ABSTRACT
To focus on Kars is to complete the promised description of the eastern end of the northern arc of Ottoman defence. Kars and Erzurum were
immensely important to the Russian-Ottoman confrontations from 1800 to the collapse of both empires by 1918. The siege of Kars is particularly illustrative of the failure of the regular Ottoman army in that region, and of the irreconcilable cultural barriers of British and Ottoman military styles, once British commanders were placed in charge of the campaign. There are myriads of British first-hand accounts of this war, most of which exude contempt for the Ottoman high command. Small wonder, then, that Ottoman military reformers looked elsewhere for inspiration after the Crimean War, and found ready advisers among the Germans, especially after 1870. Our narrative ends with 1869, when a new set of reforms signalled a further effort to construct an Ottoman army based on universal conscription.
