The Ottomans were more realistic than the Germans in their ambitions. Nonetheless, it would be wrong to deny Ottoman “agency” in the jihad that was proclaimed in 1914. Yet he was not the only German “jihadist.” Friedrich Naumann (1860–1919), the established national-liberal intellectual, supported the idea of a Muslim jihad, as did Friedrich Bronsart von Schellendorff (1864–1950), who from 1913 onwards served as chief-of-staff of the Ottoman forces in the context of the German military mission. He frequently visited Sufi events and became convinced that all Muslims were fanatically worshipping “Allah, their god.” Consequently, he pushed the German foreign office to promote a jihad against the enemies of Germany and the Central Powers. Max Freiherr von Oppenheim (1860–1946), a German dilettante Orientalist, was convinced that the “Muslim weapon” might be used to good effect in the case of a world war. Italy and Germany – began to think of harnessing the global Muslim population to their own colonial undertakings.
On the other hand, the colonial powers “that would like to be” – i.e. on the one hand, the colonial “powers that be”, namely, Britain, France and Russia, had to realise that the presence of many Muslim subjects in their colonies represented a strong – and credible – threat to their colonial possessions. By 1914, all colonial powers had realised that Islam – in its many local forms – manifested a powerful tool for anti-colonial resistance.
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