The Erzerum Offensive
posite Division and the 2nd Turkestans? They alone could save the situation by piercing the plateau between forts Chaban-dede and Tufta, and so joining up with the Derbent regiment on the heights of Olugli.[1] The critical question was whether they had been equal to their stupendous task of penetrating the 50 miles of rugged snow-bound ridges and plateau. The morning of February the 14th showed that they had accomplished this task, and so sealed the fate of Erzerum.
During the previous day the 4th Composite Division had been finishing the transport of their artillery to the summit of the Kargar-bazar ridge. The guns had again been dismembered, and carried to positions whence they could drop shells on the Turks defending the right flank of fort Tufta. The Turkestans had also prepared their artillery to sweep the fort from the North. On the morning of February the 14th the infantry of the 4th Division descended the north-western slopes of the Kargar-bazar, sliding down the snow on their coats to the open plateau, out of which the Tuy river rises. From here they moved on to the north-west and reached the foot of the Grobovoye heights, which form the eastern side of the Gurji-Bogaz defile.[1] This is the north-eastern "gateway" to Erzerum through which the 2nd Turkestans were to advance, and which the Turkish 10th Army Corps was defending from forts Kara-gyubek and Tufta. The plan was that the Turkish positions on the Grobovoye heights, connecting forts Kara-gyubek and Tufta, should be attacked simultaneously by the Turkestans coming through the northern defiles, and by the 4th Division coming down from the Kargar-bazar on the South. The
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