25 April

25 April is ANZAC Day.  Wear a sprig of rosemary in honor of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps: 
https://www.awm.gov.au/commemoration/customs/rosemary/    

TheANZACs suffered and endured the stupidity of Winston Churchill and Lord Kitchener at Gallipoli in the worst planned amphibious operation ever.

They fought in France at the Somme, at Passchendaele, at the 2nd Marne.




Their Camel Corps fought and outflanked the Turk in the Sinai, in Palestine, and in Jordan during Allenby's anabasis to Damascus and beyond.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07JGpardvLU&feature=youtu.be

In WW2, they again suffered and endured Churchill's overreaching in Crete and mainland Greece.

That same year they fought off Rommel's (at that time undefeated) Africa Corps for eight months at Tobruk until finally relieved by the Eighth Army.  Later they fought with distinction at the 2nd Battle of El Alamein.

But the Australian mainland had suffered the first of 97 separate air attacks by the IJN and IJAAF (that first attack was by 242 aircraft, most of them from the same aircraft carriers that had hit Pearl Harbor).  And at Singapore, Churchill's so-called Gibraltar of the East, Britain's disastrous defense lost the Australians 15,000 troops to Japanese POW camps.   Many of them died during the Sandakan Death March which matched (or was worse than) our experience at Bataan.  Or they died on the Burma Railway.  So the Aussie Prime Minister turned down further requests by Churchill and brought his troops home to the Pacific Theater.

Section C of the Allied Intelligence Bureau, also known as the Coastwatchers and mostly Australians, played a critical role in the Solomon Islands campaign.  https://www.amazon.com/Lonely-Vigil-Coastwatchers-Walter-Lord/dp/0670437654/ref=pd_sim_14_1?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0670437654&pd_rd_r=3AYRCBXGDPC4GSXZK3RC&pd_rd_w=UCzTU&pd_rd_wg=d5HqE&psc=1&refRID=3AYRCBXGDPC4GSXZK3RC

http://kokoda.commemoration.gov.au/

Then in New Guinea, the ANZACs saved MacArthur's entire SW Pacific strategy by taking and holding the Kokoda Track; and doing outstanding work at Buna-Gona and Salamaua-Lae.   After that, Mac then gave them the dirty jobs of mopping up Bougainville, New Britain, etc.  And relegated them to the flank in Borneo while the US Sixth Army got the glory in the Philippines.  There was some strong resentment in Canberra for that treatment.  And rightly so IMHO.



No space to list all their contributions - I missed many other battles.  But on the 25th, my bride is promising to cook up some ANZAC biscuits (guaranteed not to crumble no matter how long they spend being bounced, banged and beaten in the bottom of a military mail sack): http://allrecipes.com/recipe/9816/anzac-biscuits-i    Might even need to wash them down with a tinny of Australia's favorite bevvie.

Turkish Historical Society releases World War I archival photos

Interesting link from Hurriyet, a major Turkish Daily and reportedly the third most visited news website in Europe, probably due to the large number of immigrant Turks and Kurds in northern Europe.  In any case it shows a large digital album of 100 year-old photographs.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/Default.aspx?pageID=447&GalleryID=2202&gpid=1

Unfortunately they are not captioned.  Photo #23 was particularly intriguing: six Turkish soldiers smiling at the camera next to a tent with an American flag hanging at the entrance. I am conjecturing that they are Turkish-American returnees.  New York and New England received many ethnic Turks from the Balkans and Cyprus prior to WW-1.

Photo #40!!!  Wow, that is a genuine old-school kanonisti.  My back hurts just looking at that guy.  Gallipoli probably and I bet that shell has either General Hamilton’s or Admiral de Robeck's name written on it in chalk.

Gallipoli is where Ataturk (Mustafa Kemal) made his bones.  His face is undoubtedly in a photo of  one of those groups of  officers.  A young Mulazim (Lieutenant) Tahsin Yazıcı was also at Gallipoli and may be in one of those pics.  35 years later he commanded the Turkish Brigade in Korea as part of the United Nations Command.

I used to associate Turkey during WW1 only with the Aussies at Gallipoli and Faisal’s Arab Revolt.  But wait, not so fast:  In eastern Turkey and the Caucasus the Ottomans fought battles at Ardahan, Sarikamish, Van, Koprukoy, Trabizon, Bitlis & Mus, Erzinca, Baku, Sardarapat, Kara-Killisse, and Bash-Arbaran.  Circassian and Kurdish cavalry, Azeris, Persians, and German advisers fought alongside peasant Anatolian infantry (some Kurds fought for the Russkies too, they were not a monolithic bloc).  The initial Russian advances (along with their Armenian and Assyrian allies) were most likely due to a priority Ottoman defense of Gallipoli.  The Turks fought and won the the Battle of Ctesiphon and the Siege of Kut in Iraq.  They beat Allenby in two of the three Battles of Gaza in Palestine but lost the third and the Battle of Megiddo. They stalemated the Brits in the Yemen.  Turkish Navy ships in addition to contributing to the allied defeat at Gallipoli accompanied battlecruiser SMS Goeben (redesignated TCG Yavuz) on raids to Russian ports in the Black Sea.

Good reads on the subject are by Professor Edward J Erickson, former US Army Field Artillery Officer, and is now a professor of military history.  He has written several books on Turkey and its history.

http://www.amazon.com/Edward-J.-Erickson/e/B001H6OJYY/ref=dp_byline_cont_book_1

UPDATE:  I have been scolded, and rightfully so, for not mentioning five other WW1 Fronts in which Ottoman troops served:

Galicia where the 19^th and 20^th Turkish Divisions were hastily sent after Austro Hungarian Forces melted during the Brusilov Offensive.  The famous 19^th Division had previously been commanded by Atataturk at Gallipoli.  They fought alongside the German 55^th and 1^st (Reserve) Bavarian Divisions. (Note – This area is now mostly the Western Ukraine)

Romania where the 15^th and 25^th Turkish Divisions fought under von Mackensen against both Romanian and Russian troops.

Macedonia where two more Turkish Divisions (50^th and 46^th) reinforced the Bulgarians and fought against an Anglo-French Expeditionary Force. (Note – The Turks arrived there to much cheering by Khosovars and Albanians.)

Libya where the Turks armed and advised the Senussi guerrilla war against the Italians and also invaded the British in Egypt.  They were reinforced with a single Turkish Infantry Battalion. (Note – The Senussis were a key anti-Gaddafi faction in the 2011 Libyan Civil War.)

Iraq/Persian border where a small Turkish detachment held off Russian attacks on Khanaqin. (Note - Khanaqin is just a short distance away from Jalawla where heavy fighting is going on today between Kurds and IS.)