Show TURKISH ARMY RANKS nineteenth turkey s army and navy are both ranked nineteenth among the armies and navies of the world the boston globe remarks while her army Is fairly well organized and has a war strength of which Is only 30 behind that of great britain her fleet la practically nonexistent non existent in fact until 1910 the sultan had systematically dismantled the navy for fear that it would turn against him it had turned against his abd ul aziz the peace strength of turkeys army Is men she Is able to draw upon reserves bringing her war strength up to the population of turkey Is a little more than and of this number fully could be drawn in case of necessity before the new regime atas inaugurated in 1910 military service had been obligatory on all mus bulmahn Bul maHs christians being excluded but under obligations to pay a military exoneration tax of for every males between the ages of fifteen and seventy five under the new regime however all ottomans are subject to military service although under certain conditions exemption is purchasable active service in the turkish army lasts nine years of this the eold lers are three or four years with the colors and the rest of the time they are reserves in cases of necessity all males up to the age of seventy can be called upon to join the colors the navy has been on the decline ever bince the catastrophe ot in when a rue elan fleet practically annihilated the turkish wooden vessels the sultan with the aid of british officers succeeded in creating an imposing fleet of ironclads Iron constructed in eng ush and french yards but his successor abdul danild pursued a settled policy bt reducing the fleet to impotence most of the ships that were added were built in american british or italian yards in 1910 it was voted to spend in rehabilitating the navy the result is that tur key now has two modern battleships of the first class the reshad 1 and the reshad V both with a ton displacement besides these she also has one battleship of the cruiser type and three battleships of the older type she has two farst alusa clusa cruisers two second class cruisers and one third class cruiser the rest of the fleet Is made up by two gunboats gun boats two monitors ten destroyers and eight torpedo boats the personnel of the navy was formerly drawn from the army from 2 to joining the navy each year but under the present regime during the reorganization and reconstruction of the navy the draft of men Is made direct brit ish officers were engaged to train the men and to assist in the reorganization the naval force numbers officers and men about thirty thousand while the navy Is small its potency is greatly increased by the strategic position of turkeys naval base constantinople |