WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.899 Welcome to today's custom tailored deep dive. 00:00:04.559 --> 00:00:06.639 We are absolutely thrilled to have you with us 00:00:06.639 --> 00:00:08.160 today. Yeah, thanks for joining us. We've got 00:00:08.160 --> 00:00:10.500 a really incredible topic lined up. We really 00:00:10.500 --> 00:00:13.619 do. Today we are we're traveling back in time 00:00:13.619 --> 00:00:18.100 to August 1915. We're stepping into this brutal, 00:00:18.519 --> 00:00:20.960 heartbreaking and just incredibly pivotal clash 00:00:20.960 --> 00:00:22.960 during the World War One Gallipoli campaign. 00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:25.760 Right. We are talking about the Battle of Chunuk 00:00:25.760 --> 00:00:29.309 Ber. It is a profound. piece of military history. 00:00:29.809 --> 00:00:31.789 I mean, for this deep dive, we're drawing our 00:00:31.789 --> 00:00:34.609 insights from a single comprehensive source. 00:00:34.929 --> 00:00:37.350 Yeah, a highly detailed Wikipedia article dedicated 00:00:37.350 --> 00:00:40.229 entirely to this battle. Exactly. And it lays 00:00:40.229 --> 00:00:43.890 out the sprawling strategies, the unforgiving 00:00:43.890 --> 00:00:46.829 geography, and really the immense human cost 00:00:46.829 --> 00:00:49.630 of this specific engagement. So our mission today 00:00:49.630 --> 00:00:51.990 is to extract the most vital nuggets of this 00:00:51.990 --> 00:00:54.329 history for you. We're going to explore how a 00:00:54.329 --> 00:00:57.179 combination of impossibly rugged terrain delayed 00:00:57.179 --> 00:01:00.020 decisions and fierce leadership turned what could 00:01:00.020 --> 00:01:02.299 have been a decisive, you know, war -altering 00:01:02.299 --> 00:01:05.359 allied victory into a devastating tragedy. It's 00:01:05.359 --> 00:01:07.099 a heavy one, but so important to understand. 00:01:07.260 --> 00:01:09.680 It is. OK, let's unpack this. To really understand 00:01:09.680 --> 00:01:12.079 the stakes at Chonok Bear, you have to place 00:01:12.079 --> 00:01:14.459 yourself in the sheer frustration of the Gallipoli 00:01:14.459 --> 00:01:17.739 campaign up to that late summer point. Right. 00:01:17.840 --> 00:01:20.299 The Allies were just entirely bogged down. Completely. 00:01:20.739 --> 00:01:23.819 The attempts to capture Krithia or make any progress 00:01:23.819 --> 00:01:26.400 on the Cape Hellas front had failed completely. 00:01:26.859 --> 00:01:29.920 He was a grinding bloody stalemate. And that 00:01:29.920 --> 00:01:33.239 stalemate meant... General Ian Hamilton, he's 00:01:33.239 --> 00:01:34.959 the commander of the Mediterranean Expeditionary 00:01:34.959 --> 00:01:37.120 Force, he was sitting there with his forces, 00:01:37.459 --> 00:01:40.040 tripling in size, desperate for a breakout. Yeah, 00:01:40.260 --> 00:01:42.019 he originally had five divisions, and now he 00:01:42.019 --> 00:01:44.659 was up to 15. Meanwhile, the Ottoman defenders 00:01:44.659 --> 00:01:48.019 had swelled from six divisions to 16. So Hamilton 00:01:48.019 --> 00:01:50.079 needed a radical shift to break the deadlock, 00:01:50.180 --> 00:01:52.180 which leads him to launch the August offensive. 00:01:52.540 --> 00:01:54.620 And the grand prize of this offensive was the 00:01:54.620 --> 00:01:57.200 Saray Bear Range. Specifically, the high ground 00:01:57.200 --> 00:02:00.700 of Hill 971 and a secondary peak called Chinook 00:02:00.700 --> 00:02:02.859 Bear. Because controlling the high ground in 00:02:02.859 --> 00:02:06.280 warfare is always critical, but... But eglipli, 00:02:06.299 --> 00:02:09.539 it dictated everything. If the Allies could take 00:02:09.539 --> 00:02:12.120 those peaks, they could look down directly onto 00:02:12.120 --> 00:02:14.719 the Ottoman trench lines. They could potentially 00:02:14.719 --> 00:02:17.439 sever their communications and break the entire 00:02:17.439 --> 00:02:19.560 siege. But the Ottoman senior commanders weren't 00:02:19.560 --> 00:02:21.699 really losing much sleep over an attack on Chinook 00:02:21.699 --> 00:02:24.180 Bear, were they? Not at all. They looked at the 00:02:24.180 --> 00:02:27.830 terrain. these steep, rocky, scrub -covered ridges 00:02:27.830 --> 00:02:30.110 intersected by deep valleys, which they called 00:02:30.110 --> 00:02:33.169 darays, and they genuinely considered an assault 00:02:33.169 --> 00:02:35.770 there to be a logistical impossibility. I mean, 