Flying over Turkey and around the Syrian border - Feb. 2014

Cliff_Emerson

Yesterday's Lufthansa (LH) flight from Frankfurt to the Middle East brought me over some snowy Turkish mountain ranges at sunset... I was fascinated by the vastness of the landscape.

Additional web pages on this website to visit:
Additional links on this website:
Click here to go back to my first Web entry for Side: "Visit to Side #1"
Click here for:  "Paul's First Journey - Part 2: Traveling from Cyprus to Southern Turkey"
Click here for:  "Siege of Constantinople 1453 - Part #1"

Click here for:  "Flying from Istanbul (IST) to Antalya"

The on-board LH flight monitor (pictured below) showed that our path cut across eastern Turkey toward Syrian and Iraqi Airspace.  

We left Turkish airspace and then turned south over Iraq and Kuwait - reaching the Persian Gulf.

A close-up view - above - showed the following cities: 

• Jerevan = in Armenia;
• Tabriz = in Iran
• Mosul + Kirkuk = in Iraq
• Aleppo + Homs = in Syria.

Also take note of the Turkish cities Diyarbakır, Trabzon, and Erzurum. I'll share pictures of them below.

The map above shows Kurdish-inhabited area.Below, a map shows you how we flew "through the corridor" between Syria and Iran. The red line marks the long flight; the blue line marks the connecting 50-minute flight between Muscat, Oman (home) and Abu Dhabi. 

http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/middle_east_and_asia/middle_east98.jpg

Allow me to fantasize here, and show you four touristic sites far from Western Turkey that we flew over - places I would love to visit.

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About 40 minutes inland from the Black Sea coastal city of Trabzon, we passed close to a fantastic Greek Orthodox monastery... 

www.fazturkey.com

...the Monastery of the Black Virgin at Sumela - in the far reaches of an uninhabited forest high on an embedded rock outcropping.

http://byztex.blogspot.com/2010/08/turkey-allows-orthodox-to-pray-in-their.html

Hidden away from civilization.

http://romeartlover.tripod.com/Trebiso1.html

This enormous seven-story structure perches dramatically on a ledge...

 ...halfway up a sheer rock face above a forest and roaring stream. Sadly, the monks were deported to Greece along with the rest of the Greek community in 1923, so it now sits empty...

de.wikipedia.org

...except for all the tourists that come.

Scroll the map above to help you see the eastern part of the country.

A nearby bridge called Camlihemsin Ayder, at Rize, looks quite old and intriguing - probably built in the Middle Ages.

Further south-east near Lake Van, Hosap Castle stands in an arid desert:

trekearth.com

This area - and all the way down to Iran and Iraq - is Kurdish territory, and could be potentially dangerous for Westerner travelers - from attacks and kidnappings. That's why I only dream of them, and don't visit them!

www.turkeyforholidays.com

Entrance to the castle.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hosap-castle_(10).jpg

Straight south, near the Syrian border, there's a fascinating city: Diyarbakır.

www.turkeyvacationplaces.com -

Diyarbakır is surrounded by a dramatic set of high walls of black basalt forming a 5.5 km (3.4 mi) circle around the old city. It has four gates and 82 towers. The wall was built in antiquity, and expanded under the Roman emperor Constantius II in 349 BCE.  (Wikipedia)

www.turkeyvacationplaces.com -

Diyarbakır sits on the the Tigris River in Upper Mesopotamia in an area called Al-Jazira (Arabic: الجزيرة) - the name used for the highlands and large sedimentary plain of NW Iraq, south-east Syria and south-east Turkey. [It's the same word used for the ALJAZEERA broadcasting company based in Doha, Qatar.]

bmhdiyarbakir.com

Following is a first-hand account of the siege of the city when it was in Roman hands:

Roman Historian's Account of the Siege of Amida (Diyarbakır) by the Persians (Sassinids)
Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae, 18.7

>>As news of the Persian invasion spread, the civilian population of the region began to panic. Dispatch riders were sent at once with orders to compel the farmers to move with their families and livestock to places of safety. The whole country was set on fire to deprive the enemy of a source of food (scorched earth). In the panic which followed, several Roman legions narrowly escaped the Persian advance by rushing to the safety of the walled city.

It appears the Persian plan was to bypass the stalward fortress and march straight into Syria. When the forces approached Amida, the Sassanids were provoked into attacking the city when the son of the commander, while inspecting the defences of Amida, was killed with an arrow shot from the city. Ammianus described how the leader, outraged at his son's death, demanded revenge from the Romans. The Sassanids began the attack with siege towers, but were unsuccessful.

www.diyarbakirdefterdarligi.gov.tr

The king himself, Shapur II, mounted on a charger, rode before the whole army, wearing a golden image of a ram's head set with precious stones instead of his normal diadem. He was accompanied by a great retinue of men of the highest rank and of various nations. But, it was clear that he was only trying to impress the defenders of the walls.<<

http://www.ntvmsnbc.com/id/25407073/

Ammianus Marcellinus continues with the account of how he reached the safety of the city just as the Sassanids were descending on the city: >>I myself, having been separated from my comrades, was looking around to see what to do, when Verennianus, one of the guard, came up with an arrow in his thigh. While I was trying to pull it out, I found myself surrounded on all sides by the advancing Persians. I quickly aimed my horse toward the city, and could approach it only by a single very narrow ascent - made still narrower by towers which had been built or the cliffs. Here, we mingled with the Persians, who were rushing toward the wall, and remained motionless until sunrise of the next day, so crowded together that the bodies of the slain, held upright by the throng, could nowhere find room to fall...<<

http://www.dooyoo.co.uk/destinations-international/diyarbakir/

Every time Shapur II attempted to capture the city, it ended with disaster. Siege towers were set on fire by the Romans. A plague broke out in Amida but ended after ten days by a light rain. (Next picture: Shapur II and his son)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Taq-e_Bostan_-_High-relief_Shapur_II_and_Shapur_III.jpg

