Indian Expeditionary Force D sails for the Persian Gulf

On 16 October 1914 the 16th Indian Brigade of Brigadier General Walter Delamain sailed from Bombay. It was the advance part of Indian Expeditionary Force D, whose commander, General Arthur Barrett, had been appointed at the end of September. That same day Force B, intended for East Africa, also set out from Bombay.

A secret mission

The brigade consisted of the British 2nd Battalion of the Dorsetshire Regiment and three battalions of the Indian Army: the 20th Punjabis, the 104th Wellesley’s Rifles and the 117th Mahrattas. It was accompanied by mountain artillery, sappers and services. In all there were some 5,000 soldiers and more than a thousand animals.

The purpose of the expedition was kept secret. The Ottoman Empire was still formally neutral, and the British did not want to give the Turks a pretext for war. The brigade therefore sailed together with a convoy carrying Indian troops to Egypt and on to France. From the outside it looked like another troop transport for the European front. Delamain, however, had secret orders to detach himself from the convoy at sea and head for the Persian Gulf.

Oil from Abadan

The brigade’s most important task was to protect the Anglo-Persian Oil Company refinery on Abadan island, its tanks and its pipeline. The refinery lay on the Persian bank of the Shatt al-Arab river, opposite Ottoman territory, and in the event of war could easily fall victim to a Turkish attack. It was important to Britain, which since 1914 had been the company’s majority shareholder and whose navy was switching from coal to oil. The orders also provided for covering the landing of further units. The capture of Basra was permitted only if war with Turkey broke out.

The expedition also had political significance. The British wanted to show the sheikhs of the Gulf, especially the ruler of Mohammerah and the Emir of Kuwait, that they could count on British protection. It was feared that if the Turks entered the war and proclaimed a holy war, British passivity might shake Britain’s position in the Muslim world, including in India itself.

As planned, the brigade detached itself from the convoy and on 23 October dropped anchor off Bahrain. There it waited for events to unfold. After the Ottoman Empire entered the war, the expedition, conceived as a limited covering operation, began the Mesopotamian campaign, one of the longest campaigns of the First World War.