Military, finance, and economy in the Late Ottoman Empire: Directorate-general of Hedjaz and military railways and ports, 1914-1919

Abstract

WOS:000511433400002 ; This article deals with the Ottoman military's financial and economic activities during the First World War. It concentrates on how the Directorate-General of Hejaz and Military Railways and Ports (DHMRP) developed relations with the Ottoman National Credit Bank and the Ministry of Finance. Examining a set of commercial activities in which the DHMRP was engaged in cooperation with the National Credit Bank and the Ministry of Finance, it is argued that an informal alliance of the military and financial sectors came to dominate the Ottoman wartime economy in the course of the war. Yet the establishment of the Ministry of Supplies towards the end of the war marked the disintegration of this coalition. The DHMRP was closed down in March 1919, after the war ended.