Defense of Van (1915)

The Van Uprising (Armenian Վանի Հերոսամարտ Wani Herosamart, Turkish Van Direnişi 'Van Resistance') was an attempt by Ottoman Armenians to resist the Ottoman Empire's massacres of Armenians in the Vilâyet Van in the spring of 1915. Van was one of the six Armenian Vilâyets at that time. The Ottoman government used the Armenian resistance as a pretext for the deportation of Armenians throughout the Ottoman Empire. The decision to deport and exterminate Armenians had already been made before the uprising.

Rafael de Nogales corroborates the accounts of other contemporary witnesses that the Armenian position at Van was defensive and a resistance action to the massacre. The uprising, which took place mainly in the town of Van, was a rare case of Armenians fighting against the forces of the Ottoman Empire.

Fighting continued from April 19 until May 17, 1915, when the Ottoman army retreated as the Russian Empire's army approached. It was joined by the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaks), the Social Democratic Hunchak Party (Hunchak) and the Democratic Liberal Party (Armenakan).

The uprising was led by the Armenian Aram Manukyan; the Ottoman 3rd Army was commanded by Chevdet Bey, governor of Van province, Halil Bey, commander of the gendarmerie, Köprülü Kâzım Bey, lieutenant colonel, and the Venezuelan adventurer Rafael de Nogales. The strength of the Armenian Fedayeen was 1300 men, while the striking power of the 3rd Army was over 5000 soldiers. A total of 55,000 civilians were killed, most of them Armenians.

In the course of the attempted resistance of the Armenians within the framework of the Caucasus Front, the Tehcir Law was passed by the Ottoman Parliament, in the course of which first the Armenians in Constantinople and later all Armenians in the entire empire were to be deported.