Welcome to the Deep Dive. Today we are heading
back to a day that completely shattered illusions.
And forged national identities. Yeah, exactly.
And changed the course of military history. We're
looking at April 25, 1915. The landing at Anzac
Cove. Right. And our grounding source for this
exploration is an incredibly detailed historical
article breaking down this specific First World
War battle. It's a heavy one. It really is. Our
mission today is to, well... To bypass the grand
sweeping myths of the era, we're gonna pull you
right down into the gritty, chaotic, on -the
-ground reality of a military plan that went
completely sideways. Sideways is an understatement.
We're dissecting a fascinating intersection of
tactical failures, monumental assumptions, and
honestly extraordinary human resilience. Yeah,
we're looking at how a single day of sheer survival
in a hostile landscape forged a lasting legacy
for three different nations. The sources we're
using today strip away all that geopolitical
grandstanding. They just lay bare the mechanics
of the battle. Which is what you need for this.
Exactly. They show us not just what went wrong
on the beaches and cliffs of the Gallipoli Peninsula,
but how the soldiers on both sides reacted when
meticulously crafted plans evaporated. Right.
Upon contact with reality. Yes. So to really
understand the stakes for you as the listener,
we need to bypass the standard history textbook
introduction. Let's jump straight into the Imperial
War Cabinet's massive strategic gamble. Right.
The grand plan. It's early 1915 and the British
planners in London are looking to break the broader
deadlock of the war. They want to open a new
front in the Mediterranean. Their target is the
Dardanelles. Yep. That narrow strait in the Ottoman
Turkish Empire. And the ultimate goal is an amphibious
invasion of the Gallipoli Peninsula. Basically
to secure a passage for the navy. Exactly. They
want to sail right up to the Turkish capital,
Constantinople, and just force an armistice.
Boom. War over. The hubris embedded in this planning
stage is staggering. I mean, they formed the
Mediterranean Expansionary Force under General
Ian Hamilton, and a key part of this invasion
falls to a force of over 30 ,000 men. The Australian
and New Zealand Army Corps. Right. ANZAC. Commanded
by Lieutenant General William Birdwood. And the
planners in London. They essentially treated
this like a pristine map exercise. It's wild
to read about. It really is. They operated under
this bizarre assumption that the Gallipoli Peninsula
was sparsely defended. If it was defended at
all. Right. They didn't seriously consider the
possibility of heavy coordinated Turkish opposition?
No. The blueprints they drew up basically mapped
out an unopposed stroll up the hills, just seize
the ridges, cut off Turkish communication lines,
and have a cup of tea. Which brings us to the
actual execution. OK, let's unpack this. The
morning of April 25. Where the friction of war
immediately takes over. It's the middle of the
night. At 1 a .m., the British ships stop out
at sea. The troops transfer into 36 wooden rowing
boats. Towed by small steamers. Yeah. So I want
you to imagine sitting in one of those boats
in the pitch black. Terrifying. By 3 .30 a .m.,
the larger ships stop and the men have to row
the last 50 yards in total darkness. Bending
complete silence. Exactly. They're supposed to
land at a designated beach between a headland
called Gabatepe and Fisherman's Hut. But the
currents and the darkness throw them wildly off
course. Wildly. They land a full mile north.
At a jagged, unforgiving spot called Aribernu.
Which later becomes known as Anzac Cove. And
that single navigational error completely altered
the terrain they faced. And by extension, the
entire nature of the battle. Right. The planners
expected an open, relatively flat beach. A place
where they could easily organize battalions and
march inland. Instead, as the sun begins to rise,
the ANZ -AXE forces find themselves staring up
at nearly vertical cliffs. 300 -foot steep cliffs.
And these cliffs aren't just bare rock. They
are covered in thick, impenetrable, coarse scrub.
It is an absolute nightmare terrain for an amphibious
assault. But, and here's what's fascinating from
the sources, there's an incredible paradox regarding
that navigational mistake. Missing their target
was a logistical disaster, yes. But it almost
certainly saved the Anzac seas from a total massacre
on the beaches. Because the intended target,
Gabatepe, was not the empty stretch of sand the
British envisioned. No, the Turks had heavily
fortified it. They had a strong point there.