00:02:35.949 --> 00:02:38.009 if the terrain was that brutal, did the Ottomans 00:02:38.009 --> 00:02:40.969 just leave the entire ridge exposed? Basically, 00:02:41.169 --> 00:02:43.599 yes. Most of the high command did. But there 00:02:43.599 --> 00:02:45.800 was one commander who looked at the exact same 00:02:45.800 --> 00:02:48.759 map and saw a massive vulnerability. Mustafa 00:02:48.759 --> 00:02:51.259 Kemal. Exactly. Mustafa Kemal, the commander 00:02:51.259 --> 00:02:54.219 of the Ottoman 19th Division. He anticipated 00:02:54.219 --> 00:02:57.379 this exact allied move. He realized that the 00:02:57.379 --> 00:03:00.639 peak of Juniper was incredibly dangerous precisely 00:03:00.639 --> 00:03:02.759 because it was lightly defended and he pleaded 00:03:02.759 --> 00:03:04.979 with his superiors to strengthen the line Yeah, 00:03:05.080 --> 00:03:07.419 he did but his warnings were completely ignored 00:03:07.419 --> 00:03:12.439 man So the stage is set for this massive allied 00:03:12.439 --> 00:03:15.280 nighttime advance. We are looking at the night 00:03:15.280 --> 00:03:19.370 of August 6th going into the 7th The plan is 00:03:19.370 --> 00:03:22.849 highly complex. The New Zealand and Australian 00:03:22.849 --> 00:03:25.569 Division, commanded by Major General Alexander 00:03:25.569 --> 00:03:28.389 Godley, is tasked with pushing up a piece of 00:03:28.389 --> 00:03:31.590 high ground called Rhododendron Spur. This spur 00:03:31.590 --> 00:03:34.250 runs directly from the beach up to the peak of 00:03:34.250 --> 00:03:36.110 Chinook Bear. But they couldn't just march in 00:03:36.110 --> 00:03:38.729 a salt column straight up the spur. The Ottomans 00:03:38.729 --> 00:03:40.969 had heavily protected outposts scattered all 00:03:40.969 --> 00:03:43.590 along the way. fortified with machine gun positions. 00:03:43.870 --> 00:03:45.469 So before the main assault column could even 00:03:45.469 --> 00:03:47.469 begin their climb, a covering force had to go 00:03:47.469 --> 00:03:49.750 in under the cover of darkness and clear those 00:03:49.750 --> 00:03:52.030 outposts one by one. Sending a covering force 00:03:52.030 --> 00:03:53.830 into the pitch black of that terrain to clear 00:03:53.830 --> 00:03:57.129 machine gun nests sounds like a recipe for absolute 00:03:57.129 --> 00:04:00.050 chaos. It was a brutal undertaking. They sent 00:04:00.050 --> 00:04:02.270 in four under strength regiments of the New Zealand 00:04:02.270 --> 00:04:04.250 Mounted Rifles Brigade. We're talking about the 00:04:04.250 --> 00:04:06.770 Auckland Regiment clearing old number three outposts. 00:04:06.770 --> 00:04:08.909 Right. And the Wellingtons taking Destroyer Hill 00:04:08.909 --> 00:04:11.830 and Tabletop and the Otago and Canter... regiments 00:04:11.830 --> 00:04:14.530 assaulting Bouchops Hill. And the fighting was 00:04:14.530 --> 00:04:17.449 ferocious. Strictly hand -to -hand combat in 00:04:17.449 --> 00:04:20.290 the dark. Bouchops Hill is actually named after 00:04:20.290 --> 00:04:22.949 Lieutenant Colonel Arthur Bochop who died capturing 00:04:22.949 --> 00:04:25.490 it that very night. The New Zealanders lose about 00:04:25.490 --> 00:04:27.550 a hundred men just clearing that initial path 00:04:27.550 --> 00:04:31.170 but they do succeed. The outposts fall. The outposts 00:04:31.170 --> 00:04:33.730 fall but that struggle cost them two precious 00:04:33.730 --> 00:04:37.019 hours. And in a coordinated offensive Two hours 00:04:37.019 --> 00:04:40.459 is an eternity. Exactly. The plan begins to run 00:04:40.459 --> 00:04:43.319 dangerously behind schedule. The main assault 00:04:43.319 --> 00:04:45.519 columns advance up the valleys on either side 00:04:45.519 --> 00:04:48.319 of the stir, and by 4 .30 in the morning shortly 00:04:48.319 --> 00:04:51.420 before dawn, three battalions finally manage 00:04:51.420 --> 00:04:54.439 to get into position on a null dubbed the Apex. 00:04:54.720 --> 00:04:56.639 Here's where it gets really interesting because 00:04:56.639 --> 00:04:59.399 the geography at the apex is agonizing. They 00:04:59.399 --> 00:05:01.699 are only 500 yards away from the summit of Chinook 00:05:01.699 --> 00:05:04.439 Bear. Just 500 yards. And at that exact moment, 00:05:04.660 --> 00:05:07.240 at 430 in the morning, the peak is essentially 00:05:07.240 --> 00:05:09.439 empty. Completely wide open. There were only 00:05:09.439 --> 00:05:11.560 about 20 Ottoman soldiers up there