In April, Treb´izond, the most important city on the Turkish shore of the Black Sea, surrendered to the invading Russian army. The Russians, supported by fleets along the coast, had made the defense of the city impossible. The fall of Trebizond was a very serious blow to the power of Turkey in Asia Minor.
THE CAMPAIGN IN MESOPOTAMIA.--Part of the Allied plan in the east was for the junction of Russian armies operating from the region of the Caucasus with British troops from the land around the Persian Gulf. While the Russians, as we have seen, were making a noteworthy success of their part of this program, the British had not been so fortunate. Their plan was to take possession of Mesopotamia, the valley of the Tigris-Euphrates, and occupy its capital, the famous city of Bagdad. General Townshend with an insufficient force had begun his march up the Tigris River the year before and in March, 1915, had occupied the stronghold of Kut-el-Ama´ra, about 100 miles below Bagdad. Here later he was besieged by a Turkish army. A Russian army on the way from Erzerum and an English relief force from the south failed to reach the place in time, and April 29, 1916, General Townshend was forced by starvation to surrender.
RUSSIAN SUCCESSES IN AUSTRIA.--During the summer months the Russians under the command of one of their greatest leaders, General Bru´silov, renewed their offensive against the border lands of Austria-Hungary. It looked for a while as if the disasters of 1915 in this region were about to be redeemed. On a wide front extending from the Prip´et marshes in eastern Poland all the way to Bukowina (boo-ko-vee´nah), the Austrian province southeast of Galicia, the Russian armies advanced. They invaded Galicia and took hundreds of thousands of Austrian prisoners. Austria was compelled to transfer troops from her Italian front. The year 1916 closed with the Russians in a decidedly more favorable military position than they had occupied a year before.
ROUMANIA IN THE WAR.--Roumania had long looked forward to an extension of her boundaries to include all the Roumanians of southeastern Europe. Across the border, in southeastern Hungary, were more than two million Roumanians living in the large region known as Transylvania. The annexation of Transylvania was one of the greatest ambitions of Roumanian leaders. In August, 1916, encouraged by the promises of Russia, her powerful neighbor and protector, Roumania entered the war on the side of the Allies.