ОТОМАНСКИ РАТНИ ПЛАНОВИ И ПРВИ ОКТОБАР–ДЕЦЕМБАР 1912
OTTOMAN WAR PLANNING AND THE BALKAN CAMPAIGN OF OCTOBER-DECEMBER 1912

Summary/Abstract: Sudden and, for most of contemporary observers, unexpected defeat of Ottoman imperial army in First Balkan War of 1912-1913 in previous decades was interpreted differently. Within many explanations which tried to blame overall situation in Ottoman army related to demoralized and untrained conscriptsor unrealistic and alienated members of officers corpse equally important place is has aspect of military reforms in related to war planning and preparations. Following German models Ottoman General Staff has created several variants of war plan for eventual conflict against its Balkan neighbors.Complexity of this issue was even strengthen by the fact that despite many improvements military reforms were far from concluded and completed because of lack of trained officers, technical and transport units or modern guns and machineguns. Other issue was the fact that modern training system did not encompass reserve units as well. Also, majority of units were deployed in the Balkans, while majority of reservist were supposed to come from central and eastern Anatolia.In addition, reluctance of Ottoman military leadership to follow military logic and accept initial inferiority after which eventual counter-offensive would follow led to series of mistakes which culminated in decision to initiate offensive action on all fronts despite the inferiority and uncompleted mobilization.Outcome was disastrous and led to loss of almost all Ottoman possessions in Europe.

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