and they were 00:05:11.560 --> 00:05:14.480 sleeping. The entire Gallipoli campaign was sitting 00:05:14.480 --> 00:05:17.259 there ripe for the taking. It remains the ultimate 00:05:17.259 --> 00:05:20.620 what if of the entire campaign. The door was 00:05:20.620 --> 00:05:23.500 wide open, but the Canterbury battalion, which 00:05:23.500 --> 00:05:25.459 was traveling along the south side of the spur, 00:05:25.920 --> 00:05:28.339 had gotten hopelessly lost in the dark and the 00:05:28.339 --> 00:05:31.399 confusing ravines. They were delayed. Yeah. And 00:05:31.399 --> 00:05:33.639 the overall commander of the attack on the ground, 00:05:33.819 --> 00:05:36.819 Colonel Francis Johnston, makes a fateful decision. 00:05:36.939 --> 00:05:39.379 Even though he had explicit original orders not 00:05:39.379 --> 00:05:42.540 to halt for any reason. Right. He decides to 00:05:42.540 --> 00:05:44.879 stop the advance at the apex and wait for the 00:05:44.879 --> 00:05:47.680 lost battalion to arrive. He just stops, 500 00:05:47.680 --> 00:05:50.370 yards away. It's agonizing. And this attack was 00:05:50.370 --> 00:05:52.449 supposed to coordinate with other assaults happening 00:05:52.449 --> 00:05:55.629 simultaneously down at a place called The Neck. 00:05:55.850 --> 00:05:58.949 An attack goes ahead at 430 a .m. Which was supposed 00:05:58.949 --> 00:06:01.589 to coincide with the New Zealanders attacking 00:06:01.589 --> 00:06:04.529 down from Tunic Bear into the rear of the Ottoman 00:06:04.529 --> 00:06:06.910 trenches. But because Johnston halted at the 00:06:06.910 --> 00:06:09.209 apex, the New Zealanders weren't there to support 00:06:09.209 --> 00:06:11.449 them. The Battle of the Neck goes ahead anyway, 00:06:11.649 --> 00:06:14.310 resulting in absolutely staggering allied casualties. 00:06:14.449 --> 00:06:16.569 And while Johnston is waiting at the apex, the 00:06:16.569 --> 00:06:18.970 sun inevitably comes up. With the daylight comes 00:06:18.970 --> 00:06:21.589 the realization for the Ottomans that Chunuk 00:06:21.589 --> 00:06:25.389 Ber is in imminent danger. Mustafa Kemal, the 00:06:25.389 --> 00:06:28.230 man who had predicted this exact scenario, rushes 00:06:28.230 --> 00:06:31.009 to the area and frantically starts ordering regiments 00:06:31.009 --> 00:06:33.790 to the peak. German Lieutenant Colonel Hans Kanengasser, 00:06:34.250 --> 00:06:36.850 commander of the Ottoman 9th Division, also reaches 00:06:36.850 --> 00:06:39.129 the summit and immediately begins organizing 00:06:39.129 --> 00:06:41.769 the defense. The cost of that delay changes history. 00:06:42.089 --> 00:06:45.850 By 10 a .m., the window of opportunity has slammed 00:06:45.850 --> 00:06:49.040 shut. Those 20 sleeping soldiers have been reinforced 00:06:49.040 --> 00:06:52.040 by around 500 Ottoman and German troops. I want 00:06:52.040 --> 00:06:54.319 you to imagine the psychological toll of that 00:06:54.319 --> 00:06:56.839 scenario. Put yourself in the boots of those 00:06:56.839 --> 00:06:59.300 soldiers sitting at the apex. You've climbed 00:06:59.300 --> 00:07:02.379 all night through impossible terrain, surviving 00:07:02.379 --> 00:07:04.839 hand -to -hand combat in the dark. Just brutal 00:07:04.839 --> 00:07:06.899 conditions. You get within a short sprint of 00:07:06.899 --> 00:07:08.879 a victory that could end the stalemate. You can 00:07:08.879 --> 00:07:11.259 literally see the empty summit. Then you are 00:07:11.259 --> 00:07:13.579 ordered to sit in the dirt and wait. Just sit 00:07:13.579 --> 00:07:16.199 there and watch. Exactly. As you wait hour after 00:07:16.199 --> 00:07:18.800 hour, you watch the enemy heavily fortify the 00:07:18.800 --> 00:07:22.180 very hill you now have to charge. It's an unimaginable 00:07:22.180 --> 00:07:25.379 level of frustration. And the tragedy compounds 00:07:25.379 --> 00:07:28.199 from there. Because it's daylight and the enemy 00:07:28.199 --> 00:07:30.819 is now entrenched on the high ground, taking 00:07:30.819 --> 00:07:33.779 the peak looks suicidal. Totally suicidal. Colonel 00:07:33.779 --> 00:07:37.060 Johnston, seeing the reinforced peak, actually 00:07:37.060 --> 00:07:39.579 requests permission to wait until nightfall to 00:07:39.579 --> 00:07:42.160 resume the attack. But General Godley, who is 00:07:42.160 --> 00:07:44.769 stationed miles away from the front line, sends 00:07:44.769 --> 00:07:48.750 down a rigid response. Attack now. So at 11 duro 