The Battle of Megiddo was fought between 19 and 25 September 1918, on the Plain of Sharon, in front of Tulkarm, Tabsor and Arara in the Judean Hills as well as on the Esdralon Plain at Nazareth, Afulah, Beisan, Jenin and Samakh. Its name, which has been described as "perhaps misleading" since very limited fighting took place near Tel Megiddo, was chosen by British commander Edmund Allenby for its biblical and symbolic resonance.
The battle was the final Allied offensive of the Sinai and Palestine Campaign of World War I. The contending forces were the Allied Egyptian Expeditionary Force, of three corps including one of mounted troops, and the Ottoman Yildirim Army Group which numbered three armies, each the strength of barely an Allied corps. The series of battles took place in what was then the central and northern parts of Ottoman Palestine and parts of present-day Israel, Syria and Jordan. After forces of the Arab Revolt attacked the Ottoman lines of communication, distracting the Ottomans, British and Indian infantry divisions attacked and broke through the Ottoman defensive lines in the sector adjacent to the coast in the set-piece Battle of Sharon. The Desert Mounted Corps rode through the breach and almost encircled the Ottoman Seventh and Eighth armies still fighting in the Judean Hills. The subsidiary Battle of Nablus was fought virtually simultaneously in the Judean Hills in front of Nablus and at crossings of the Jordan River. The Ottoman Fourth Army was subsequently attacked in the Hills of Moab at Es Salt and Amman.
These battles resulted in many tens of thousands of prisoners and many miles of territory being captured by the Allies. Following the battles, Daraa was captured on 27 September, Damascus on 1 October and operations at Haritan, north of Aleppo, were still in progress when the Armistice of Mudros was signed ending hostilities between the Allies and Ottomans.
The operations of General Edmund Allenby, the British commander of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force, achieved decisive results at comparatively little cost, in contrast to many offensives during the First World War. Allenby achieved this through the use of creeping barrages to cover set-piece infantry attacks to break a state of trench warfare and then use his mobile forces (cavalry, armoured cars and aircraft) to encircle the Ottoman armies' positions in the Judean Hills, cutting off their lines of retreat. The irregular forces of the Arab Revolt also played a part in this victory.
Background
The ancient fortress of Megiddo stands on Tell el-Mutesellim (Tel Megiddo), at the mouth of the Musmus Pass near al-Lajjun, controlling the routes to the north and the interior by dominating the Plain of Armageddon or of Megiddo. Across this plain several armies, from the ancient Egyptians to the French under Napoleon, had fought on their way towards Nazareth in the Galilean Hills. By 1918 this plain, known as the Plain of Esdraelon (the Jezreel Valley in Israeli terms) was still strategically important as it linked the Jordan Valley and the Plain of Sharon 40 miles (64 km) behind the Ottoman front line, and together, these three valleys formed a semicircle round the main Ottoman positions in the Judean Hills held by their Seventh and Eighth armies.
Allied situation
The Entente Powers had declared war on the Ottoman Empire in November 1914. In early 1915 and in August 1916 the Ottomans, with German commanders, aid and encouragement, had attacked the Suez Canal, a vital link between Britain and India, Australia and New Zealand. Under General Archibald Murray, the British Egyptian Expeditionary Force (EEF) stopped the Ottoman army at the Battle of Romani and drove them back to Magdhaba and across the Sinai to Rafa to reoccupy Egyptian territory and secure the safety of the Suez Canal. Having constructed a railway and water pipeline across the desert, Murray then attacked southern Palestine. In the First Battle of Gaza and the Second Battle of Gaza in March and April 1917, the British attacks were defeated.
In 1916, the Arab Revolt against Ottoman rule had broken out in the Hejaz, led by Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca. Although the Ottomans defended Medina, at the end of the Hejaz Railway against them, part of the Sherifian Army, led by Hussein's son, the Emir Feisal, and British liaison officer T. E. Lawrence, extended the revolt northwards. Finally, Lawrence and bedouin tribesmen won the Battle of Aqaba in July 1917. The capture of the port of Aqaba allowed the Allies to supply Feisal's forces and deprived the Ottomans of a position behind the right flank of the EEF.