Complete with an artillery battery. Heavy, 15
centimeter. and 12 centimeter guns. Supported
by interlocking machine gun nests. Had the ANSAACs
landed where they were supposed to, they would
have been walking directly into a wall of coordinated
artillery fire. So the steep hills surrounding
their accidental landing spot actually shielded
them. It's a remarkable twist of fate. It really
is. A mistake saves them from immediate destruction,
but plunges them into utter tactical chaos. Total
chaos. The boats are all mixed up along the shoreline.
Officers are trying to figure out where on earth
they are. Holding maps that do not match the
jagged clefts in front of them at all. And Turkish
sentries have already opened fire from the reaches
above. So the Grand Corps plan was just immediately
discarded. Because it was physically impossible
to execute. Right. Men from different battalions
simply started scrambling up the Ari Bernou slope.
They were literally grabbing the thorny gorse
branches. Digging their bayonets into the dirt
just to pull themselves up the inclines. And
because the original plan is entirely out the
window, the orders passed down the line become
incredibly disjointed. Vanguard units like the
9th and 10th battalions, they're given these
frantic orders to just go as fast as they can.
Keep going at all costs. Yeah. So instead of
forming a solid, cohesive, defensive line, they
advance piecemeal into the deadly scrub -covered
terrain. areas known as the 400 Plateau and baby
700. The battle just immediately devolves into
small pockets of men fighting isolated, confusing
skirmishes. Those rapid advances led to some
incredibly intense close quarters encounters.
Because they were pushing forward so aggressively
through the brush, some Australian units actually
stumbled right into hidden Turkish artillery
positions. Yes. The sources share a brilliant
anecdote about this exact kind of encounter.
It involves Lieutenant Thomas's platoon. Right.
So they're wandering across this plateau, taking
fire, desperately looking for the guns that are
targeting the beaches. And they finally spot
a Turkish artillery battery hidden at the head
of a gully. Thomas's men opened fire, charged
the gun crews, and actually managed to capture
the artillery pieces. But the Turkish crews had
managed to remove the breach blocks before retreating.
Right. And for those unfamiliar, a breach block
is the heavy steel mechanism that seals the rear
of the cannon. Without it, the explosive force
of the shell would just blow backward out of
the gun. Making it completely impossible to fire.
So the Australians realized they couldn't turn
the captured guns on the enemy. Adapting on the
fly. They take whatever tools they have and completely
smash the delicate optical sights. They destroy
the internal screw mechanisms to ensure that
even if the Turks reclaim the position, they
can never use those guns against the beaches
again. It's a perfect distillation of the quick,
brutal improvisational warfare that defined the
morning. And they absolutely needed to improvise
because that foundational British assumption
that the Ottoman Army would just fold under pressure
was fatally flawed. The planners in London completely
ignored recent history. The Ottoman Army of World
War One was heavily influenced by German military
advisers. And more importantly, their commanders
down to the company level were highly experienced.
These were hardened veterans who had just fought
in the grueling Balkan Wars. They knew how to
maneuver. They knew how to utilize defensive
terrain. And they were fiercely motivated to
defend their homeland. Which brings us to a crucial
moment, into this sprawling chaotic beachhead
steps, one of the most significant military and
political figures of the 20th century. Here's
where it gets really interesting. Lieutenant
Colonel Mustafa Kemal. The commander of the Turkish
19th Division. His involvement on that first
day is a master class in battlefield command.
And situational awareness. The British thought
they had the element of surprise, right? Right.
But by pure, incredible chance, Kemal's 57th
Infantry Regiment wasn't asleep in their barracks
when the landing happened. They had been awake
since 5 .30 a .m., fully armed and prepared.
Because they were scheduled to conduct a routine
military exercise in the hills overlooking that
exact area. It is a staggering piece of terrible
luck for the invading forces. So when Kemal gets
word of the landing, he doesn't wait for explicit
orders from the higher -ups in the Ottoman command
chain. He personally leads his vanguard regiment
toward a high ground position called Çinlikber.
He looks down at the chaotic advance and immediately
recognizes the strategic reality that the British
planners failed to grasp. Whoever held those
commanding heights would dominate the entire
battlefield. If the Anzies took the heights,
they could fire down onto the Turkish supply
lines and the campaign was functionally over.