00:07:48.750 --> 00:07:51.829 a .m. on August 7th, the Auckland Battalion is 00:07:51.829 --> 00:07:54.250 ordered to charge. They have to sprint from the 00:07:54.250 --> 00:07:56.730 apex to another knoll called the pinnacle and 00:07:56.730 --> 00:07:59.620 from there it's a straight utterly exposed climb 00:07:59.620 --> 00:08:02.339 to the summit. It's an absolute disaster. Barely 00:08:02.339 --> 00:08:04.920 100 men make it as far as the Pinnacle, desperately 00:08:04.920 --> 00:08:07.540 trying to dig into the rocky ground. Around 300 00:08:07.540 --> 00:08:10.180 fall as casualties just trying to cross the open 00:08:10.180 --> 00:08:12.420 space between the apex and the Pinnacle. And 00:08:12.420 --> 00:08:14.759 seeing his men slaughtered, Johnston turns to 00:08:14.759 --> 00:08:16.939 the Wellington Battalion and tells them to continue 00:08:16.939 --> 00:08:19.139 the attack. This brings us to one of the most 00:08:19.139 --> 00:08:21.259 remarkable figures in this battle, Lieutenant 00:08:21.259 --> 00:08:23.420 Colonel William Lone, the commander of the Wellington 00:08:23.420 --> 00:08:25.899 Battalion. Yes. When ordered to send his men 00:08:25.899 --> 00:08:28.699 into that same meat grinder, Malone flat out 00:08:28.699 --> 00:08:31.920 refuses. He just says no. He states that he is 00:08:31.920 --> 00:08:34.820 not willing to order his men to carry out a hopeless 00:08:34.820 --> 00:08:37.899 suicidal daylight attack. He insists his battalion 00:08:37.899 --> 00:08:40.139 will take Chinook Bear, but they will do it at 00:08:40.139 --> 00:08:42.559 night. Standing there while men are dying and 00:08:42.559 --> 00:08:44.600 refusing a direct order because you know it's 00:08:44.600 --> 00:08:47.240 a death sentence takes incredible amount of conviction. 00:08:47.610 --> 00:08:50.309 What's fascinating here is how history has recorded 00:08:50.309 --> 00:08:53.389 this moment and how the line between insubordination 00:08:53.389 --> 00:08:56.049 and tactical sanity is sometimes drawn. Right. 00:08:56.230 --> 00:08:58.669 For decades, the myth was that Malone directly 00:08:58.669 --> 00:09:01.990 defied General Godley. But the source highlights 00:09:01.990 --> 00:09:05.169 a 2018 insight from New Zealand military historian 00:09:05.169 --> 00:09:07.909 Ian McGibbon, who challenges this narrative. 00:09:08.049 --> 00:09:10.250 OK, so what really happened? McGibbon points 00:09:10.250 --> 00:09:13.750 out that Malone and Johnston actually both vehemently 00:09:13.750 --> 00:09:16.710 disagreed with Godley's order. Johnston had reluctantly 00:09:16.710 --> 00:09:19.899 accepted it. But Malone pushed back. Right. Crucially, 00:09:20.039 --> 00:09:21.980 Malone didn't actually refuse a direct order 00:09:21.980 --> 00:09:25.000 from the general himself. He argued fiercely 00:09:25.000 --> 00:09:28.080 with a junior British officer. Major Arthur Temperley. 00:09:28.720 --> 00:09:31.539 Exactly. Major Temperley, who was Johnston's 00:09:31.539 --> 00:09:34.720 brigade major. This nuance adds a really compelling 00:09:34.720 --> 00:09:37.159 layer to how chaotic the chain of command had 00:09:37.159 --> 00:09:39.840 become on that ridge and how Malone navigated 00:09:39.840 --> 00:09:41.679 that friction to save his men from a pointless 00:09:41.679 --> 00:09:44.220 slaughter. Godley finally calls off the daytime 00:09:44.220 --> 00:09:47.139 attacks, but hundreds of Anzacs are already dead 00:09:47.139 --> 00:09:50.279 or wounded on the slopes. So they pivot to a 00:09:50.279 --> 00:09:52.840 night attack plan. The shattered Auckland and 00:09:52.840 --> 00:09:55.279 Canterbury battalions are pulled back, replaced 00:09:55.279 --> 00:09:58.889 by the Otago and Wellington battalions. At 3 00:09:58.889 --> 00:10:02.690 .30 a .m. on August 8th, a heavy naval bombardment 00:10:02.690 --> 00:10:05.649 pounds the peak for 45 minutes. And this time, 00:10:05.789 --> 00:10:08.529 the tactics align with the terrain. How so? Well, 00:10:08.549 --> 00:10:10.830 the ground on Chunuk Ber was too hard and rocky 00:10:10.830 --> 00:10:13.269 for the Ottomans to dig deep, protective trenches. 00:10:13.769 --> 00:10:16.350 So the naval barrage essentially sweeps the defenders 00:10:16.350 --> 00:10:19.389 right off the summit. Wow. Following the bombardment, 00:10:19.529 --> 00:10:21.370 Malone's Wellingtons, followed by the British 00:10:21.370 --> 00:10:23.889 7th Gloucesters, push up and reach the summit 00:10:23.889 --> 00:10:26.490 virtually unopposed. They secure Chunuk Ber. 00:10:26.649 --> 00:10:28.769 But taking the high ground is one thing. Holding 00:10:28.769 --> 00:10:31.009 it proves to be a completely different nightmare. 