ANZAC Day

[BadElvin]

"Lest we forget" 1915

[rhondabrwn]

Agreed, this should never be forgotten. This song says it all...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZqN1glz4JY

[rhondabrwn]

A live performance of the song by it's author... Eric Bogle

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=471-ucVd7o0

[fodder]

bump

[fodder]

I'll put out the Aussie today. [:)]

[warspite1]

Missed this with all that Spam $%^& yesterday [:@]

A belated Happy ANZAC Day to our antipodean cousins [&o]



Should not single individuals out but sometimes its justified. An extra toast to:

Charles Upham VC and bar [&o]

[ronweasley]

I've always loved celebrating ANZAC day, it's really important that even today's generation never forgets why.

[wings7]

Happy ANZAC Day! [:)]

Patrick

[Jagdtiger14]

All propaganda aside, I'm curious how people in Australia and New Zealand (and Canada as well) who know their history well can abide by what happened at Gallipoli. After the way GB wiped their @$$ with them there, they should have gotten a divorce after the war. ANZAC Day should be akin to our July 4th. Maybe I don't understand the relationship due to me being an American?

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: Jagdtiger14

All propaganda aside, I'm curious how people in Australia and New Zealand (and Canada as well) who know their history well can abide by what happened at Gallipoli. After the way GB wiped their @$$ with them there, they should have gotten a divorce after the war. ANZAC Day should be akin to our July 4th. Maybe I don't understand the relationship due to me being an American?

warspite1

Wow! That is one of the most bizarre comments I have ever read! I should ignore it and walk away but people will read it and some may think it is true and that would be a real shame. I am really saddened by this rubbish.

The problem with responding to such a post is that anything I write may be seen to be anti-Australian or anti-New Zealand. I trust that my past posts on this and other subjects will be suffice to confirm that nothing could be further from the truth. I have upmost respect and gratitude to the peoples of these two countries (and indeed all peoples of the Commonwealth of nations) that fought alongside the United Kingdom in so many conflicts.

All propaganda aside….people…. who know their history…..after the way GB wiped their @$$ with them there

You say that, but clearly you have been reading …. well I don’t know what you’ve been reading but perhaps you are a disciple of Mel Gibson’s school of History? You do realise the British lost 25,000 dead and the French 10,000? or don't they matter?

Here is a relevant section from Digger History:

Propaganda

Distorted propaganda is usually at its height during wars but corrected in later years. In the case of Gallipoli the opposite occurred. The official Australian war historian, Charles Bean, was reluctant to hint that Australians were ever less than heroic, and in the interests of maintaining good relationships with Australia, Cecil Aspinall-Oglander, the official British war historian, toned down even implied criticisms of any Australian action. As Rhodes James observed, the result of massaging the truth was an 'Australian mythology that Gallipoli was an Australian triumph thrown away by incompetent British commanders'.

• Far worse distortions disfigure the Peter Weir film Gallipoli, which seeks to contrast cowardly and idle British troops with ANZAC heroes. Some British troops did bathe and drink tea at Suvla Bay whilst horrific fighting was taking place a few miles to the south, but others were as fully engaged in that conflict as New Zealanders and Australians.
• Rhodes James noted that the 'suicidal assault' of the Australian Light Horse at The Nek on 7 August 1915 'had nothing to do with the British landing at Suvla, but was intended to help the New Zealanders, as the film's military advisers knew'.
• However, 'the principal Australian sponsor of the film (Rupert Murdoch) wanted an anti-British ending, and got it', with 'the deliberately inaccurate final scenes' of the film, a potent source of Australian republican sentiments.
• Few Australians realise that 'the British, French and Indian causalities were far greater than those of the Anzacs, and that the British bore the brunt of the fighting - and the losses.'

Far from covering up British errors, British historians exposed them at every level, from Kitchener, Churchill, Fisher and Hamilton down. The indecisiveness of the naval commanders , the muddle at Imbros, the incapacity of Sir Frederick Stopford, and every other British failing, were laid bare to the world. This is as it should be, if anyone is to benefit from past errors, but in 2001 British people, no more or less than Australians and New Zealanders, can take pride in heroic deeds at Gallipoli, as indeed can French, Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi people. We should not allow latter-day propagandists to sow seeds of unwarranted resentment between peoples whose ancestors fought with great courage in a common cause.

they should have gotten a divorce after the war. ANZAC Day should be akin to our July 4th.

