There’s a Turkish saying that one disaster is better
than 1,000 pieces of advice. Whatever myths created about it in the last 100
years, Gallipoli was a disaster. The Turks won. Gallipoli was the British
Empire and France trying to knock Germany’s ally Turkey out of World War One,
thereby reducing the pressure on the Allies’ eastern front. As the historians
say, “Gallipoli was launched almost casually, into a void, and was doomed to
fail.”
There was little planning and the troops used were
inexperienced. Part of the soldiers’ training was ‘how to recognize when a
Turkish soldier surrenders.’ The initial assault was timed to take place between
the setting of the brilliant moon at 2.56am and the arrival of sunrise – i.e. a
window of just one and a half hours to get thousands ashore, but it took a full
40 minutes just to get the heavily laden soldiers into the rowboats. The Allies thought they would be facing heavy
odds, and the first troops ashore reported encountering ferocious gunfire, but
often the gunfire was Allied. The sparse numbers of Turkish defenders had to
hold out for 24 hours before reinforcements could arrive. And although the
Aussies and Kiwis remember Gallipoli with a special reverence, we shouldn’t
forget that of the half a million British Empire forces involved, the vast
majority were British/Irish with significant contributions from the Indian Army,
and the Gurkhas who in one deadly night attack drove the Turkish frontline back
500 yards. Nor should we overlook the 79,000 French.
Yet the significance for the ANZACs is undeniable. The
eight months of brutal fighting gave the ANZAC forces a powerful sense of
comradeship, a growing sense of military competence and ultimately their first
real sense of nationhood. By the end of the Great War, the ‘colonials’ were appreciated
as battle-hardened shock troops.
Without the lessons of Gallipoli there would have been
no D-Day. D-Day saw two hundred thousand troops put ashore, in the right place,
in the right formations, unlike Gallipoli, with immediate artillery support. Unlike
Gallipoli D-Day quickly created a formidable beachhead with plenty of force to
create an effective new Front. So yes, Gallipoli helped save the planet.
GALLIPOLI FACTS
Wearing of sprigs of rosemary is part of Gallipoli
remembrance; rosemary is the traditional symbol of remembrance and grows wild
on the Gallipoli cliffs.
8th August 1915 saw the bitterest
Australian fighting at Gallipoli for the Lone Pine ridge with seven Aussie VCs
being awarded. 8th August 1918 saw the Australians triumph on the
western Front at the battle of Amiens.
Kebabs originated as skewers of lamb barbecued on the
bayonets of Turkish soldiers.
THINGS TO DO DURING GALLIPOLI 100
ATTEND the march-past at the Cenotaph at 11.00 Saturday
25th April.
SEE The Russell Crowe action melodrama The Water
Diviner
WATCH The Gurkhas march down the Mall 30th
April at 2.30
VISIT Imperial War Museum for their Gallipoli
collection
JOIN a guided Gallipoli 100 walking tour – visiting
the central London the war memorials. Led by Blue Badge tour guide (kiwi) Simon
Rodway 25th April - meet 2.00 Green Park tube park-side exit. www.worldwaronewalks.com
Lest We Forget
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