So he stops retreating Turkish sentries, forces
them back into a defensive line to buy time,
and prepares the 57th Regiment for a massive,
immediate counterattack. The sources provide
the ultimate order he gave to his men that morning,
and it perfectly encapsulates the severity of
the situation. He told them, Men, I am not ordering
you to attack. I'm ordering you to die. In the
time that it takes us to die, other forces and
commanders can come and take our place. I mean,
wow. That is a chilling concept. Existential
defense. He understood that this single morning
was the hinge point of the entire campaign. That
order and the willingness of the Turkish soldiers
to sacrifice everything to hold the high ground,
it completely blunted the fragmented ANZ -WIG
advance. Okay, let's slow down for a second.
When we talk about grand strategies and massive
troop movements... It's very easy to lose sight
of the human toll. Exactly. We need to ground
this narrative in what this environment actually
felt like for the people trying to survive it.
To help us picture the sheer terror of this landscape,
our sources include the extensive diary of Private
Victor Rupert Laidlaw, who served as a medic
with the Second Field Ambulance. His accounts
are visceral. Haunting. He wrote about sitting
in the rowing boats in the pre -dawn light, hearing
the massive 15 inch guns of the naval battleships
offshore pounding the coastal forts. But the
detail that stood out to him. The thing that
signaled the true danger was the sound of the
small arms fire from the cliffs. He noted that
the distant overlapping rifle shots sounded just
like croaking frogs. It's such a surreal, almost
peaceful metaphor for a sound that represented
mechanized death. And that brief illusion of
nature shattered the moment the boats hit the
shingle. Laidlaw documents the terrifying reality
that the Turks were completely prepared and waiting.
Many men were killed by concentrated fire before
they even had a chance to swing their legs over
the side of the rowing boats. Once the medical
teams finally made it ashore, they faced a logistical
nightmare that bordered on the impossible. I
really want you to put yourself in the shoes
of a field medic in this terrain. Imagine trying
to maneuver a heavy canvas stretcher carrying
a severely wounded man. down a nearly vertical
cliff face, sliding on loose dirt with your path
entirely choked by those thorny gorse bushes
we mentioned earlier. And you are doing all of
this while under constant invisible fire from
the ridges above. Laidlaw wrote that the country
was awful and mountainous and that Turkish snipers
would camouflage themselves up in the sparse
trees doing what he called their deathly work.
The tactical situation deteriorated so badly
that the medical corps had to make a deeply psychologically
damaging decision. Laidlaw mentions that they
eventually had to rip the Red Cross emblems off
their uniforms. And paint over the crosses on
their medical gear. In the laws of armed conflict,
that emblem is supposed to be a universal shield.
But in the absolute chaos and desperation of
this environment, the bright red crosses were
simply providing a high contrast aiming point
for snipers in the brush. Removing that emblem
is a profound stripping away of the rules of
war. It reduces everything to pure survival.
And as the sun arcs across the sky, the situation
for the ANZACs only grows more desperate. By
the afternoon, Mustafa Kemal's initial counterattack
has swelled into a massive coordinated operation.
The Turks bring up reinforcements from the 72nd,
the 27th and the 77th Infantry Regiments. We're
looking at an organized assault involving between
10 ,000 and 12 ,000 Turkish troops. Now fully
backed by their own artillery firing down into
the gullies. This overwhelming counter -attack
systematically pushes the exhausted, fragmented
ANZAC forces back toward the sea. All those units
that had charged forward so aggressively in the
morning are forced into a grueling fighting retreat.
By the time the sun begins to set, the ANZACs
have been boxed into a tiny, incredibly precarious
beachhead. To give you a true sense of the claustrophobia
of this space, the entire allied perimeter was
under two miles long. And barely 790 yards deep.
Less than half a mile inland. after an entire
day of relentless combat. By nightfall, there
were roughly 16 ,000 ANZAC -C troops ashore packed
into this tiny sliver of beach and cliffside.
And they are in a state of absolute command crisis.
Which brings us to the critical inflection point
of the entire campaign. It's 9 .15 p .m. Lieutenant
General Birdwood, the ANZAC -C commander, finally
goes ashore to assess the situation. He is immediately
surrounded by his senior generals and brigadiers.
And they are panicked. They report that the troops
are thoroughly demoralized. They have been subjected
to constant shrapnel fire all day. These are
artillery shells designed to burst in the air
and rain jagged metal down on exposed infantry.
The casualty count is horrific. The brigadiers
firmly believe that if they are subjected to
another coordinated Turkish attack in the morning,
they will be driven right into the sea. They
urgently beg Birdwood to order an immediate evacuation.