What? What does that mean? Do you know anything about the Empire – Commonwealth? The relationship between the UK and the Colonies/Dominions/Territories changed over time as the latter developed (for example the relationship at the start of both World Wars was different), but I suspect from your comment that you believe the United Kingdom exercised total control over the Dominions in 1914 and the dastardly, moustache twirling, evil British were glad to see as many Colonials exterminated as they could get (“GB wiped their ass” – what a $%^&ing crass thing to say). Clearly no British soldier was ordered over the top to walk into a hail of machine gun fire at Gallipoli or elsewhere in WWI…..[8|]

Here is another section from Digger History.

Formation of ANZAC

Before 1914, all major political parties in Australia supported military training for young men. Labor leaders such as Billy Hughes, born in London, and John Christian Watson, of Scottish descent but born on board ship in Valparaiso Harbour, Chile, were ardent supporters of the Australian National Defence League. In his recent Soldier Boy: The True Story of Jim Martin the Youngest Anzac, Anthony Hill explains how young Jim was imbued at school with pride in being part of the British Empire and was keen to join the military training scheme for boys of twelve and above. Jim enlisted at 14, giving a false age, and had not reached his fifteenth birthday when he died of typhoid fever in a hospital ship off Gallipoli in October, 1915.

When war broke out, the Labor leader, Scotland-born Andrew Fisher, supporting the England-born Liberal Prime Minister, Joseph Cook, declared that Australia would stand beside the mother country to help and defend her "to the last man and the last shilling". About 40 per cent of all Australian males aged between 18 and 45 voluntarily enlisted to serve in the Australian Imperial Forces (AIF), that is about 417 000 men, of whom about 60 000 died in all campaigns and another 160 000 were wounded or maimed. At least a quarter of the Australian volunteers were born in Great Britain and Ireland, Robert Rhodes James's estimate being 35 per cent. About 98 per cent of the rest were of British or Irish origin. The immigration rate from the United Kingdom was exceptionally high between 1910 and 1914. 'Simpson' - 'the man with the donkey' was John Simpson Kirkpatrick, a recent Geordie emigrant.

'Rule Britannia', 'Soldiers of the Queen' and 'Sons of the Sea' were sung at recruiting offices in Adelaide and Sydney, Wellington and Christchurch, as loudly as in Birmingham or Glasgow. In 1914 and 1915 there was little difference between the volunteer rate in Australia of Protestants and Roman Catholics of Irish descent, but the number of Irish volunteers fell sharply after the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin and after Cardinal Mannix, Archbishop of Melbourne, took a leading part in opposing conscription in the referenda of 1916 and 1917.
In 1915 almost all Anzac troops considered themselves part of a wider British people and wanted to be regarded as British, not only as Australians or New Zealanders.

Clearly times have moved on, and Gallipoli was so important to the Aussies and Kiwis as this tragic episode did help forge these two young nations and helped give them identities of their own. By the outbreak of WWII the growing sense of independence from the UK was stronger still and of course the need to look to the US for security post December 1941, furthered the growing disconnect. That development continues and who knows? Maybe one day in the not too distant future one or both will change their flag, remove the Queen as head of state or whatever. If they do, good luck to them, it’s all part of the development process, a process that began from the moment the UK began colonising the territories.

Maybe I don't understand the relationship due to me being an American?

Yes you don’t understand – and no, being an American has nothing to do with it. You have simply decided for whatever reason to buy into the anti-British myth as opposed to checking out the reality - which is a real shame.

[nicwb]

Warspite,

your essentially right but I think Jagdtiger's final line is the clue.

Jagdtiger, by 1914 Australia had only been a country for less than 14 yrs. Before than we had been a collection of self governing Crown colonies. We had a general vague sense of self identity but it was heavily tinged with an attachment to "Mother England". Unlike the US we didn't have to fight for national independence. We never even really had much in the way of wars (leaving aside a brief excursions to South Africa and NZ and what happened to the indigenous population).

