The Ottoman Empire was a Turkish empire that was founded in 1299 and conquered in 1940 during the Global War. The Ottoman Empire reached its greatest extent under the Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent in the mid-16th century. By the time of the North American Rebellion in the late 18th century, the Ottoman Empire had suffered a series of defeats at the hands of the Austrian and Russian Empires.
At some point after the North American Rebellion, there appears to have been a union of the Ottoman and Persian Empires. Sobel refers to the ruler of the Ottoman Empire by the Persian title Shah rather than the Ottoman title Sultan, and in late 1940 the Germans were able to invade India directly from Ottoman territory. Possibly a member of the Persian Ghajar dynasty succeeded to the Ottoman throne, but retained the more prestigious title of Shah.
In 1894 Diego Cortez y Catalán of Kramer Associates began negotiations with the Friedrich Alfred Krupp in the Germanic Confederation to take control of the Ottoman Empire, but the two industrialists were unable to reach an agreement. Following the breakup of the Russian Empire during the Russian Revolution, the Ottoman Empire formed an alliance with Germany which was directed against the Russian successor states.
Despite the Ottoman alliance with the Germans, most of the Ottoman Empire's oil production in the early 20th century was controlled by the British. German oil companies began competing with the British in 1933, and the Shah skillfully played both countries against each other. However, when Abdul el Sallah lauched the Arab Revolt in August 1939, Chancellor Karl Bruning chose to support him, believing that el Sallah would favor German oil interests. After el Sallah was defeated in the Battle of el Khibir on 10 September 1939, Bruning had 6000 German troops airlifted to Arabia. The British responded by sending troops of their own to support the Shah, and by the end of September British and German troops were fighting near Damascus.
The German troops inflicted a series of defeats on the British and Turkish armies in Arabia in late November, and on 25 December 1939 the Germans took both Alexandria and the Victoria Canal. By the end of 1940 the Germans had conquered the Ottoman Empire, and were using it as a base to launch an invasion of India. By 1946 the Germans had suffered a series of reversals, and Chancellor Heinrich von Richter withdrew all but token forces from the former Ottoman Empire.