battle, notable, First World War

Battle of Basra

Battle of Basra was a battle fought on 11 November 1914 at Basra, in what is now Iraq. It was part of the Middle Eastern theater of World War I, which ran from 1914 to 1918. The recorded result: British victory.

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This map shows the initial British attack and capture of Basra, 1914. See Battle of Basra (1914).. Department of Military Art and Engineering, at the U.S. Military Academy (West Point), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Record

Date	11 November 1914
Place	Basra, Iraq 30.417N, 48.017E
Part of	Middle Eastern theater of World War I (1914 to 1918)
Kind	Battle, First World War
Result	British victory
Territorial change	British capture of al-Basra
Belligerents	British Empire; United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland; British India	Ottoman Empire; Al-Muntafiq
Commanders	T. E. Lawrence; Charles Townshend; Arthur Barrett; John Eccles Nixon	Mehmed Subhi Bey; Süleyman Askerî
Casualties and losses	500 casualties	1,300 casualties

The recorded site, with the nearest other engagements in the atlas. Present-day coastlines, rivers and borders; towns from Natural Earth.

Nearest engagements

Battle of Khorramshahr 1980, 14 km
Liberation of Khorramshahr 1982, 16 km
Battle of the Camel AD 656, 21 km
Siege of Basra 1987, 23 km
Siege of Abadan 1980, 27 km

In the same war

Before: Fao Landing 6 November 1914
After: Battle of Qurna 3 December 1914
All 70 engagements of Middle Eastern theater of World War I

Elsewhere in 1914

First Battle of the Marne France
Battle of Tannenberg Poland
Battle of Liège Belgium
Battle of the Falkland Islands Argentina
Battle of Sarikamish Turkey

Battle of Basra is one of 1,912 engagements of the 20th century in the atlas and one of 88 in present-day Iraq.

Sources

Identity, coordinates, dates and the war from Wikidata Q1327145, released under CC0. Result, belligerents, commanders, strength and casualties from the infobox of the English Wikipedia article Battle of Basra (1914), revision 1370433519, read 2026-11-14, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0; the article's text is not reproduced here. Present-day country and state from Natural Earth. Dates before 1582 follow the Julian calendar as recorded.