00:10:31.450 --> 00:10:34.169 As daylight breaks on August 8th, the peak is 00:10:34.169 --> 00:10:37.090 totally exposed to inflating fire from the main 00:10:37.090 --> 00:10:39.250 Ottoman line on Battleship Hill to the south 00:10:39.250 --> 00:10:41.970 and from Hill Q to the north. And the terrain 00:10:41.970 --> 00:10:45.240 turns against them again. It's solid rock. The 00:10:45.240 --> 00:10:47.399 New Zealanders can only scrape the shallowest 00:10:47.399 --> 00:10:49.820 of trenches, offering minimal cover. Which is 00:10:49.820 --> 00:10:52.120 terrifying. Worse, the slope of the hill on the 00:10:52.120 --> 00:10:54.240 Ottoman side is incredibly steep, creating a 00:10:54.240 --> 00:10:57.500 terrifying blind spot. The Ottoman troops could 00:10:57.500 --> 00:10:59.799 creep up the slope and get within 22 yards of 00:10:59.799 --> 00:11:03.120 the allied trenches, completely unseen. 22 yards! 00:11:03.139 --> 00:11:05.080 They were practically breathing on the summit 00:11:05.080 --> 00:11:07.960 before they could be spotted. Yeah. By 5 .00 00:11:07.960 --> 00:11:10.279 a .m., massive Ottoman counterattacks surge up 00:11:10.279 --> 00:11:13.019 that blind spot. It results in desperate, close 00:11:13.019 --> 00:11:15.929 -quarters combat. Just relentless. The New Zealanders 00:11:15.929 --> 00:11:18.370 fought so relentlessly, firing their own rifles 00:11:18.370 --> 00:11:20.230 and picking up the rifles of their fallen friends 00:11:20.230 --> 00:11:22.450 to keep up the rate of fire, that the wooden 00:11:22.450 --> 00:11:24.809 stocks of the guns became physically too hot 00:11:24.809 --> 00:11:27.750 to hold. Too hot to hold? That is insane. And 00:11:27.750 --> 00:11:29.590 when the Ottomans crested the ridge and poured 00:11:29.590 --> 00:11:32.289 into those shallow trenches, the fighting devolved 00:11:32.289 --> 00:11:35.129 entirely into vicious bayonet combat. They managed 00:11:35.129 --> 00:11:38.409 to hold on all day through sheer willpower. But 00:11:38.409 --> 00:11:41.049 around 5 day OPM, a devastating blow strikes 00:11:41.049 --> 00:11:43.720 the Wellingtons. Yeah. Colonel Malone, the man 00:11:43.720 --> 00:11:45.659 who had saved his men the day before, is killed. 00:11:46.100 --> 00:11:48.460 And he isn't killed by an Ottoman bullet. He 00:11:48.460 --> 00:11:51.039 is struck by a misdirected artillery shell. It 00:11:51.039 --> 00:11:53.200 was friendly fire, either from their own Anzac 00:11:53.200 --> 00:11:56.200 artillery or a British ship off the coast. It's 00:11:56.200 --> 00:11:58.820 a catastrophic loss of leadership and a crushing 00:11:58.820 --> 00:12:02.840 blow to morale. As darkness falls on August 8th, 00:12:02.679 --> 00:12:05.019 the Wellington Battalion is finally relieved. 00:12:05.240 --> 00:12:07.379 And the casualty numbers are difficult to process. 00:12:07.679 --> 00:12:10.120 Out of the 760 men of the Wellington Battalion 00:12:10.120 --> 00:12:12.840 who reached the summit that morning, 711 had 00:12:12.840 --> 00:12:17.059 become casualties. 711 out of 760. Unbelievable. 00:12:17.240 --> 00:12:19.360 And a British regiment suffered terribly as well. 00:12:19.549 --> 00:12:22.649 The Gloucesters lost 350 men, which included 00:12:22.649 --> 00:12:24.950 every single one of their officers. The Welch 00:12:24.950 --> 00:12:28.169 pioneers had 417 casualties. For the wounded 00:12:28.169 --> 00:12:30.470 who survived the summit, getting off that mountain 00:12:30.470 --> 00:12:32.789 was an ordeal in itself. It took some men three 00:12:32.789 --> 00:12:35.250 full days to travel just over a kilometer down 00:12:35.250 --> 00:12:37.590 the rugged rhododendron spur back to the beach. 