As depicted in the great film Lawrence of Arabia, General Allenby planned a swift campaign that would knock Turkey out of World War I. His Desert Mounted Corps succeeded in sweeping through the Turkish lines in an action which was to take them all the way to Damascus, supported on their right flank by Lawrence and his Arab irregulars. The lasting legacy of the battle of Megiddo was that it revealed the potential of a modern war of movement, producing a profound change in military thought and tactics. As depicted in the great film Lawrence of Arabia, General Allenby planned a swift campaign that would knock Turkey out of World War I. His Desert Mounted Corps succeeded in sweeping through the Turkish lines in an action which was to take them all the way to Damascus, supported on their right flank by Lawrence and his Arab irregulars. The lasting legacy of the battle of Megiddo was that it revealed the potential of a modern war of movement, producing a profound change in military thought and tactics. As depicted in the great film Lawrence of Arabia, General Allenby planned a swift campaign that would knock Turkey out of World War I. His Desert Mounted Corps succeeded in sweeping through the Turkish lines in an action which was to take them all the way to Damascus, supported on their right flank by Lawrence and his Arab irregulars. Allenby's Egyptian Expeditionary Force had achieved the breakthrough in Palestine that commanders on the Western Front had only dreamed of. Turkey's war was over, and the days of the tottering Ottoman Empire were numbered. The lasting legacy of the battle of Megiddo was that it revealed the potential of a modern war of movement, producing a profound change in military thought and tactics. Here, Bryan Perrett examines this campaign, possibly the most successful of World War I, in detail. The important roles of the RAF, irregular Arab forces, armored cars and cavalry are all explained, and the impressive effects of their co-operation analyzed. Bryan Perrett's readable style, his close attention to detail and his obvious familiarity with the period make this a truly fascinating book.

Osprey's Campaign title for the Battle of Megiddo (1918), which was one of the more decisive campaigns of World War I (1914-1918). After securing the capture of Jerusalem General Allenby planned a campaign that would knock Turkey out of World War I. In a spectacular campaign General Allenby's Egyptian Expeditionary Force achieved the breakthrough in Palestine that commanders on the Western Front had only dreamed of. Supported by Lawrence and his Arab irregulars, the Desert Mounted Corps swept across the Turkish rear, destroying three armies in the process. Turkey's war was over and the days of the tottering Ottoman Empire were numbered. This was a British 'Blitzkrieg' with a speed of advance that stunned the world twenty years before Germany's Panzers rolled across Europe.

The Battle of Megiddo was not only the last large cavalry offensive in world history, but also a tribute to combined arms operations fostered over the course of the First World War. Fought between 19-25 September 1918, it was the final Allied offensive of the Sinai and Palestine Campaign. The contending forces were the British Empire’s EEF (Egyptian Expeditionary Force) of three infantry and one mounted corps pitted against the Ottoman-German Yildirim Army Group which numbered three weak armies with the approximate total strength of a single enemy corps. Comparable to what General Erich von Ludendorff called the ‘Black Day’ of the German Army (opening of the Battle of Amiens, 8 August 1918) on the Western Front, the complete Ottoman defeat would have been impossible without the application of superior logistics. Whilst Megiddo did not determine the outcome of the war in the Middle East, the ramifications of the victory decisively shaped the post-war world in the region.

At the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, the British government realized that it had to keep the Suez Canal open at all costs because it was the primary sea route connecting Britain to its far-flung eastern colonies. The Suez bordered Egypt, a nominal Turkish province, and, when Turkey became involved in the war on Germany's side in 1915, Turkey attacked the canal. As a result the British declared war on Turkey and began an offensive against the Ottoman forces and their German advisers. The British, aided by various Arab groups, swept north through Palestine, Jordan, and Syria to Turkey's ultimate defeat in October 1918. In Armageddon, 1918, eminent military historian Cyril Falls discusses the background of the World War I Middle East conflict and relates the final, critical campaign through Palestine, along with its notable personalities, including T. E. Lawrence, Emir Feisal, Kress von Kressenstein, and Edmund Allenby. Falls ends with a pertinent reflection on the subsequent history of the region, from the formation of Iraq in 1920 through the establishment of Israel, showing how the campaign in the Middle East brought into the international spotlight the tangled alliances and imperialistic and nationalistic desires that have left an indelible mark on the region to this day.

The 1918 Battle of Megiddo was not only the last large cavalry offensive in world history, but also a tribute to combined arms operations fostered over the course of the Great War. Its success is attributable to logistics, being a crucial part of the success of any military operation. The loss of the Ottomans and consequent victory of Allied forces would not have been possible without good Allied logistics in the face of poor Ottoman logistics. While this battle did not determine the outcome of World War I in the Middle East, the ramifications of the Allied victory shaped greatly the post-war world in the region.

The First World War in the Middle East is an accessibly written military and social history of the clash of world empires in the Dardanelles, Egypt and Palestine, Mesopotamia, Persia and the Caucasus. Coates Ulrichsen demonstrates how wartime exigencies shaped the parameters of the modern Middle East, and describes and assesses the major campaigns against the Ottoman Empire and Germany involving British and imperial troops from the French and Russian Empires, as well as their Arab and Armenian allies. Also documented are the enormous logistical demands placed on host societies by the Great Powers' conduct of industrialised warfare in hostile terrain. The resulting deepening of imperial penetration, and the extension of state controls across a heterogeneous sprawl of territories, generated a powerful backlash both during and immediately after the war, which played a pivotal role in shaping national identities as the Ottoman Empire was dismembered. This is a multidimensional account of the many seemingly discrete yet interlinked campaigns that resulted in one to one and a half million casualties. It details not just their military outcome but relates them to intelligence-gathering, industrial organisation, authoritarianism and the political economy of empires at war.