So WW1 for us was a big event. We followed the Empire to war from a mixture of the same patriotic enthusiasm for mother England as the ordinary man in the street in Clapham -King and Country ! Our cause was obviously just.

As with the Europeans we went with little real understanding of what was really involved. Worse we were going to show the motherland not only our support but we would do our best to the utmost. When they formed the 1st Australian division they took only the best and fittest recruits -literally the pride of the country.

Then came Gallipoli - the casualties for the first day weren't huge in European terms but for a country where the population still is only just around 20m they were an enormous shock. Worse still it was a shock handed out at the hands of what was generally considered then a second rate country in decline, Turkey - the sick man of Europe. The ANZACs then went to the trench warfare in Europe and the shocks kept coming.

And at the end of it what happened? Those that could came home and tried to pick up the pieces. I think the nation as a whole, tried to make some sort of sense of it all especially that first big shock. There would have been no family who had either not lost someone or had someone comeback as walking wounded.

So we focused on the positive and the comradeship of the men and women under extreme conditions and blamed who we could.

Warspite has a good point - you really have to be careful of the popular media accounts - they are not necessarily historical but rather a "compressed experience" or an approach of "conventional wisdom says it is so" or even simple artistic licence. But for a long time everyone subscribed to the "Lions led by lambs" concept. Senior generals (conveniently Britsh not ANZAC) not only had botched it but done so repeatedly in callous fashion. Certainly CEW Bean and (the official war historian) and Murdoch (father of the current media proprietor) subscribed to the view both for their own reasons.

We're only just coming out of that phase now that the last survivors of the war have passed away and a more objective approach is possible without being seen to insult the survivors. From what I have read a similar sort of re-assessment is happening in the UK with the role of Lord Haig.

The effect of Gallipoli probably weakened the apron strings we had with the UK but we still went pretty much straight into WW2 with the rest of the empire and volunteered with a vigour for that little event too.

It's generally considered that we really didn't fully assert ourselves until around the fall of Singapore to the Japanese. However we still draw heavily from the UK - in terms of law, government, culture and our head of State.

So is it our July 4th ? - yes but not in the sense it is for the US - not so much an independence day but rather a coming of age day where we got an idea of what the cost and responsibility of being a nation could be.

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: nicwb

Warspite,

your essentially right but I think Jagdtiger's final line is the clue.

warspite1

I think it was the first line that grated.

...who know their history well can abide by what happened at Gallipoli. After the way GB wiped their @$$ with them there,

The Campaign was a brilliant strategic move.... and an operational shambles. The British generals in charge, quite rightly, have to take the blame for that total balls up (where have we heard that before in the two World Wars?). But the inference is that Antipodean lives were thrown away without care (and thus the Aussies and Kiwis should have "got a divorce" is quite bizarre when looked at in the context of how millions of lives - from all nationalities - were thrown away on the orders of generals - from all nationalities - in that hideous war.

[Jagdtiger14]

Warspite and nicwb: Thank you for your insights and opinions. Frankly I have to admit I have been lazy about researching this event as its not really that interesting to me beyond what I might see on the History Channel.

And Warspite...don't take my ignorance personal. To continue my laziness on this subject...I did a quick check of numbers involved and it reveals Australia took 47% casualties (dead and wounded), New Zealand 42%, Britain 29%...and if that is true, then my initial lazy thoughts bear out some curiosity on this event.

Of everything both of you wrote, what I was looking for was the part about weakening of apron strings, and nicwb's last sentence. Thank you.

[warspite1]

The actual and % losses number is important because - as nicwb points out - the actual numbers compared to the size of the country is pretty meaningful.

The numbers as a % of those involved I would take with an element of caution for the simple reason that I suspect (but don't know) that when looking at the total number involved, the British would have provided a lot (most?) of the non-combatant troops too.

It would be interesting to see how that % is broken down i.e. are we comparing apples with apples and fighting divisions with fighting divisions? If so then this would merit further investigation as to the reason for the wide variance.