00:12:38.009 --> 00:12:40.769 Meanwhile, General Godley remains at his headquarters 00:12:40.769 --> 00:12:44.120 near the beach. largely insulated from the horrific 00:12:44.120 --> 00:12:46.740 realities on the summit and the exhausted state 00:12:46.740 --> 00:12:49.379 of his troops. Completely disconnected. Ignorant 00:12:49.379 --> 00:12:53.139 of the conditions, he devises a new, highly complex 00:12:53.139 --> 00:12:56.340 operational plan for August 9th. While the men 00:12:56.340 --> 00:12:58.539 on Chinook Bear are just trying to survive the 00:12:58.539 --> 00:13:01.000 night, Godly decides it's time to capture the 00:13:01.000 --> 00:13:04.129 neighboring peak. Hill Q. Right. He sends a mixed 00:13:04.129 --> 00:13:06.750 force commanded by Brigadier General Anthony 00:13:06.750 --> 00:13:09.730 Baldwin to assault the hill. They are supposed 00:13:09.730 --> 00:13:12.190 to stage their attack from a small sheltered 00:13:12.190 --> 00:13:14.610 plateau on the north side of the spur known as 00:13:14.610 --> 00:13:17.490 the farm. But the friction of war immediately 00:13:17.490 --> 00:13:19.809 takes over. It's pitch black. The terrain is 00:13:19.809 --> 00:13:22.350 an absolute labyrinth of ravines and thick scrub. 00:13:23.090 --> 00:13:25.389 And Baldwin's battalions get completely lost. 00:13:25.509 --> 00:13:27.669 They wander in the dark and don't manage to locate 00:13:27.669 --> 00:13:30.750 the farm until six series a .m. Well after dawn. 00:13:30.889 --> 00:13:33.190 So the coordinated attack entirely falls apart 00:13:33.190 --> 00:13:36.370 before it even begins. There is one agonizingly 00:13:36.370 --> 00:13:38.870 fleeting moment of success on Hill Q. A battalion 00:13:38.870 --> 00:13:41.210 of Gurpas commanded by Major Allenson actually 00:13:41.210 --> 00:13:43.289 manages to fight their way to the summit of Hill 00:13:43.289 --> 00:13:46.049 Q. But in a horrifying repeat of the tragedy 00:13:46.049 --> 00:13:49.730 that killed Colonel Malone, they are almost immediately 00:13:49.730 --> 00:13:52.370 shelled by their own artillery. and forced to 00:13:52.370 --> 00:13:55.009 retreat off the high ground. It perfectly illustrates 00:13:55.009 --> 00:13:57.190 the total breakdown of communication between 00:13:57.190 --> 00:13:59.309 the front lines and the supporting artillery 00:13:59.309 --> 00:14:01.750 batteries. Commanders firing the guns simply 00:14:01.750 --> 00:14:04.029 don't know where their advancing men are. Right. 00:14:04.269 --> 00:14:07.370 As night falls on August 9th, the surviving, 00:14:07.450 --> 00:14:09.950 exhausted New Zealanders are pulled back down 00:14:09.950 --> 00:14:12.529 to the apex. And they are replaced on the summit 00:14:12.529 --> 00:14:16.750 of Chinook Bear by two British New Army battalions, 00:14:17.250 --> 00:14:19.669 the 6th South Lancashire's and some of the 5th 00:14:19.669 --> 00:14:22.440 Wilchers. These were troops unfamiliar with the 00:14:22.440 --> 00:14:24.559 sheer brutality of the landscape they had just 00:14:24.559 --> 00:14:26.679 walked into. And waiting for them in the dark 00:14:26.679 --> 00:14:29.980 is Mustafa Kemal. He spent August 9th personally 00:14:29.980 --> 00:14:32.799 reconnoitering the area, right? Yes. He knows 00:14:32.799 --> 00:14:35.019 the allied troops holding the peak are exhausted, 00:14:35.460 --> 00:14:38.519 disjointed, and stretched thin. So at dawn on 00:14:38.519 --> 00:14:41.200 August 10th, he launches the final decisive blow. 00:14:41.360 --> 00:14:43.200 If we connect this to the bigger picture... If 00:14:43.200 --> 00:14:45.639 we connect this to the bigger picture, you really 00:14:45.639 --> 00:14:50.649 see Kemal's ruthless military pragmatism. His 00:14:50.649 --> 00:14:53.450 plan for this counterattack lacked any kind of 00:14:53.450 --> 00:14:55.970 subtle maneuvering. It was terrifyingly direct. 00:14:56.490 --> 00:14:59.289 His strategy was simply to overrun the defenders 00:14:59.289 --> 00:15:02.269 using the sheer overwhelming weight of numbers. 00:15:02.929 --> 00:15:05.990 He amassed six entire battalions for this dawn 00:15:05.990 --> 00:15:08.950 strike. Six battalions charging against about 00:15:08.950 --> 00:15:12.029 2 ,000 defenders scattered on or below the summit, 00:15:12.429 --> 00:15:14.549 plus Baldwin's brigade down at the farm plateau. 