Harold Courtenay Armstrong (1891–1943)

Harold Armstrong served as a British officer during the siege and capitulation of Kut during the Mesopotamian Campaign. It is here where this story begins. Armstrong does not paint a pretty picture of conditions for the British military during the siege, and spares nothing with his description of condition during the march into captivity. Armstrong's strong personality landed him in even worse conditions while in captivity in Turkey. His descriptions of the Turkish prison system are pretty show more horrific.

Despite his coverage of this in the first seven chapters of this book, the bulk of the narrative focuses on the immediate postwar climate in Turkey, and the Allies ill-fated attempt to carve out spheres of influence in the defunct Ottoman Empire. The Allies, tired from years of warfare, did not anticipate a resurgent Turkish nationalism, that in the end drove the Allies out of Anatolia and created the modern Turkish State.

Armstrong served in a supervisory role over the Turkish Gendarmarie. His stories of working against the brigands that roamed the outskirts of Constantinople are interesting. Armstrong's very strong pro-British empire views tend to detract from his otherwise good recounting of the events after the armistice was signed. A good accounting of the transition of the facts on the ground from the Treaty of Sevres to the Treaty of Lausanne.
For anyone interested in the birth of the modern Turkish state, this should be of interest. show less