Dardanelles is a strait between the northwestern part of Asia Minor and the Gallipoli Peninsula, located in the European part of Turkey. The Strait of the Dardanelles, which is 1.3 km to 6 km wide and 65 km long, is of great strategic importance as it is part of the waterway connecting the Mediterranean Sea with the Black Sea.
Gella Sea
The obsolete name of the strait is the Hellespont, which is translated from Greek as "the sea of Gella". This name is associated with the ancient myth of twins, brother and sister, Frix and Gella. Born by the Orkhomenian king Afamant and Nephela, the children were soon left without a mother - they were raised by the evil stepmother Ino. She wanted to kill her brother and sister, but the twins fled on a flying ram with golden wool. During the flight, Gella slipped into the water and died. The place where the girl fell - between Chersonese and Sigey - has since been called the "sea of \u200b\u200bGella". The Dardanelles got its modern name from the name of the ancient city that once stood on its shore - Dardania.
Bosphorus
This is another Black Sea strait. The Bosphorus connects the Black Sea with the Sea of Marmara. The strait has a length of about 30 kilometers, its width ranges from 700 m to 3700 m. The depth of the fairway is from 36 to 124 m. Istanbul (historical Constantinople) is located on both sides of the strait. The shores of the Bosphorus are connected by two bridges: the Bosphorus (length - 1074 meters) and the Sultan Mehmed Fatih Bridge (length - 1090 meters). In 2013, the Marmaray underwater railway tunnel was built to connect the Asian and European parts of Istanbul.
Geographic location
The Dardanelles and the Bosporus are 190 kilometers apart. Between them is the Sea of Marmara, the area of which is 11.5 thousand km2. A sea vessel going from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea must first enter the rather narrow Bosphorus, pass Istanbul, swim to the Sea of Marmara, after which it will meet with the Dardanelles. This strait ends with the Aegean Sea, which, in turn, is part of the Mediterranean. This route does not exceed 170 nautical miles in length.
Strategic value
The Bosphorus and the Dardanelles are links in the chain that connects the closed sea (Black) with the open (Mediterranean). These straits have repeatedly become the subject of a dispute between the leading world powers. For Russia in the 19th century, the path to the Mediterranean provided access to the center of world trade and civilization. In the modern world, it also has an importantmeaning, is the "key" to the Black Sea. The international convention assumes that the passage of merchant and military ships through the Black Sea straits should be free and free. However, Turkey, which is the main regulator of traffic through the Bosphorus, is trying to use this situation to its advantage. When the volume of oil exports from Russia increased strongly in 2004, Turkey authorized the restriction of the movement of ships in the Bosphorus. Traffic jams appeared in the strait, and oilmen began to suffer all sorts of losses for delays in deliveries and demurrage of tankers. Russia has officially accused Turkey of deliberately complicating traffic on the Bosphorus in order to redirect the export cargo flow of oil to the port of Ceyhan, whose services are paid. This is not Turkey's only attempt to capitalize on its geophysical position. The country has developed a project for the construction of the Bosphorus Canal. The idea is good, but the Republic of Turkey has not yet found investors to implement this project.
Fighting in the region
In antiquity, the Dardanelles belonged to the Greeks, and the main city in the region was Abydos. In 1352, the Asian shore of the strait passed to the Turks and Canakkale became the dominant city.
Under an agreement signed in 1841, only Turkish warships could pass the Dardanelles. The First Balkan War put an end to this state of affairs. The Greek fleet defeated the Turkish fleet at the entrance to the straits twice: in 1912, on December 16, during the battle of Elli, and in 1913, on January 18, in the battle ofLemnos. After that, the Turkish fleet did not dare to leave the strait.
During the First World War, bloody battles were fought between Atlanta and Turkey for the Dardanelles. In 1915, Sir Winston Churchill decided to knock Turkey out of the war at once by breaking through the Dardanelles to the country's capital. The First Lord of the Admir alty was deprived of military talent, so the operation failed. The campaign was poorly planned and mediocrely executed. In one day, the Anglo-French fleet lost three battleships, the rest of the ships were seriously damaged and miraculously survived. The landing of fighters on the Gallipoli Peninsula turned into an even greater tragedy. 150 thousand people died in a positional meat grinder that did not bring any results. After a Turkish destroyer and a German submarine sank three more British battleships, and the second landing in Suvla Bay was ingloriously defeated, it was decided to curtail the military operation. A book has been written about the circumstances of the greatest catastrophe in British military history called "The Dardanelles 1915. Churchill's Bloodiest Defeat."
Question of Straits
While the Byzantine and then the Ottoman Empire dominated the area of the straits, the question of their functioning was decided within the states themselves. However, at the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries, the situation changed - Russia came to the coast of the Black and Azov Seas. The problem of control over the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles is on the international agenda.
In 1841, at a conference in the city of London, an agreement was concluded onthat the straits would be closed to the passage of warships in peacetime. Since 1936, according to modern international law, the Straits area has been considered the "high seas" and questions about it are regulated by the Montreux Convention on the Status of the Straits. Thus, the control of the straits is carried out while maintaining the sovereignty of Turkey.
Provisions of the Montreux Convention
The convention states that merchant ships of any state have free access to the passage through the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles both in wartime and in peacetime. The Black Sea powers can guide warships of any class through the straits. Non-Black Sea states can only allow small surface ships to pass through the Dardanelles and the Bosporus.
If Turkey is involved in hostilities, the country may, at its discretion, let the warships of any power pass. During a war in which the Republic of Turkey is not involved, the Dardanelles and the Bosporus must be closed to military courts.
The South Ossetian crisis in August 2008 was the last conflict in which the mechanisms provided for by the Convention were activated. At that time, warships of the US Navy were passed through the straits, which proceeded in the direction of the Georgian ports of Poti and Batumi.
Conclusion
The Dardanelles on the map of Eurasia takes up very little space. However, the strategic importance of this transport corridor on the continent cannot be overestimated. From an economic point of view, it is important for Russia, first of all, the export of petroleum products. Transportation of "blackgold" by water is much cheaper than by an oil pipeline. Every day, 136 ships pass through the Dardanelles and the Bosphorus, 27 of them are tankers. The density of traffic through the Black Sea straits is four times higher than the intensity of the Panama Canal, three times the intensity of the Suez. The Russian Federation incurs daily losses of approximately $12.3 million due to the low cross-country ability of the straits. However, a worthy alternative has not yet been found.