>>The siege took 73 days. After capturing the city, Shapur II advanced further and took Singara and some other fortresses in the following years.

http://upload7.ir/imgs/2014-09/12065185900434297444.jpg

In 363, Emperor Julian, at the head of a strong army, advanced to Ctesiphon, but was killed in a battle. His successor Jovian signed a treaty of peace, by which the five Roman provinces on the Tigris and Nisibis were ceded to the Persians, and the Romans promised to interfere no more in Armenia. (Note: A day before capture of the city, Ammianus Marcellinus [the Roman historian who wrote this account] escaped to Melitene, and thence returned to Antioch.)<< (Wikipedia.com - edited)

http://www.enuygun.com/galeri/diyarbakir-da-gezilecek-yerler

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I took the following photo as we flew over the city of Kirkuk, Iraq, with its concentric circles of roads, on the way to Baghdad. Then, we flew down the middle of the Persian Gulf, staying at some distance away from the Iranian side. 

Cliff_Emerson
On later flights, however, we flew from Turkey right into Iranian airspace, avoiding airspace over Syria and Iraq.

cliff_emerson

Often, as we would cross the Persian Gulf coastline, we would look down at refineries on the Iranian side. 

Looking out into the darkness through a right-side window... Iranian cities and oil refineries flaring gas.

In my earlier days, this is how I flew from Oman to Frankfurt.

Cliff_Emerson

This is the 747-400 I flew on from Frankfurt to Denver.

Cliff_Emerson

Here are two 747's at the new Concourse Z in Frankfurt Airport:

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Back to the subject of special sites in Turkey.
One city on the flight monitor,  Erzurum, closer to the Black Sea coast, is another place I'd like to visit. A bit of history: "Between 1828 and 1918 alone the region was the scene of at least four wars between the Ottoman Empire and Russia... 

www.furkanhacamat.com 

in the winter of 1914, the last of Turkey's imperial dreams came to grief as least 60,000 soldiers under (General) Efnver Paşa froze to death or were killed in military action in the Allahuckber Mountains near Sankamis LINK, a  melancholy tale commemorated by a monument outside of that town."[Insight Guides, Turkey] 

My video shows a full moon over an icy landscape in the mountains of eastern Turkey.

To conclude, I'm posting a map and links to two pbs articles about the fighting in Syria. It was hard to get credible news about the war in those days. 
[I put the red line on their map to show the approximate path of my Lufthansa flights.] [Click on it to enlarge.]

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/foreign-affairs-defense/syrias-second-front/map-syrias-shifting-battle-lines/

MAP: SYRIA’S SHIFTING BATTLE LINES
February 11, 2014, 6:42 am ET by Evan Wexler and Sarah Childress
"Since the uprising began nearly three years ago, the war in Syria has become increasingly diffuse. The high security risk for journalists and the fluid nature of the conflict make it difficult to mark boundaries with certainty. Areas of control are constantly shifting as armed groups claim, and lose, territory."

This map, above, assembled from data shared with FRONTLINE by researchers who have consulted extensively with Syria’s armed groups, shows the best available information about the main military areas of control as of early February 2014.

The Syrian government still maintains the broadest swath of territory. In the southern region, its troops have surrounded pockets of rebel fighters who are now cut off from aid and supplies. The opposition, meanwhile, has fractured into more than 5,000 armed groups with shifting alliances. And the Kurdish forces in the north fight only for themselves, at times seemingly on the side of the government, and at others in support of the rebels.

A new actor, ISIS, or Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (the Levant), emerged in April 2013. It’s composed of a few thousand foreign militants, battle-hardened from waging an insurgency in Iraq. ISIS has quickly become the most radical group in Syria, battling other rebel groups and imposing a strict interpretation of Shariah law. Last week, Al Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri publicly disowned the group, after previously encouraging ISIS and the other rebels to fight President Bashar al-Assad, not each other.<<

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/foreign-affairs-defense/syria-arming-the-rebels/for-syrians-fleeing-violence-scant-refuge-or-relief/

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20-June-2014
The political map of Iraq has changed this week (click to enlarge):

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2662272/This-similar-Nazi-occupation-Europe-says-Iraq-chief-ISIS-burn-cigarettes-Sharia-law-Britain-warned-militants-target-UK.html

21-June-2014
U.N.: ISIS committing war crimes in Iraq
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAclQLHNjmc

ISIL Attack Military base and take Tanks | ISIL iraq war | VIDEO
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIa77o73Yvg

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Here are some additional web pages on this web site:
Click here for:  "Visit to Side #1"
Click here  for:  "Paul's 1st Journey - Part 2: Traveling from Cyprus to S. Turkey"
Click here for:  "Siege of Constantinople 1453 - Part #1"
Click here for:  "Flying from Istanbul (IST) to Antalya"