Gallipoli Diary. Ian Hamilton
made several lines of entrenchments covering the landing places, with concealed machine gun emplacements and land mines on the beach; and has put in concealed positions guns and howitzers capable of covering the landing places and approaches with their fire."
"The Turkish Army in the Peninsula is being supplied and reinforced from the Asiatic side and from the Sea of Marmora and is not dependent on the Isthmus of Bulair. The passage of the Isthmus of Bulair by troops and supplies at night cannot be denied by the guns of our Fleet."
After estimates of our forces and of the difficulties they may expect to encounter, Hunter-Weston comes to the conclusion that, "the only landing places worth serious consideration are:
"(1). Those near Cape Suvla,
(2). Those near Cape Helles."
Of these two he advises Helles, because:—"the Fleet can also surround this end of the Peninsula and bring a concentrated fire on any Turks holding it. We, therefore, should be able to make sure of securing the Achi Baba position." Also, because our force is too weak to hold the big country round Suvla Bay and at the same time operate against Kilid Bahr.
If this landing at Helles is successful, he considers the probable further course of the operations. Broadly, he thinks that we are so short of ammunition and particularly of high explosive shell that there is every prospect of our getting tied up on an extended line across the Peninsula in front of the Kilid Bahr trenches. Should the enemy submarines arrive we should be "up a tree."
The cards in the game of life are the characters of men. Staking on those cards I take my own opinions—always. But when we play the game of death, things are our counters—guns, rivers, shells, bread, roads, forests, ships—and in totting up the values of these my friend Hunter-Weston has very few equals in the Army.
Therefore, his conclusion depresses me very much, but not so much as it would have done had I not seen him. For certainly during his conference on the 30th March with d'Amade and myself he never said or implied in any way that under conditions as he found them and as they were then set before him, there was no reasonable prospect of success:—quite the contrary. Here are the conclusions as written at Malta:—
"Conclusion. The information available goes to show that if this Expedition had been carefully and secretly prepared in England, France and Egypt, and the Naval and Military details of organisation, equipment and disembarkation carefully worked out by the General Staff and the Naval War Staff, and if no bombardment or other warning had been given till the troops, landing gear, etc., were all ready and despatched, (the troops from England ostensibly for service in Egypt and those in Egypt ostensibly for service in France) the capture of the Gallipoli Peninsula and the forcing of the Dardanelles would have been successful.
"Von der Goltz is reported to have visited the Dardanelles on 11th February and before that date it appears that very little had been done.
"Now big guns have been brought from Chatalja, Adrianople and elsewhere—roads have been made—heavy movable armaments provided—troops and machine guns have been poured into the Peninsula—several lines of trenches have been dug—every landing place has been trenched and mined, and all that clever German Officers under Von der Goltz can design, and hard working diggers like the Turks can carry out, has been done to make the Peninsula impregnable.
"The prizes of success in this Expedition are very great.
"It was indeed the most hopeful method of finishing the war.
"No loss would be too heavy and no risks too great if thereby success would be attained.
"But if the views expressed in this paper be sound, there is not in present circumstances a reasonable chance of success. (The views are founded on the information available to the writer at the time of leaving Malta, and may be modified by further information at first hand on arrival at Force Head Quarters.)
"The return of the Expedition when it has gone so far will cause discontent, much talk, and some laughter; will confirm Roumania and Greece in the wisdom of their neutrality, and will impair the power of our valuable friend M. Venezelos. It will be a heavy blow to all of us soldiers, and will need great strength and moral courage on the part of the Commander and Government.
"But it will not do irreparable harm to our cause, whereas to attempt a landing and fail to secure a passage through the Dardanelles would be a disaster to the Empire.
"The threat of invasion by the Allies is evidently having considerable effect on the Balkan States.
"It is therefore advisable to continue our preparations;—to train our troops for landing, and to get our expedition properly equipped and organised for this difficult operation of war; so as to be ready to take advantage of any opportunity for successful action that may occur.
"But I would repeat; no action should be taken unless it has been carefully thought out in all its possibilities and details and unless there is a reasonable probability of success.
"A. Hunter-Weston, M.G."
Paris's appreciation gives no very clear lead. "The enemy is of strength unknown," he says, "but within striking distance there must be 250,000." He also lays stress on the point that the enemy are expecting us—"Surprise is now impossible—. … The difficulties are now increased a hundredfold. … To land would be difficult enough if surprise was possible but hazardous in the extreme under present conditions." He discusses Gaba Tepe as a landing place; also Smyrna, and Bulair. On the whole, he favours Sedd-el-Bahr as it "is the only place where transports could come in close and where the actual landing may be unopposed. It is open to question whether a landing could be effected elsewhere. With the aid of the Fleet it may be possible to land near Cape Helles almost unopposed and an advance of ten miles would enormously facilitate the landing of the remainder South of Gaba Tepe."
The truth is, every one of these fellows agrees in his heart with old Von der Goltz, the Berlin experts, and the Sultan of Egypt that the landing is impossible. Well, we shall see, D.V., we shall see!! One thing is certain: we must work up our preparations to the nth degree of perfection: the impossible can only be overborne by the unprecedented; i.e., by an original method or idea.
10th April, 1915. S.S. "Arcadian." Lemnos. Cast anchor at 7 a.m. After breakfast went on board the Queen Elizabeth where Braithwaite and I worked for three hours with Admiral de Robeck, Admiral Wemyss and Commodore Roger Keyes.
Last time the Admiral made the running; to-day it was my turn for I had to unfold my scheme and go through it point by point with the sailors. But first I felt it my duty to read out the appreciations of Hunter-Weston, Birdwood and Paris. Then I gave them my own view that history had never offered any nation so clean cut a chance of bringing off an immeasurably big coup as she had done by putting our Fleet and Army precisely where it was at present on the map of the war world. Half that unique chance had already been muddled away by the lack of secrecy and swiftness in our methods. With check mate within our grasp we had given two moves to the enemy. Still, perhaps; nay, probably, there was time. Were we to prolong hesitation, or, were we, now that we had done the best we could with the means under our hands, to go boldly forward? Here was the great issue: there was no use discussing detail until the principle was settled. By God's mercy the Vice-Admiral, Wemyss and Keyes were all quite clear and quite determined. They rejected Bulair; they rejected Asia; most of all they spurned the thought of further delay or of hanging about hoping for something to turn up.
So I then told them my plan. The more, I said, I had pondered over the map and reflected upon the character, probable numbers and supposed positions of the enemy, the more convinced I had become that the first and foremost step towards a victorious landing was to upset the equilibrium of Liman von Sanders, the enemy Commander who has succeeded Djavad in the Command of the Fifth Army. I must try to move so that he should be unable to concentrate either his mind or his men against us. Here I was handicapped by having no knowledge of my opponent whereas the German General Staff is certain to have transferred the "life-like picture" Schröder told me they had of me to Constantinople. Still, sea power and the mobility it confers is a great help, and we ought to be able to rattle the enemy however imperturbable may be his