The third Turkish offensive took place early in July, 1915. This time the Turks, with all their available forces--eleven divisions of regular troops, again under the command of Khalil Bey--attacked the very center of the Caucasian army. In a few days they re-occupied Malashkert, Toutakh, and the greater part of the plains of Alashkert. During one week the center of the Russian army retreated more than 100 kilometers (62 miles) leaving behind the district of Van entirely unprotected, and in danger of being surrounded at any moment. If the Turks had had one or two more divisions of troops at their service in those days, they would have been able very easily to take prisoners the entire fourth army of the Russian left wing and cut off their way of retreat. In order to escape from this dangerous situation, the Russian left wing was forced to retreat hastily toward the Russian frontier and sent a part of its forces to aid the central army. Only at the end of July did the Russian army, having received aid from its left wing, and under the leadership of the Armenian General Nazarbekoff, succeed in forcing back the Turks to their former line. These were the conditions under which nearly 150,000 Armenian inhabitants of the district of Van were compelled to leave all their property at the mercy of the enemy's fire and flee toward Erivan. ARMENIAN RESISTANCE TO THE TURKISH MASSACRES It is true that the battalions of Armenian volunteers took no active part in the battles of July, for they were then in the district of Van and undertaking the heavy duty of rear guard work for the Russian army and the Armenian refugees. But the Turkish Armenians behind the front, who were being deported and massacred as early as the month of July, by their heroic resistance, occupied the attention of four Turkish divisions and tens of thousands of Kurds just at the time when the Turks had such great need of those forces to aid them in their July drive. It is worth while, therefore, to point out here that, during the deportations and massacres of 1915, whenever the Armenians had any possible means at all of resisting the criminal plans of the Turkish government, they took up arms and organized resistance in different parts of Armenia.