Documentation of The Ottoman State Ottoman Basra policy (1878-1907)

Basra is situated 420 km southeast of Baghdad and 50 km southeast of the conjunction of Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. Basra was divided into four sanjaks. These were Basra, Muntefik, Amara and Necid sanjaks. The policy of the Ottoman Empire on Basra became forward with the Mithat Pasha period and the strategic importance of this region increased. The desire of the Great Britain on spanning and becoming sovereign started with by constructing power and influence regions at Basra and Red Sea areas.The reason of Abdulhamid?s preference on Germany was due to the restrictions of his movement space left for the interior and exterior policies. To take the control of the sea trade routes from Indian Ocean to Persian Gulf, Great Britain from the second half of the nineteenth century began to construct power and influence regions and settle down at the coasts of Arab Peninsula which were beyond the boundaries of the Ottoman Empire.After the 1877-78 Ottoman-Russian war, a turning point was occurred at the relations between the Ottoman Empire and the Great Britain. The Great Britain had projects such as constructing the Hayfa-Damascus and Egypt-Basra railways, but II. Abdulhamid didn?t allow this due to not wishing the increase in the Great Britain?s power and influence on the Middle East.Basra without any resistance and with their own wishes accepted the sovereignty the Ottoman Empire at 1934 and continued this by making this situation formal at 1938. The Ottoman Empire also made Iran accept the sovereignty of Basra with the Amasya Treaty at 1555. From this time, the Ottoman Empire had efforts on continuous improvements at Basra and organizing at the region. The Ottoman Empire wanted to protect the area against Portuguese, especially by constructing shipyards at the coast regions. With doing so, the threat of Portuguese?s span to Indian Ocean would get rid of and the commercial development of the region would be provided.