EDIT: And now, after Aurelian has peaked my interest in Downfall and cost me the price of a book on that subject, Jagdtiger has done the same and I have just ordered Gallipoli (Carlyon). [;)]

[nicwb]

That's pretty right -strategically the whole thing was sound. Force the straits and remove Turkey from the war. That meant the allies could reach Russia by sea, Suez would be secured and empire forces in the Near east could be redeployed to the Europe.

The execution was lacking. It's hard to imagine any of them had real staff experience sufficient to organise what was a major amphibious operation and the level of communications were pretty basic - no radio. The British generals must take their share of the blame but the Australian and NZ divisions had the same issues - little staff experience and inexperienced commanders. It one thing to be able to do something but quite another to know what to do.

They also had a large share of bad luck. the local forces were commanded by Mustapha Kemal probably the best senior Turkish commander of the war.

The inference of ANZAC lives thrown away without care is of course wrong. It's easy to think that way by simply accepting the myths that grew up after the war because its easier and quicker than assessing the facts.

[Jagdtiger14]

Well, as Warpite mentions...what really are the facts?...are we talking apples to apples? If the ANZACS really took a higher percentage beating, then there is a level of curiosity as to why that may have been?

[gradenko2k]

I was vacationing in Kota Kinabalu (formerly Jesselton) on ANZAC Day and visited the memorial there:

[nicwb]

I was vacationing in Kota Kinabalu (formerly Jesselton) on ANZAC Day and visited the memorial there:

Nice pics gradenko. Pretty well any town you go to in Australia will have an ANZAC memorial - its really a measure of how much the country was personally affected.

Well, as Warpite mentions...what really are the facts?...are we talking apples to apples? If the ANZACS really took a higher percentage beating, then there is a level of curiosity as to why that may have been?

Fair question Jagdtiger. I think it was really a matter of combined mathematics and pride. we were proud enough to try and field as large a force as possible but o the mathematics as I said we had a significantly smaller population. I have seen figures that suggest statistically we lost more casualties per head of population over the entire war but

As to why - as Warspite has pointed out at Gallipoli we took numerically smaller casualties than most of the other countries - for the campaign as a whole (240 days) the figures break down as Turks 86,000, British about 34,000, French 9,000, Australians 8,000, NZ 2,700 (source Strachan "The First World War).

As a point of comparison Australian took over 5000 casualties at the battle of Fromelles (a two day event) and the British forces took 57,000 casualties on the first day of the Somme (source Carlyon "the Great War").

The point is that British senior commanders weren't any more callous about ANZAC casualties than they were of British casualties. And the British really weren't any more callous than the French or German commanders.

The simple fact is that they all wanted to win but neither side really knew how to break the other's lines. It would take until 1917 for the British to discover tanks (and have the technology to build them) and for the Germans to formulate strosstruppen tactics.

I guess essentially, that Australians could see that they weren't been singled out especially or treated any worse than any other empire troops.

[Neilster]

The Australian landings, at any rate, were planned by Australian officers, actually occurred in the right place and didn't involve slaughter on the beaches. Contrary to the suggested plan of a heavy bombardment followed by a dawn assault, the Australian command decided on a stealthy pre-dawn landing that was a successful example of an amphibious infiltration with very few casualties.

The few Turkish defenders fought bravely and the terrain was overgrown and extremely steep. There were significant Turkish reserves nearby and has been mentioned the Turks were very ably led. A nasty stalemate ensued (with heat and thirst being replaced by bitter cold) that lasted until the evacuation about 6 months later.

As has been described, it was expedient for Australian reporters to emphasize the heroism and downplay any futility. The excuse that callous, bumbling British officers sent our brave boys to a certain death is convenient but mostly untrue. The whole thing is only now emerging from the fog of myth in the public's perception.

Cheers, Neilster

[gradenko2k]

ORIGINAL: nicwb
The simple fact is that they all wanted to win but neither side really knew how to break the other's lines. It would take until 1917 for the British to discover tanks (and have the technology to build them) and for the Germans to formulate strosstruppen tactics.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but both sides could/knew how to break the other's lines by as early as 1915.

Tanks and airpower and improved artillery, doctrine and technology helped, of course, but breakthroughs were already doable - it was more the inability to produce the operational-level exploitation phase that bogged down such offensives repeatedly.