Turkish Armed Forces

The Turkish Armed Forces were established on May 3, 1920 during the Turkish War of Independence, growing directly out of the collapse of Ottoman military structures at the end of the First World War, when officers who refused Allied surrender orders organized the irregular Kuva-yi Milliye forces into a regular army under commanders including Ismet Pasha. Under Mustafa Kemal Ataturk's command from August 1921, this nascent military defeated the invading Greek army in the Great Offensive, expelling Greek forces from Anatolia in roughly three weeks and securing Turkish independence by 1923, after fighting Greek, Armenian, French and other Allied-aligned forces across the preceding several years. The Turkish Armed Forces comprise three branches, Land Forces, Naval Forces and Air Force, commanded by a Chief of the General Staff under civilian ministerial oversight, and fielded approximately 481,000 active personnel as of 2024. Turkey joined NATO on February 18, 1952, and the Turkish Armed Forces have since grown into the alliance's second-largest standing military after the United States, maintaining nuclear-sharing status within NATO's collective defense arrangements.