[2] Led by Bahaeddin Şakir and Nazım Bey and formed in early 1914 of tribesmen (especially Circassians and Kurds) as well as more than 10,000 convicted criminals—offered a chance to redeem themselves if they served the state—as a force independent of the regular army.

[15] The Special Organization was founded to be a vanguard for a Muslim uprising in Bulgarian occupied Western Thrace during the Balkan Wars.

Enver Pasha assumed the primary role in the direction of the Special Organization and its center of administration moved to Erzurum.

[20] Talaat Pasha, as the Interior Minister, gave orders that all of the prisoners convicted of the worst crimes, such as murder, rape and robbery, could have their freedom if they agreed to join the Special Organisation to kill Armenians and loot their property.

[21] As explained in the key indictment at the trial (in absentia) of the Three Pashas, the Armenian genocide massacres were spearheaded by the Special Organisation under one of its leaders, the Turkish physician Dr. Behaeddin Shakir.

[22] The American historian Gerard Libaridian wrote about the lethal combination in the Special Organisation of fanatical Unionist cadres commanding convicts newly released from prison: The release of the vilest, unbridled animal passions served well the government's purpose of ensuring extermination in the most humiliating, dehumanizing fashion.

In Thrace and western Anatolia the Special Organization assisted by government and army officials, deported all Greek men of military age to labor brigades beginning in summer 1914 and lasting through 1916.

[25] During World War I Eşref Sencer Kuşçubaşı was allegedly the director of operations in Arabia, the Sinai, and North Africa.

[5] However, Ahmet Efe has written that the Ottoman military archives have detailed information on the organization's personnel, and that Kuşçubaşı is not mentioned.