Birdwood is looking at a potential massacre.
But he refuses to make that monumental call alone.
He signals his superior, General Ian Hamilton,
who is safely out on the flagship. Hamilton turns
to his naval commanders and asks if it is logistically
possible to pull 16 ,000 men off that beach in
the dark. The Navy unequivocally says no. They
explain it would take days to organize. And they
would lose entirely too many men trying to load
them back into the wooden boats under constant
artillery fire. So Hamilton is trapped by the
logistics of his own flawed invasion plan. He
sends a response back to Birdwood that permanently
alters the course of history for everyone involved.
He informs the commanders on the beach that evacuation
is impossible. His final fateful order to the
ANZAC forces is to dig yourselves right in and
stick it out. Dig. Dig, dig until you are safe.
Dig, dig, dig. And that is exactly what they
did. What was designed in London to be a rapid
mobile assault to quickly capture a peninsula
instantly transformed into a brutal static war
of attrition. The soldiers pulled out their entrenching
tools and dug defensive lines that in some places
were only yards away from the Turkish trenches.
They stayed pinned on that tiny patch of land
for eight grueling months before finally evacuating
in December of 1915. The human cost of that stubborn
refusal to yield on both sides of the line was
staggering. The sources lay out the grim mathematics
of the campaign very clearly. On the very first
day alone, over 2 ,000 Australians and New Zealanders
were killed or wounded in the scrub. On the Turkish
side, the 27th and 57th Infantry Regiments, the
vanguard units that bore the brunt of the defensive
fighting. They lost about 50 % of their combined
combat strength. By the time the eight -month
campaign finally ended, Over 11 ,000 Anzacese
and an estimated 87 ,000 Turkish soldiers would
be dead. So what does this all mean? Why do we
still dissect this specific battle over a century
later? The legacy of this single day is incredibly
profound. April 25th became known as Anzac Day.
But it is vital to emphasize that Anzac Day does
not celebrate a military victory. Not at all.
The Gallipoli campaign was an unmitigated strategic
failure for the British Empire. The day is fundamentally
about commemoration. It honors the contribution,
the resilience, and the immense suffering of
all the Australians and New Zealanders who served
and died in that conflict. And in all conflicts
since. It is a day of reflection on the cost
of war. It also raises a remarkable reality about
reconciliation, because the legacy of April 25th
isn't solely held by Australia and New Zealand.
It is deeply embedded in the national consciousness
of Turkey as well. The modern reality of this
shared history is incredibly moving. Today, tens
of thousands of people, including generations
of Australians and New Zealanders, travel to
Turkey. They gather peacefully at Anzac Cove
in the freezing dark for dawn services. They
stand shoulder -to -shoulder on the exact same
ground where this brutal, chaotic fighting took
place. And they are welcomed there as guests.
by the very nation their ancestors once invaded.
It's a shared commemoration of immense loss and
mutual respect. We started this deep dive looking
at a deeply flawed strategic plan drawn up in
London. A plan born of imperial hubris that dropped
thousands of men onto the bloody, gorse -covered
cliffs of Gallipoli. As we wrap up, I want to
leave you with a final lingering thought that
builds on everything we've unpacked today. Go
for it. The failure of Gallipoli is often viewed
strictly as a military disaster. But consider
how this catastrophic event paradoxically forged
three distinct national identities for Australia
and New Zealand. The shared suffering on those
cliffs became a moment where they stepped out
from the shadow of the British Empire and defined
their own independent character. And for the
Ottoman Empire, the ferocious defense of their
homeland laid the groundwork for the modern Republic
of Turkey. Led by none other than Mustafa Kemal.
Right. It raises a fascinating observation about
the nature of history. How often in modern strategic
planning, whether in boardrooms, political campaigns,
or even our own personal lives, do we map out
perfect scenarios that completely ignore the
agency, capability, and willpower of the people
on the other side? That is a profound perspective
to consider. The idea that national identity
can be born from the ashes of a flawed military
campaign gives a completely different weight
to the history of that day. It really does. Thank
you so much for joining us on this deep dive.
We hope it gave you a new lens through which
to view a legendary chaotic moment in time. Keep
questioning the history you think you know. Keep
digging into the sources and we'll catch you
on the next deep dive.