00:15:14.809 --> 00:15:16.950 When the sun comes up, the Ottomans charge. They 00:15:16.950 --> 00:15:18.950 completely sweep over the Lancashire battalion 00:15:18.950 --> 00:15:21.610 on the summit in minutes. The Wilchers were caught 00:15:21.610 --> 00:15:24.350 unequipped and were just scattered. The Ottomans 00:15:24.350 --> 00:15:26.649 reclaim the peak and then pour down the slopes 00:15:26.649 --> 00:15:29.110 like a tidal wave. They capture the pinnacle, 00:15:29.250 --> 00:15:31.070 leading to one of the most chaotic and tragic 00:15:31.070 --> 00:15:33.549 moments of the entire battle down at the apex. 00:15:33.690 --> 00:15:36.250 The fog of war at the apex becomes an absolute 00:15:36.250 --> 00:15:38.269 nightmare. The New Zealand machine gunners are 00:15:38.269 --> 00:15:40.590 still positioned there, watching this massive 00:15:40.590 --> 00:15:42.870 wave of Ottoman soldiers charging down the spur 00:15:42.870 --> 00:15:45.029 directly toward them. They open fire to break 00:15:45.029 --> 00:15:47.389 the assault. But the retreating British new army 00:15:47.389 --> 00:15:49.950 troops are entirely mixed in with the charging 00:15:49.950 --> 00:15:52.590 Ottomans. The gunners cannot discriminate friend 00:15:52.590 --> 00:15:55.590 from foe. in the smoke, the dust, and the chaos 00:15:55.590 --> 00:15:58.129 of the charge. To stop the Ottoman advance from 00:15:58.129 --> 00:16:00.350 breaking the entire line, they have to keep the 00:16:00.350 --> 00:16:02.350 guns firing, knowing they're cutting down many 00:16:02.350 --> 00:16:04.950 of their own allies in the process. It's devastating. 00:16:05.269 --> 00:16:07.730 And on the other side of the spur, the Ottoman 00:16:07.730 --> 00:16:10.889 wave crashes down onto the farm plateau. They 00:16:10.889 --> 00:16:14.470 completely overrun Baldwin's lost brigade. Entire 00:16:14.470 --> 00:16:17.330 regiments are decimated. Brigadier General Baldwin 00:16:17.330 --> 00:16:20.269 himself is killed in the slaughter. The survivors 00:16:20.269 --> 00:16:23.279 are forced to retreat. all the way back to Cheshire 00:16:23.279 --> 00:16:25.799 Ridge. The Ottoman infantry, utterly exhausted 00:16:25.799 --> 00:16:27.980 by the momentum of their own attack and the sheer 00:16:27.980 --> 00:16:30.220 scale of the casualties, finally fall back to 00:16:30.220 --> 00:16:32.759 the main ridge. And just like that, the Allied 00:16:32.759 --> 00:16:35.940 offensive is definitively over. The human cost 00:16:35.940 --> 00:16:38.340 of these four days is staggering. In the fighting 00:16:38.340 --> 00:16:41.220 around Chinook Bear and Hill 971, the Ottomans 00:16:41.220 --> 00:16:44.639 suffered 9 ,200 casualties. Which contributed 00:16:44.639 --> 00:16:48.340 to roughly 18 ,000 total Ottoman casualties across 00:16:48.340 --> 00:16:51.360 the entire Anzac sector during this offensive. 00:16:51.549 --> 00:16:53.870 On the allied side, the British Empire forces, 00:16:54.169 --> 00:16:56.409 the New Zealanders, Australians, British and 00:16:56.409 --> 00:16:59.570 Indian troops, suffered between 12 ,000 and 13 00:16:59.570 --> 00:17:02.490 ,000 casualties. All of this blood was spilled 00:17:02.490 --> 00:17:04.990 for a peak they held for barely two days before 00:17:04.990 --> 00:17:07.009 being violently pushed back to where they started. 00:17:07.390 --> 00:17:09.990 The Battle of Chinook Bear left a massive enduring 00:17:09.990 --> 00:17:12.769 scar, particularly on the national consciousness 00:17:12.769 --> 00:17:15.450 of New Zealand. Out of that tragedy, incredible 00:17:15.450 --> 00:17:19.029 acts of bravery emerged. Corporal Cyril Bassett 00:17:19.029 --> 00:17:21.750 was awarded the Victoria Cross for repeatedly 00:17:21.750 --> 00:17:24.589 repairing fragile telephone lines under heavy 00:17:24.589 --> 00:17:27.049 enemy fire throughout the battle, ensuring some 00:17:27.049 --> 00:17:29.470 level of communication remained intact. And the 00:17:29.470 --> 00:17:31.849 leaders who sacrificed themselves are also etched 00:17:31.849 --> 00:17:35.410 into memory. In 1923, the Malone Memorial Gate 00:17:35.410 --> 00:17:37.950 was constructed in Stratford, New Zealand, honoring 00:17:37.950 --> 00:17:39.869 the lieutenant colonel who pushed back against 00:17:39.869 --> 00:17:42.380 a feudal order to save his men. Two years later, 00:17:42.660 --> 00:17:44.660 a memorial honoring all the New Zealand soldiers 00:17:44.660 --> 00:17:46.660 who died there was unveiled right on the peak 00:17:46.660 --> 00:17:49.180 of Chinook Bear itself. It's a battle that heavily 00:17:49.180 --> 00:17:52.359 influenced pop culture and art, too. New Zealand 00:17:52.359 --> 00:17:54.880 writer Marie Shadbolt wrote a play about it in 00:17:54.880 --> 00:17:58.579 1982 called Ones on Chinook Bear, which was adapted 00:17:58.579 --> 00:18:02.200 into a 1991 film. There's a brilliant brass band 00:18:02.200 --> 00:18:05.500 piece by composer Duane Bloomfield called Behold 00:18:05.500 --> 00:18:08.059 the Narrows from the Hill. Musician PJ Harvey 00:18:08.059 --> 00:18:10.059 even wrote about the lingering ghosts of this 00:18:10.059 --> 00:18:13.099 landscape in her 2011 song on Battleship Hill. 00:18:13.500 --> 00:18:15.779 These artists gravitated to this battle because 00:18:15.779 --> 00:18:18.599 it perfectly encapsulates the profound, almost 00:18:18.599 --> 00:18:21.359 futile sacrifice that defines so much of the 00:18:21.359 --> 00:18:23.940 First World War. This raises an important question. 