Gallipoli

Gallipoli

The Gallipoli Campaign

A way to break DEADLOCK

When: 1915

Where: Turkey

Two Sides: British, French and ANZAC Troops vs. Turkish, Austria-Hungary, and Germany

Why Gallipoli?

British government could see no way of breaking the stalemate.

If they captures Gallipoli they would:

• Secure Egypt and Suez Canal
• Italy and Balkans would have to join on their side
• Britain could send weapons to Russia
• Russia could send Britain food and supplies

One idea was to attack

Germany’s allies. Lloyd

George, the soon-to-be

Prime Minister described

it as ‘knocking the props

from under Germany’.

However....

The Royal Navy tried to bomb Turkish forts in the Dardanelle Straits in March 1915, but all this did was warn Turkish forces that the Allies were thinking of attacking there.

The landings on 25th April were in the wrong place. The ships got lost and landed a mile away from the correct beaches. Instead of a shallow beach, the landing force was faced by steep cliffs and Turkish defenders who were well dug in.

HOMEWORK:

This includes your in class assignment for next Wednesday's class, since we will not be meeting then.

Your extended assignment should be completed for HOMEWORK and CLASSWORK.

DUE Wednesday Week 11 by 12pm.

1. By email (ecn@bryanston.co.uk)

2. Late Box

3. eLocker

Watch this clip, the last 3 minutes of Gallipoli.

What do you see why is it important?

Was the Gallipoli Campaign a failure?

Why were casualties so great?

PAIR SHARE!!!

From this short movie clip- tell me what we will be learning about in class today!

Who was to blame?

What they were hoping for....

(Eastern Front Goals)

1. It would drive Turkey out of the war.

2. It would open up a sea route to the Russian front so supplies could be given to the Russians.

3. It would create a new front, away from France.

4. It would relieve pressure on the Russian forces.

What actually happened.....

Pair Share: What do you think will happen next?

The first beachhead was too small to allow forces to be landed

quickly and later landings faced problems.

Some landings were carried out in the dark and troops became lost. There was total confusion.

Once on land, the Allied troops found themselves bogged down in very difficult country, where the Turkish forces were always holding the high ground.

The Allies found themselves once again in a trench war, making no progress against the Turks.

Why did Allies fail at Gallipoli?

Turkish Victory

The British would not send their best ships or officers

because they wanted to keep them on the Western Front.

It was very badly planned. The British did not even know how many Turkish troops were in the area. They were even using some old tourist guide books for intelligence!

There were disagreements between the army and navy commanders.

The officers made some very bad decisions. For example, soldiers were told to wait on beaches when they could easily have moved inland. This gave the Turks time to regroup and attack.

The Turkish forces proved to be very determined fighters.

The climate was very inhospitable and many soldiers died of heat and disease.

The Allies still used trench warfare even though this had caused a deadlock on the Western Front.

The objectives assigned for the first day were still

distant dreams when the British finally admitted

defeat and evacuated the Peninsula in January 1916.

The Turks saw this as a resounding victory.

Continued...

Some senior commanders were already thinking of evacuating the troops and giving up.

The situation was made worse when Bulgaria entered the war on the side of Germany. This would mean that Germany would now have a direct land route (via Bulgaria) to Turkey, enabling Germany to supply heavy siege artillery which would devastate the Allied trench network.

After visiting the front at Gallipoli himself Lord Kitchener agreed that evacuation of British Empire troops was the only action left.

The evacuation was the most successful part of the whole operation, and was carried out without any further fatalities in December 1915