General Allenby had been appointed to succeed Murray in command of the EEF, and was encouraged to renew the offensive. After receiving reinforcements, he broke through the Ottoman defences in the Third Battle of Gaza and defeated an Ottoman attempt to make a stand to the north at the Battle of Mughar Ridge. Despite Ottoman counter-attacks, the EEF captured Jerusalem in the second week in December 1917.
After a pause of several weeks caused by bad weather and the need to repair his lines of communication, Allenby advanced eastward to capture Jericho in February 1918. However, in March, the Germans launched their spring offensive on the Western Front, intending to defeat the Allied armies in France and Belgium. Allenby was ordered to send reinforcements (two complete divisions, another 24 infantry battalions from other divisions and nine dismounted yeomanry regiments) to the Western Front. Allenby's tank force was also returned to France. In total approximately 60,000 officers and men were transferred to the Western Front in 1918.
However, Allenby maintained pressure on the Ottoman armies by twice sending mounted and infantry divisions across the Jordan. The first attack briefly cut the Hejaz Railway near Amman before the attackers retreated. In the second attack, Allenby's troops captured Es Salt on the road to Amman, but fell back when their communications were threatened. Despite these failures, Allenby had established two bridgeheads across the Jordan north of the Dead Sea which were retained during the ensuing occupation of the southern Jordan Valley.
Ottoman situation
At the same time (effectively from 8 March 1918), the Ottoman command changed. The highest level Ottoman headquarters in Palestine was the Yıldırım Army Group. The army group had originally been formed to recapture Baghdad which had been captured by the British in March 1917. Instead, it had been diverted to Palestine where the British were close to capturing Jerusalem. The army group's commander was the German general, Erich von Falkenhayn, who wished to continue a policy of "yielding defence" rather than hold all positions at all costs. He was also prepared to retreat to shorten his lines of communication and reduce the need for static garrisons. However, he was unpopular among Ottoman officers, mainly because he relied almost exclusively on German rather than Ottoman staff officers, and was blamed for the defeats at Gaza and Jerusalem. He was replaced by another German General, Otto Liman von Sanders, who had commanded the Ottoman defence during the Gallipoli Campaign. Liman reasoned that continued retreat in Palestine would demoralise the troops, ruin their draught animals, encourage the Arab Revolt to spread further north into the Ottoman rear areas and also lead to all the Ottoman forces to the south in the Hejaz being finally isolated. His forces halted their retreat and dug in to resist the British, even reoccupying some ground near the Jordan as Allenby's two raids across the Jordan were repulsed.
Until late September 1918, the strategic situation of the Ottoman Empire appeared to be better than that of the other Central Powers. Their forces in Mesopotamia were holding their ground, while in the Caucasus they had captured Armenia, Azerbaijan and much of Georgia in an advance towards the Caspian Sea. Liman von Sanders was expected to repeat his defence of Gallipoli and defeat the British invasion in Palestine.
However, some other commanders were worried about an assault on their extended front in Palestine. They wished to pull their troops back, so an attack would have to cross undefended ground and lose any tactical surprise. However, Liman would have had to abandon what seemed to be good defences and he decided that it was too late to pull back.
Allied reorganisation
During the summer of 1918, Allenby's forces were built back up to full strength. Two British Indian Army cavalry divisions, the 4th Cavalry Division and 5th Cavalry Division, arrived from the Western Front and were reorganised to include one British yeomanry regiment in five of their six brigades. Two Indian infantry divisions, the 3rd (Lahore) Division and the 7th (Meerut) Division, were transferred from the Mesopotamian Campaign to replace two divisions which had been sent to the Western Front. Four of Allenby's infantry divisions (the 10th, 53rd, 60th and 75th) were reformed on the pattern of British Indian Army, with three Indian and one British infantry battalion in each brigade except one brigade in the 53rd Division which had one British, one South African and two Indian battalions. The remaining British infantry division, the 54th (East Anglian) Division, retained its all-British composition, although the brigade-sized Détachement Français de Palestine et de Syrie was attached to the division.