00:18:24.460 --> 00:18:26.839 Why does learning the granular details of this 00:18:26.839 --> 00:18:29.140 specific battle matter to you? Listening to this 00:18:29.140 --> 00:18:31.480 right now. over a century later. Why does it 00:18:31.480 --> 00:18:33.980 matter? It matters because Januk Baer is a master 00:18:33.980 --> 00:18:36.599 class in the dangers of disconnect. It exposes 00:18:36.599 --> 00:18:39.259 exactly what happens when rigid, inflexible planning 00:18:39.259 --> 00:18:41.579 from a distant headquarters collides with the 00:18:41.579 --> 00:18:43.880 chaotic, unpredictable realities of the ground. 00:18:44.059 --> 00:18:46.299 It's a profound study in the friction of war. 00:18:46.559 --> 00:18:48.980 How a battalion taking a wrong turn in the dark, 00:18:49.519 --> 00:18:52.960 a two -hour delay at a ridge, or a miscalculated 00:18:52.960 --> 00:18:55.759 artillery coordinate can completely alter the 00:18:55.759 --> 00:18:58.200 trajectory of world history. The capture of Chunuk 00:18:58.200 --> 00:19:01.240 Ber was the single fleeting success for the Allies 00:19:01.240 --> 00:19:04.099 during the entire Gallipoli campaign. Right. 00:19:04.359 --> 00:19:07.039 For a few brief hours, those soldiers could look 00:19:07.039 --> 00:19:09.519 down from the summit and actually see the Dardanelles 00:19:09.519 --> 00:19:12.259 Straits, the ultimate objective of the entire 00:19:12.259 --> 00:19:16.319 war in that theater. But because of delays, miscommunications 00:19:16.319 --> 00:19:19.059 and overwhelming counterattacks, that victory 00:19:19.059 --> 00:19:21.380 slipped right through their fingers. So what 00:19:21.380 --> 00:19:23.269 does this all mean? I want to leave you with 00:19:23.269 --> 00:19:25.950 a deeply unsettling detail from our source material 00:19:25.950 --> 00:19:28.710 regarding the aftermath of this battle. OK. We 00:19:28.710 --> 00:19:31.490 discussed the small plateau called the farm where 00:19:31.490 --> 00:19:33.710 Baldwin's brigade was overrun and effectively 00:19:33.710 --> 00:19:36.009 destroyed on the morning of August 10th. After 00:19:36.009 --> 00:19:38.789 the battle ended, the farm became an unreachable 00:19:38.789 --> 00:19:41.690 part of no man's land. It was completely abandoned 00:19:41.690 --> 00:19:44.609 to the dead. The source reveals that it wasn't 00:19:44.609 --> 00:19:47.630 until 1919, long after the war had ended and 00:19:47.630 --> 00:19:49.869 the guns had fallen silent, that the Imperial 00:19:49.869 --> 00:19:52.650 War Graves Commission burial teams finally returned 00:19:52.650 --> 00:19:55.670 to that exact spot. Four years later, when they 00:19:55.670 --> 00:19:59.329 arrived, they found a macabre reality. The earth 00:19:59.329 --> 00:20:01.849 was still so thoroughly carpeted in the surface 00:20:01.849 --> 00:20:04.349 bones of the men from Baldwin's Lost Brigade 00:20:04.349 --> 00:20:06.170 that they couldn't even separate or move them. 00:20:06.170 --> 00:20:08.769 Oh my god. Instead of relocating the remains, 00:20:09.289 --> 00:20:11.029 they were forced to build a farm Commonwealth 00:20:11.029 --> 00:20:13.849 War Graves Commission Cemetery right there, directly 00:20:13.849 --> 00:20:15.470 on top of the bones where the men had fallen 00:20:15.470 --> 00:20:19.029 four years prior. Wow. It is a stark, haunting 00:20:19.029 --> 00:20:21.589 reminder that the earth literally holds on to 00:20:21.589 --> 00:20:24.589 the brutal mistakes of our past, forcing us to 00:20:24.589 --> 00:20:26.529 reckon with them long after the politics of the 00:20:26.529 --> 00:20:29.150 war had faded. A truly powerful thought to end 00:20:29.150 --> 00:20:31.609 on. Thank you for joining us on this deep dive 00:20:31.609 --> 00:20:34.109 into the Battle of Chinook Bear. We hope we've 00:20:34.109 --> 00:20:36.130 helped you understand the profound weight and 00:20:36.130 --> 00:20:38.269 the cascading consequences of this historical 00:20:38.269 --> 00:20:41.170 moment. Keep questioning, keep exploring, and 00:20:41.170 --> 00:20:42.049 we'll catch you next time.