, Meiningen, May 23, 1922.
  2. ^ Wilhelm Rost: The descendants of Wolff Nathan Liepmann. A contribution to Liman research. Genealogy. German magazine for family studies. Vol. 29, Issue 2, February 1980, pp. 44-51.
  3. ^ Franz Menges, "Liman von Sanders, Otto", in: Neue Deutsche Biographie 14 (1985), pp. 563-565; Online version , accessed on December 31, 2016.
  4. ^ Jacob Jacobson : Jewish weddings in Berlin 1759-1813. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 1968, p. 286.
  5. Tabular, unsigned and undated typewritten résumés in the holdings of the Federal Archives-Military Archives in Freiburg.
  6. ^ Military weekly paper . No. 81 of June 19, 1913, p. 1864.
  7. ^ Gothaisches Genealogisches Taschenbuch der Briefadeligen houses. 1915. Justus Perthes, Gotha 1914, p. 578.
  8. Alan Palmer : Decline and Fall of the Ottoman Empire. Heyne, Munich 1994 (English original: London 1992), pp. 1–448, ISBN 3-453-11768-9 , here: p. 317, with reference to F. Fischer, Krieg der Illusionen. Düsseldorf, 1969, p. 333f .; Note: on June 15, 1913, the military cabinet asked Liman to head the German military mission in the Ottoman Empire (Otto Liman von Sanders: Five Years of Turkey . Scherl, Berlin 1920, p. 9), in November 1913 the German authorized Emperor Liman von Sanders to sign the relevant contract (Otto Liman von Sanders: Five Years Turkey . Scherl, Berlin 1920, p. 10 f.).
  9. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, p. 55.
  10. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, p. 55.
  11. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, pp. 125f.
  12. ^ Otto Liman von Sanders: Five years of Turkey. Scherl, Berlin 1920, p. 77ff.
  13. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, p. 113.
  14. ^ Otto Liman von Sanders: Five years of Turkey. Scherl, Berlin 1920, pp. 247-252, 254.
  15. Alan Palmer: Decline and Fall of the Ottoman Empire. Heyne, Munich 1994, p. 346.
  16. ^ Otto Liman von Sanders: Five years of Turkey. Scherl, Berlin 1920, p. 250ff.
  17. Zoryan Report for the Canadian Parliament: www.zoryan.org/ReportToParliament.html
  18. National Archives, Kew, London: War Office 32/5385: General Liman von Sanders.
  19. ^ Gothaisches Genealogisches Taschenbuch der Briefadeligen Häuser (1929), p. 387.
  20. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, p. 154.
  21. Alan Palmer: Decline and Fall of the Ottoman Empire. Heyne, Munich 1994, p. 328f.
  22. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, pp. 40f., 125f.
  23. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, p. 56f.
  24. ^ Otto Liman von Sanders: Five years of Turkey. Scherl, Berlin 1920, pp. 25ff.
  25. ^ Otto Liman von Sanders: Five years of Turkey. Scherl, Berlin 1920, p. 246.
  26. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, p. 57f.
  27. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, pp. 97-99.
  28. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, p. 126.
  29. ^ Otto Liman von Sanders: Five years of Turkey. Scherl, Berlin 1920, pp. 30ff, 264, 299.
  30. ^ S. Kaznelson : Army and Navy (art of war). in: S. Kaznelson (ed.): Jews in the German cultural sector. A compilation. Jüdischer Verlag, Berlin 1959, pp. 799-824.
  31. Alan Palmer: Decline and Fall of the Ottoman Empire. Heyne, Munich 1994, p. 328f.
  32. z. B. in the report of the Legation Council Braun von Stumm about his trip to the Dardanelles in September 1925; Political Archive of the Federal Foreign Office, Berlin, R 48065 (German warrior graves and memorials in Turkey)
  33. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, pp. 13, 144.
  34. ^ Otto Liman von Sanders: Five years of Turkey. Scherl, Berlin 1920, pp. 187-189, cf. pp. 70f.
  35. ^ Otto Liman von Sanders: Five years of Turkey. Scherl, Berlin 1920, pp. 48, 123f., 134f., 225f., 242.
  36. Joseph Pomiankowski: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire - memories of Turkey from the time of the world war. Amalthea, Vienna 1928, pp. 161–164.
  37. ^ Otto Liman von Sanders: Five years of Turkey. Scherl, Berlin 1920, pp. 200-202.
  38. Cf. Correspondence with the German embassy, ​​read on the website - e.g. B. Letter of November 12, 1916, there Document No. 1916-11-12-DE-001
  39. ^ Report in the Berliner Lokal-Anzeiger on Germany and the Armenians of April 24, 1919. Retrieved on July 29, 2018.
  40. http://www.pourlemerite.org/ .
  41. ^ Jena University Archives, holdings M, No. 659, p. 109.
  42. online at archive.org accessed on August 4, 2018.