 The Dervish State was recognized as an ally by the Ottoman Empire and the German Empire.It also succeeded at outliving the Scramble for Africa, and remained throughout World War I the only independent Muslim power on the continent.After a quarter of a century of holding the British at bay, the Dervishes were finally defeated in 1920, when Britain for the first time in Africa used airplanes to bomb the Dervish capital of Taleh.