Battle of Wadi (1916)

Battle of Wadi
Part of the Mesopotamian Campaign of World War I
Date 13 January 1916 Location Hanna defile, 3.5 miles (5.6 km) east of Sheikh Sa'ad, Mesopotamia, present-day Iraq Result Ottoman victory
Belligerents
United Kingdom  British India	Ottoman Empire
Commanders and leaders
Fenton Aylmer George Younghusband George Kemball	Colmar von der Goltz Halil Pasha
Strength
19,000	22,500
Casualties and losses
1,600 dead or wounded, numerous captured	527 casualties unknown, estimated minor

The Battle of Wadi, occurring on 13 January 1916, was an unsuccessful attempt by British forces fighting in Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq) during World War I to relieve beleaguered forces under Sir Charles Townshend then under siege by the Ottoman Sixth Army at Kut-al-Amara.

Pushed by regional British Commander-in-Chief Sir John Nixon, General Fenton Aylmer launched an attack against Ottoman defensive positions on the banks of the Wadi River. The Wadi was a steep valley of a stream that ran from the north into the River Tigris, some 6 miles (9.7 km) upstream towards Kut-al-Amara from Sheikh Sa'ad. The attack is generally considered as a failure, as although Fenton managed to capture the Wadi, it cost him 1,600 men. The British failure led to Townshend's surrender, along with 10,000 of his men, in the largest single surrender of British troops up to that time. However, the British recaptured Kut in February 1917, on their way to the capture of Baghdad sixteen days later on 11 March 1917.

On 5 December 1915, Ottoman forces under the command of Halil Kut and the German commander Baron von der Goltz, surrounded an Anglo-Indian force of 25,000 men and began the Siege of Kut-Al Amara, a city 50 miles (80 km) south of Baghdad. Replying to pleas for help from Major Charles Townshend, Mesopotamian Theatre commander Sir John Nixon dispatched the British Tigris Corps of 19,000 men under Lieutenant General Sir Fenton Aylmer to relieve the besieged garrison.

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