There was a comparative lull in activity while Allenby's divisions were reorganised and retrained, but some local attacks were made, especially in the Judean Hills. On 19 July, the Ottomans and Germans mounted a brief attack at Abu Tellul near the Jordan, but were defeated by Australian Light Horse regiments with heavy casualties to the German 11th Reserve Jäger battalion, which was subsequently withdrawn from Palestine.
Arab Northern Army
As Allenby's reorganisation proceeded, the Arab Northern Army (part of the Arab Revolt) was operating east of the Jordan under the overall leadership of the Emir Feisal. Feisal's headquarters were at Aba el Lissan, about 15 miles (24 km) south-west of the Ottoman position at Ma'an, and his army received support from the British through the port of Aqaba. Assistance to Feisal included liaison officers, detachments of armoured cars, Indian machine gunners and a French Algerian mountain battery, 2,000 dromedary from three disbanded battalions of the Imperial Camel Corps Brigade, weapons, ammunition and above all, money (almost always in coin). In mid-1916, this had started as a monthly subsidy of £30,000. By the time Allenby launched his Megiddo offensive, it had grown to £220,000 a month.
The 2,000 regular soldiers of the Arab Northern Army maintained a blockade of the Ottoman garrison at Ma'an after an unsuccessful attack at Khirbet es-Samra earlier in the year. They were commanded by Jaafar Pasha, formerly an Ottoman officer who had been sent to lead a rebellion against the British by the Senussi in Egypt, but had joined the Arab Revolt after being captured. Most of these regulars were former Arab conscripts in the Ottoman Army who had deserted or, like Jaafar, had changed sides after becoming prisoners of war.
Meanwhile, Arab irregulars raided the Hejaz Railway from Aba-el-Lissan and Aqaba, often accompanied by Lawrence and other British liaison officers. In particular, in the weeks following the failure of Allenby's second attack across the Jordan, they carried out demolitions on an 80 miles (130 km) stretch of line around Mudawwara, due east of Aqaba, effectively closing the line for a month and ending Ottoman operations around Medina at the end of the railway.
I do not for one moment denigrate the good name of Lawrence, nor detract from his leadership in the 'Arab Revolt' in Arabia in harassing the Turks, blowing up trains, etc. but when it came to co–operation with Allenby's forces, the Arabs under Lawrence had in my experience, nuisance value only.
— Rex Hall 5th Light Horse Brigade
Prelude
Allenby's plan
Allenby intended to break through the western end of the Ottoman line, where the terrain was favourable to cavalry operations. His horsemen would pass through the gap to seize objectives deep in the Ottoman rear areas and isolate their Seventh and Eighth Armies.
As a preliminary move, the Arab Northern Army would attack the railway junction at Daraa beginning on 16 September, to interrupt the Ottoman lines of communication and distract the Yildirim headquarters.
The two divisions of XX Corps, commanded by Lieutenant General Philip Chetwode, would make an attack in the Judean Hills beginning on the night of 18 September, partly to further distract Ottoman attention to the Jordan Valley sector, and partly to secure positions from which their line of retreat across the Jordan could be blocked. Once the main offensive by XXI Corps and the Desert Mounted Corps was launched, XX Corps was to block the Ottoman escape route from Nablus to the Jordan crossing at Jisr ed Damieh and if possible capture the Ottoman Seventh Army's headquarters in Nablus.
The main breakthrough was to be achieved on the coast on 19 September by four infantry divisions of XXI Corps, commanded by Lieutenant General Edward Bulfin, massed on a front 8 miles (13 km) wide. The fifth division of XXI Corps (the 54th) was to make a subsidiary attack 5 miles (8.0 km) inland of the main breach. Once the breakthrough was achieved, the corps, with the 5th Light Horse Brigade attached, would advance to capture the headquarters of the Ottoman Eighth Army at Tulkarm and the lateral railway line by which the Ottoman Seventh and Eighth Armies were supplied, including the important railway junction at Messudieh.