Anatolian Mujaheddin Front

Anatolian Mujaheddin Front (Anadolu Mujahedin Cephesi in Turkish) or Turkish Jihad Front, also known as Jabhat Mujahidi al'Anadul (جبهة مجاهدي الأناضول in Arabic) is a Salafist jihadist organization formed during ERR-Turkey War with main goal of freeing Anatolia from Thracian and Christian occupation and most recently - to form a radical Islamist state in the region.

Origins
The outbreak of war between majority Muslim Turkey and majority Christian ERR caused several small groups of Jihadi mind-set propagating fighters to form mere week after the start of war. These first Turkish Jihadis were primarily members and sympathizers of Turkish supremacist anti-Thracian violent groups. Apart from activity in social media, the first jihadi groups were mostly gathering recruits and any weaponry they could in anticipation of joining the battles against ERR.

It was not until first crushing defeats by ERR that Turkey was thrown into retreat to Istanbul that Jihadis started to gain more traction by warning the people of arriving doom and death at the hands of Roman invaders. The Turkish army still refused to let these marginal groups to join the fighting in fears of more civilian casualties, but directed them to join the nationwide mobilization instead.

Several jihadist-linked terror attack attempts were discovered in ERR at this time, but the Frumentarii State Security, which was the ERR's State Security force managed to prevent them from succeeding.

Battle of Istanbul
The true nature of war became clear when the attacking coalition reached premises of Istanbul. Roman legions donned crosses and images of Christ on their legion standards and the presence and influence of Order quickly turned the offense into a zealous campaign with goal of "freeing Constantinople from Islamic heathens and restoring the long lost glory of Rome". Long unseen brutality ensued and city soon became a hellish battleground.

Among the ruins of city, the first Jihadi groups formed sizable rebel bands made up from civilians that assisted Turkish army in fighting the enemy. The attempts were futile and mostly ending in total destruction, which, after realizing upcoming defeat, Turkish army command commanded all non military personnel to retreat away from city and form a second line of defense that could be ready to fight ERR as it continued after taking the city. It was the first time government officially recognized the Jihadi fighters as their own official force. This decision granted them full access to military training and weaponry.

Not all Jihadists agreed to retreat and kept fighting. The last group of 460 fighters remained in Hagia Sophia to defend it to the last breath against arriving Order forces who saw the structure as one if the primary goals of the crusade. The entire garrison, led by imam Erdag Akdemir was slaughtered in 2 hours, as the fighters had neither credible military training or equipment that their enemies had at the moment.

The capture of Hagia Sophia was the final sign of ERR's and Christian force victory at the city. Istanbul fell in 24 hours and the acts of Order demolishing the minarets and other deeds were spread by the crusaders to signal their victory. This was the pivotal point after which thousands of disgruntled Muslim men from all around the world started travelling to Turkey and joining the Jihadi movement. The foundations of Anatolian Mujaheddin Front were set.

From Battle of Bursa to Present
War continued on after Istanbul was taken by ERR and Turkey entered in a total war campaign in effort to stop the advancing ERR Legions and other forces allied to them. This made the Jihadis more numerous and stronger by influx of foreign jihadists from the Middle East, Africa and even Indonesia, the Jihadi movement joined Turkish Army in numerous battles all over Anatolia, including the bloody Battle of Bursa. Jihadis were credited for several successes in preventing ERR and Order into encircling the city completely for some time. Several districts were primarily controlled by the radicals and fighting there was known to be especially bloody and hard. Yet, despite the biggest efforts, Bursa fell after it was deemed too costly to keep defending it further.

Jihadist faction started to distance itself slowly from weakening Turkish army and this was another major problem that sabotaged the effort to organize an effective defense strategy. Foreign fighters were not as loyal to Turkey as they were to Islam and largely secular nature of Turks caused mistrust in both sides. Despite both factions fighting together for a better part of remaining war, during last months the Jihadis have mostly departed from main army group, taking large quantities of weapons, supplies and some vehicles with them. Hills, forests and mountains became new base of operations for Islamist who swore to keep fighting the hated Christian infidels.

The ceasefire that ended war also brought news of a new radical Islamist faction being formed - The Turkish Jihad Front, announced and led by a veteran of war and a known radical figure Mehmet Kurtoglu. The primary goal of this group now is to fight their ideological enemies and establish a state of their own.

Numbers and Equipment
Anatolian Mujaheddin Front is large and well centralized faction of jihadists, rumored to be one of the best equipped and trained in the world due to previous effort to arm them against invading ERR. While exact numbers are unknown and hard to predict due to them constantly shifting, it is believed that the Front commands at least 20 000 fighters under its flag. The quality and training of fighters varies a lot, with veterans of war having the best arms available and fresh recruits given bare minimum of what is available.

As previously during the war, Jihadists mainly recruit from local populations who despise the occupation and foreign jihadist fighters that arrive to Anatolia through numerous hard to track routes. As a result, roughly half of the faction is foreign to Turkey, with most coming from Syria, Iraq, Egypt, Sudan and Saudi Arabia.

Activity
The Front is mainly active in southern area where border between Crusader State of Anatolia and ERR is, also in and around areas of DMZ, which means that Jihadists are also active inside Turkey and most probably supplied by it to some extent.

Fighters often cross in what is currently Crusader State and launch attacks aimed against Order's military and its subjects, while in ERR their seek to orchestrate large terror attacks and harass the Legions who also need to fight Turkish rebels and hunt down outlaw groups.

Fighters belonging to this faction are known to be sufficiently violent and fanatical as any other well known jihadist faction in the world, even more so that many members of Turkish Jihad Front were members of other active extremist groups, bringing their experience and zealous attitude with them. Beheadings, torture and terror tactics are employed and used by them on regular basis.

Goals
The supreme commander of the faction - Mehmet Kurtoglu has clearly stated that his main goal is to lead the Front to victory against ERR and Order by fighting them in guerrilla warfare and after sufficiently weakening them, take the lead in their controlled territories to form a radical Salafist state.

So far, the Jihadists are kept in check by both ERR legions stationed in Anatolia and Order's military that actively pursues what is most probably their most despised ideological foe.

Relations with other groups
ERR - A massive conservative Christian and Roman hegemon of Anatolia is the largest and strongest ideological enemy of any jihadist that's currently fighting there. It goes without saying that the Jihad is directly aimed at ERR and there shall be no peace ever between ERR and jihadists.

Order - The actions and involvement of radical christian zealots of Order is most probably the main reason of the counter-crusade the Anatolian jihadists are fighting now. Natural ideological enemies, they will fight each other until one is completely destroyed.

Rebels - The Anatolian Liberation Campaign is trying to keep its secular Turkish values at its heart by bravely resisting the Thracian occupation, which also puts them at odds with jihadists who on the contrary would like to see Anatolia under extremist Muslim rule. Yet, some rebel units cooperate with jihadists, much to the dismay of main rebel commanders.

Outlaws - Seeing as outlaws are so vast and diverse as a group to the point they can't even be considered as one, the interaction between them and jihadists is situational. At the end of the day, many jihadists require more luxury goods the could not get themselves, such as better weapons or drugs, such as hashish some foreign fighters like to use. If the motivations of the two collide, conflict is sure to happen.

Turkey - Largely unknown. The split from the army during war was a very betraying move and raised big concerns of anti-secular movement being born right outside borders of war-torn state of Turkey. Though some jihadists actually get past the DMZ from the Turkish side and from time to time, brand new weapons appear in hands of the extremists, suggesting the relation between Turkey and Anatolian jihadis is more amicable than it appears at first.