At Gallipoli, a Campaign That Laid Ground for National Identities - The New York Times - 0 views
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In March 1915, the Western Allies, locked in stagnant trench warfare in Europe, seized on an ambitious strategy orchestrated by Winston Churchill, then Britain’s first lord of the admiralty, to open a second front here. In securing control of the Dardanelles and conquering Constantinople, now Istanbul, the Allies hoped to knock the Turks, who had recently entered the conflict on the side of the Germans, from the war.
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After nine months of grueling trench warfare, and after suffering tens of thousands of casualties while gaining little ground, the Allies evacuated. More than 40,000 British military personnel were killed, along with nearly 8,000 Australians and more than 60,000 Turks.
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The campaign also proved crucial in the careers of two of the 20th century’s greatest statesmen: Churchill, who was demoted for his role in the military disaster, and Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, then a young Turkish officer, whose battlefield success at Gallipoli propelled him to fame, which he built on to become the founder of the modern Turkish republic.
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