[ingeborg]

I think they were suckered in because most of the Turkish war machine of pre-1914 was Mausers, Krupp cannons, and other German-made stuff. Once you buy into the parts plan, it's hard to break free.

[a_Turk]

Our losers of the day entered the war like this: The British were chasing a German battleship in the North Sea. They chased it all the way down the Atlantic coast into the Mediterranean, and then east into Turkish waters, where finally it sought refuge in our straits. The British demanded the ship. The Turks declined. The British expressed that this would amount to an act of war. The Turks replied that, fine, then this is our declaration of war.

The British did not need the ship, which ended up being a Turkish ship finally mothballed in the 1970s. After the declaration of war, they went on their merry way, as if the ship had suddenly lost it's importance. Well, in a way it did, it had done it's job.