Antranig

۱۱۷ طرفدار

۳۶ انتشار • فعال از ۲۰۰۲

Andranik Ozanian, commonly known as General Andranik or simply Andranik (25 February 1865–31 August 1927), was an Armenian military commander and statesman. He was a leader in the Armenian national liberation movement and widely regarded as the preeminent fedayi. Andranik joined the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktustyun) party and, along with other fedayi, sought to defend the Armenian peasantry living in their ancestral homeland, an area known as Western (or Turkish) Armenia—at the time part of the Ottoman Empire. He fled the empire after Ottoman forces suppressed the 1904 Sasun uprising. Three years later, he quit the Dashnaktsutyun over its brief political alliance with the Young Turks—the movement that later carried out the Armenian genocide. When the First Balkan War broke out in 1912, he and Garegin Nzhdeh formed an Armenian volunteer unit inside the Bulgarian army to fight Ottoman troops. During World War I, Andranik took command of the 1st Armenian Volunteer Battalion in the Russian Imperial Army. He took part in the capture of Van, but the Russian Revolution of 1917 and subsequent troop withdrawal left Armenian forces unsupported. Andranik led a desperate defense of Erzurum in early 1918, but retreated due to shortages and the threat of encirclement. As the retreating Armenian defenders withdrew toward the Caucasus, pursuing Ottoman forces advanced into Eastern Armenia, where their progress was ultimately halted by Armenian regulars, militia, and civilians at the Battle of Sardarabad. Despite the victory, Andranik broke ties with the Armenian National Council and refused to recognize the First Republic of Armenia or the Treaty of Batum, viewing the new state’s borders as a surrender of Western Armenia. Andranik, independently from the Republic of Armenia, fought in Zangezur against the Azerbaijani and Turkish armies, and helped to keep it under local control.