13. Final push.pdf

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After the July fights ended, there was again a long pause. Of course, small skirmishes and sorties continued, and people used to die every day, but all that fit the well-known notion “all quiet on the Western front”. This phrase, which Erich Maria Remarque used for the title of his famous novel, could well be attributed to the eastern front at Gallipoli. The Allied command frantically searched for a way out of the stalemate, and found it. If there are two hard-to-solve problems in the form of two bridgeheads, why not to solve them by creating a third problem, that is, a third bridgehead?! As General Sir Ian Hamilton expected the arrival of large reinforcements from England, and more precisely, the IX Corps, consisting of 3 divisions. However, he first launched a completely pointless offensive on 12-13 July, and then planned another landing just north of Anzac Cove. The idea was all the same: to capture the Sari Bayir massif, and from there to advance to the Kilitbahir plateau, only this time from the west, and not from the south, as previously planned. A powerful blow had to be driven on the front of Anzac Cove, where the Turks hardly expected it. But the offensive was planned to be combined with an amphibious landing, in which 5 new divisions would participate: the IX Corps, consisting of the 10th, 11th, and 12th divisions, as well as the 53rd and 54th divisions attached to it.

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01. Casualties. What casualties.pdf

Biographers of Winston Churchill do not like to write about the mistakes and blunders that extraordinary man had made quite a few. Especially costly to Great Britain was his insatiable desire to command the troops in the field. What comes to the mind first of all is evacuation of Dunkirk in 1940, Greek campaign in 1941, abortive landings at Dieppe in 1942 and in the Dodecanese in 1943, as well as the disastrous airborne operation at Arnhem in 1944. But all those defeats that dearly cost the Royal Army, Navy, and Air Force fade away before the operation that Churchill ventured in 1915 - the attempt to break through the Dardanelles, and to strike Turkey out of the Great War.

04. Prelude to disaster.pdf

The most baffling thing about the Dardanelles operation is that it is impossible to determine who and when decided to launch it. Take the operation "Barbaroßa" for example. Directive No.21, Plan "Barbaroßa", Führer’s Headquarters, 18 December 1940, text, and signature: Adolf Hitler. Everything is clear and well-known, from the beginning down to the results. Whereas when it comes to the Dardanelles operation, apart from the results nothing is known for sure.

02. Pursuit of Goeben & Breslau.pdf

The abortive attempt of the Royal Navy to break through the Dardanelles was preceded by another episode, which predetermined the further course of the war in the Mediterranean and Black Seas to a great degree. The Mediterranean Squadron composed of the battle cruiser Goeben and light cruiser Breslau under the command of Rear-Admiral Wilhelm Souchon managed to cross without any major problems the eastern Mediterranean from Sicily to the Dardanelles, safely slipping away from the pursuing Anglo-French naval forces, which possessed a great superiority in numbers and firepower.

06. War & politics.pdf

Before the decisive assault on the Dardanelles, a lot of interesting events happened in the Mediterranean, as well as in London. Since the very onset of the Dardanelles operation, there was a feeling in the air that an amphibious operation was possible, but the plan to engage land troops had immediately encountered strong opposition by Field Marshal Herbert Horatio Kitchener, who maintained that he had not a single extra soldier. It was then that Winston Churchill started talking about an all-naval operation. Admiral John Fisher rather advocated the notion that such an operation must be conducted together by army and navy: "I warned everybody about this, but it was like talking to a wall. The Dardanelles futile, without soldiers!" he wrote.

05. Ships against forts.pdf

On 19 February 1915 salvoes from the battleship "Cornwallis" opened the ill-fated Dardanelles operation. It may be considered a bad omen, but it was the surrender of General Charles Cornwallis that put the end to the American War of Independence, although the battleship was named after his brother, Admiral Sir William Cornwallis. Nevertheless, there was something sinister in the air. After all, it was exactly on the same day that Admiral Sir John Duckworth started his Dardanelles campaign in 1807. At the spearhead of the attack were engaged battleships "Suffren" (Rear-Admiral Émile Guépratte's flagship), "Bouvet", "Triumph", "Albion", and "Cornwallis" (Admiral Sir Sackville Carden's flagship), as well as the battle cruiser "Inflexible". Supporting them were the battleship "Gaulois" and the protected cruiser "Amethyst". Battleship "Vengeance" (Rear-Admiral Sir John de Robeck) was kept in reserve. Arrival of the battleships "Queen Elizabeth" and "Agamemnon" was expected daily.

03. Crisis in the Straits.pdf

As strange as it may seem, the escape of Goeben and Breslau to the Dardanelles brought great relief to the British Admiralty. As if a heavy stone fell from their heart: Nothing menaced any more their control of the Mediterranean Sea, and the French shipping could launch unmolested transfer of the troops from North Africa to the Western front. Their Lordships had painted a glamorous picture of cowardly escape, and consequent inglorious internment of the German Mediterranean Squadron.

07. The Dardanelles' reveille.pdf

Admiral de Robeck's plan was simple: He intended to reduce the forts and batteries of the Narrows with artillery fire from the extreme distances, after which his ships would steam up the straits, while silencing the howitzer batteries covering the minefields. With the Turkish artillery eliminated, trawlers would clear the passage about half a mile wide to open the way to the battleships, which would finish the Narrows defences at the blank point. And next day they efforts would be crowned with a triumphant entry into the Sea of Marmara. In essence, it would be the repetition of the operation to reduce the forts at the entrance to the Dardanelles.

08. Blood on the beaches.pdf

After the debacle on 18 March 1915, the British command decided to try to capture the Black Sea straits from the land. The Admiralty still believed that the ground forces should be brought into action only after the fleet broke through to the Sea of Marmara, but a different point of view prevailed. What the British generals were counting on is hard to say. The war on the Western front has since long assumed a positional character. Why did they assume that they would be able to march across the Dardanelles by a forced march, remains a mystery. After all, it was no secret that the mountainous wilderness of the Gallipoli Peninsula did not in the least resemble the well-maintained roads of Western Europe. The Turks had long concentrated significant forces on the peninsula, and there was absolutely no chance of a swift offensive. And yet the fateful decision was made.

11. Battle in the air.pdf

The naval war in the Dardanelles and the Sea of Marmara was rapidly acquiring new features, perhaps even faster than in the main naval theatre in the North Sea. Here, the Allies actively used a new weapon – the submarines, but almost simultaneously with them, the war moved into another dimension – into the air.

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