Kut (or Kut-el-Amara , Arabic. الكوت ) is a city in eastern Iraq , the administrative center of Wasit province. Located on the left bank of the Tigris River, 160 kilometers south-east of Baghdad , at an altitude of 18 m above sea level [1] . The population according to 2003 is about 374,000 people [2] . The capital of the province, long known as Kut, but since the 1960s renamed Wasit .
| City | |
| Al kut | |
|---|---|
| Arab. الكوت | |
 | |
| A country |  Iraq |
| Governorate | Wasit |
| History and geography | |
| Center height | 18 m |
| Timezone | UTC + 3 |
| Population | |
| Population | 374,000 people ( 2003 ) |
The ancient part of the city is located in the meander of the Tigris River, which almost forms the island. Kut is a traditional carpet production center. The city is located in a fertile region where cereals are grown. The Baghdad Nuclear Research Center , Looted during the 2003 invasion of coalition forces in Iraq, is located near Kut.
In the 1930s, on the outskirts of the city, the Kut Dam was built to provide irrigation to the area. A road has been laid along the dam, a pier for boats passing up and down the Tigra is located nearby. The purpose of the dam is to maintain a sufficiently high level of water in the river in order to supply irrigation water to the Garraf Canal.
Siege Kut
The highlights of the history of the city are two episodes of the First World War - the siege of Kut by the Turks in 1915-1916 and the storming of the city by the British in 1917 .
In September 1915, the British Expeditionary Force in Mesopotamia ( The British Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force ), led by General Townsend, headed north from Basra . They reached Kut on 26 September and, after three days of fighting, drove the Turkish troops out of the city.
After an almost 9-month downtime, Townsend headed upriver to Ctesiphon . After the battle there, British troops were relegated to Kut. On December 7, 1915, the Turks under the command of German field marshal Baron von der Goltz approached Kuta and began a siege. The British cavalry under the command of Colonel Gerard Lichman was able to escape from the city, however, Townsend and the bulk of the troops remained under siege. Many attempts were made to get Townsend's forces out of Kut, about 23,000 British and Indian soldiers died trying to recapture Kut - this is probably the greatest loss of the British outside the European theater of operations. Toward the end of the siege, British intelligence agents Lawrence of Arabia and Aubrey Herbert unsuccessfully tried to bribe Khalil Pasha to allow Townsend's army to leave. Townsend, with 8,000 surviving soldiers, surrendered on April 29, 1916 .
The British again launched an offensive in December 1916 . The 50-thousand army of General Sir Stanley. Fashion again took Kut by storm on February 23, 1917 .
After the invasion of the coalition forces in Iraq in 2003, the American “Reserve Operating Base Delta” was built on the right bank of the Tigris right opposite Kuta. During the Iraq war, the base served the former Iraqi Kut al-Hai air base, which was known after the outbreak of the war as the Blair airfield [3] .
Notes
- ↑ Al Kut, Iraq Page (English) . Fallingrain Global Gazetteer. The appeal date is December 29, 2013.
- ↑ Homepage of The New Iraq (not available link) . IraqCoalition.org (November 8, 2008). The appeal date is April 28, 2012. Archived September 24, 2015.
- ↑ Kut Al Hayy Airbase