President Erdoğan Commemorates Victory of Kut Al Amara

Speaking at a commemoration ceremony held on the occasion of the centenary of Kut Al Amara Victory, President Erdoğan said: “Whoever leaves out our last 200 years, even 600 years together with its victories and defeats, and jumps directly from old Turkish history to the Republic, is an enemy of our nation and state.”

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan attended the commemoration ceremony held on the occasion of the centenary of Kut Al Amarea Victory. Speaker İsmail Kahraman of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey (TBMM), Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, Chief of General Staff Hulusi Akar and other officials were present at the ceremony, in which Kut Governor from Iraq, current leaders of the Arab tribes that contributed to the Ottoman victory in Kut Al Amara and a large number of invitees partook, as well.

Delivering a speech at the commemorative event that took place at Lütfi Kırdar Congress Center in Istanbul, President Erdoğan remembered all martyrs and veterans that fought in any front of the World War I with gratitude and respect, primarily those in the battles of Ctesiphon and Kut Al Amara.

“THIS GEOGRAPHY IS OUR INDISPUTABLY RIGHTFUL HOMELAND”

“I remember with respect and gratitude our ancestors who have become martyr or veteran in any stage of the incessant struggle we have been waging since the Battle of Manzikert in order to render these lands our homeland. I also remember all members of our founding assembly and army -- particularly Veteran Mustafa Kemal, who gifted to us our last state the Republic of Turkey by winning the War of Independence -- with respect and gratitude,” President Erdoğan said.

Stressing that this nation has shed its blood for every inch of these lands throughout its 1000-year history in this geography and made the Turkish flag wave in its skies, President Erdoğan noted: “This homeland hasn’t been granted as a favour to us by anybody. This geography is our indisputably rightful homeland for which we still continue to pay the price every day.”

DEFICIENCIES IN HISTORY TEACHING

“I reject an understanding of history that takes 1919 as the start of one-thousand year history of our nation and civilization,” President Erdoğan underscored, adding: “Whoever leaves out our last 200 years, even 600 years together with its victories and defeats, and jumps directly from old Turkish history to the Republic, is an enemy of our nation and state. Yes, Balkan Wars were a fiasco as Veteran Mustafa Kemal described with the following remarks he made while giving an attack order to his soldiers in Çanakkale: ‘I prefer to die rather than live the Balkan embarrassment again.’ However it is also a part of our history. The Ottoman army, learning its lesson from Balkan fiasco, fully reformed itself in such a short time as one year. Therefore, with a manpower that didn’t even reach one million troops, it managed to deal with 1.5 million English troops, 1 million Russian troops and a quarter-million French troops as well as minority gangs spearheaded by Armenians. This success of Ottoman Army back then was not a product of a few foreign military advisors, but a product of an uprising by our nation together with its army in a bid to survive.”

President Erdoğan added: “What have we done, however? We have almost worked to cover our own history with a black cloth. We have almost worked to bury our own history. Those who have bypassed many victories of ours with just a few words, as if these victories didn’t belong to us, have both gravely disrespected our ancestors and inflicted a severe harm on future generations.”

“OUR SPIRITUAL BORDERS HAVE NEVER BEEN SEPARATED”

Underlining that in Turkey there are still people who view Iraq, Syria, the Balkans, Crimea and the Central Asia, which are an inseparable part of our history, as if these geographies were in a different planet, President Erdoğan said: “Just a century ago, there was no difference between Bursa and Skopje just as Baghdad, Mosul, Damascus, Aleppo, Salonica, Batum and Kardzhali didn’t have any difference. For example Mosul used to be considered as a part of Anatolia rather than Iraq even by the English. However, political schemes aimed at drawing artificial borders according to oil resources and taking advantage of Ottoman State’s pluralistic structure separated these lands from each other. Our physical borders might have been separated but our spiritual borders have never been separated.”

Describing the Victory of Kut Al Amara as the most blatant example to expose the lie that ‘Arabs stabbed us in the back during WWI,’ President Erdoğan underlined that Kut Al Amara locals acted like a member of the Ottoman Army during the siege, with many locals becoming martyr to this end. President Erdoğan also mentioned the example of Uceymi Pasha, a member of a long-established Arab tribe, who saved an Ottoman unit from British siege by breaking the siege with his men.

“OUR ONLY RELIGION IS ISLAM”

Addressing the Governor of Kut Al Amara and other guests coming from Kut, President Erdoğan said: “On my behalf and on the behalf of my nation, I extend my welcome to you,” and he continued: “We don’t have any religion as Shi’ism or Sunnism. Our only religion is Islam. It is the structure that unifies us. Whoever acts in a bigotry of Shi’ism of Sunnism and disregards Islam is betraying Islam. Those dropping rockets in Kilis are chanting Allahu Akbar. However, those who become martyr due to these rockets are also my brothers who chant Allahu Akbar. How can we explain this situation? It is impossible to rationalize this.”

At the end of his speech, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan thanked those who contributed to the preparation of the ceremony held to mark the centenary of the Victory of Kut al Amara and expressed his support for any step toward telling and teaching our historical victories to new generations, including the Victory of Kut al Amara.