Visions of Glory, 1874-1932

by William Manchester

  Keyes felt “fearfully disappointed and unhappy.” Churchill was dumbfounded. As he later testified, he believed “that we were separated by very little from success. Although at the outset I should have rejoiced at the provision of an army, I saw the disadvantages which would attend its employment after what had happened…. Landing and storming the Gallipoli Peninsula, now that the Turks were fully alarmed, seemed a formidable business. It seemed to me a far more serious undertaking than the naval attack. It would commit us irrevocably if it failed, in a way no naval attack could have done. The risk was greater. The stakes were far higher… and above all I feared the inevitable delay.” Fisher, backed by Admirals Sir Arthur Wilson and Sir Henry Jackson, disagreed. Up to this point, they said, they had supported the attempt to force the strait because the commander on the spot had recommended it. But now that de Robeck and Hamilton had agreed on a joint effort, the Admiralty, in Fisher’s words, was “bound to accept their view.” Churchill later recalled: “For the first time since the war began, high words were used around the octagonal table.” He drafted a telegram to de Robeck, ordering him to break through to the Sea of Marmara, but it was never sent, because he had to consult the War Council first, and although Asquith—and Kitchener—agreed with him, the prime minister refused to overrule three distinguished admirals.104

  The next day Winston drafted a personal telegram to de Robeck. Fisher wrote him: “Send no more telegrams! Let it alone!” It went out anyway. “What has happened since the 21st,” he asked, “to make you alter your intention of renewing the attack as soon as the weather is favourable?” The answer was ambiguous. Churchill lowered his sights, hoping that the delay would be temporary. Then events conspired against him. Word reached London from Constantinople that “during the last fortnight about 150 mines, any amount of ammunition, guns, &c, have been coming through Roumania from Germany…. The ammunition comes through quite openly, and there is nothing to prevent the Germans from bringing in even big guns.” To Winston this was a spur to instant action. The admirals, on the other hand, argued that it meant greater danger for their ships in the Dardanelles. Churchill urged Grey to protest this abuse of Rumanian neutrality. Grey said it would be useless. Then, on Friday, March 26, the British consul general cabled from Rotterdam that Dutch troops were massing on their frontiers; a German invasion was expected hourly. It was a false alarm, but it triggered anxiety about the strength of the Home Fleet. The second, third, and fourth sea lords took the extraordinary step of demanding written assurance from Fisher that the force in Scapa Flow was adequate to meet all challenges. Captain Richmond was spreading his poison in the Admiralty. The first lord’s “personal vanity,” he wrote typically, “occupies so large a place in the arrangements that the operation is either a fiasco or is most wasteful in lives or matériel—or both.” Finally, Grey urged caution. Italy was on the verge of declaring war on Germany. An unsuccessful attempt to break through the Narrows might discourage it.105

  Shortly before dawn on Saturday a long message from de Robeck reached the Admiralty. As a study in stagnation it is a remarkable document. Silencing the forts, he said, would require “an excessive expenditure of ammunition,” which “cannot be spared.” Complete conquest of the blockhouses on either side of the strait would require “demolishing parties. To cover these parties at the Narrows is a task General Hamilton is not prepared to undertake and I fully concur with his view.” The “mine menace” was “even greater than anticipated.” As he saw it, “the result of a Naval action alone might in my opinion be a brilliant success or quite indecisive.” It was a risk, and he wasn’t prepared to take it when the army could “occupy the Peninsula which would open up the Strait as guns on Asiatic side can be dominated from the European shore sufficiently to permit ships to pass through.” He concluded: “With Gallipoli Peninsula held by our Army and Squadron through Dardanelles our success would be assured. The delay possibly of a fortnight will allow co-operation which would really prove factor that will reduce length of time necessary to complete the campaign in Sea of Marmara and occupy Constantinople.”106

  When Kitchener told the War Council that the army was now prepared to take over the job of opening the Dardanelles, Winston knew he was beaten. Though he felt, as he said, “grief-stricken,” he gracefully replied to de Robeck: “I had hoped that it would be possible to achieve the result according to original plan without involving the Army, but the reasons you give make it clear that a combined operation is now indispensable…. All your proposals will therefore be approved.” De Robeck now became Hamilton’s subordinate, providing naval support when and where requested. Every subsequent decision in the theater was made by either Kitchener or Hamilton. The navy never again tried to sweep mines, reduce forts, or break through the Narrows to the Sea of Marmara. Day by day the vision of victory receded, though Churchill was slow to abandon hope. On April 29 Sir George Riddell found him studying a map. In his diary Riddell set down Winston’s remarks. “This,” Churchill had said, “is one of the great campaigns of history. Think what Constantinople is to the East. It is more than London, Paris, and Berlin rolled into one are to the West. Think how it has dominated the East. Think what its fall will mean. Think how it will affect Bulgaria, Greece, Rumania, and Italy, who have already been affected by what has taken place. You cannot win this war by sitting still. We are merely using our surplus ships in the Dardanelles. Most of them are old vessels. The ammunition, even the rifle ammunition, is different from that which we are using in France—an older type—so there is no loss of power there.” Then he said: “I am not responsible for the Expedition…. I do not shirk responsibility, but it is untrue to say that I have done this off my own bat.”107

  Nevertheless, the British public believed he had done it all off his own bat. Most of them think so today.

  Silence descended upon the strait. As the weeks passed, the Turks realized that they had been granted a reprieve. In time they persuaded themselves that they had triumphed. The Westerners, to whom they had felt inferior, had been routed. Islamic xenophobia stirred in them; they wanted to express their savage new strength on any available enemy. The Armenians were available. They were Christians, they were clever, they prospered as moneylenders in cities and villages, and they were suspected of sympathizing with the Russians. Rumors spread. They were sending information to the czar’s troops, it was said; they were smuggling in arms and plotting a revolt. So a pogrom began. The men were tortured and shot; the women were recruited for harems; the very young and very old were sent down the roads to Syria, Persia, and Mesopotamia, where robbers stripped them naked and left them to die of hunger and exposure. Before it was over, 750,000 Armenians were dead.

  Barbarism was one expression of the new Turkish mood. Another, which boded ill for Hamilton’s troops, was the soaring morale of the askar, or private soldier. The askari were in a fighting temper, and they knew where they were going to fight; Turkish spies were active in Cairo, watching British officers scour shops for Gallipoli guidebooks. British soldiers cruising in the waters off the peninsula watched the entrenchments grow there. Every morning found them higher and wider. By the middle of April—Hamilton had set his landing date back eleven days—Von Sanders had sixty thousand men behind barbed wire and machine guns, backed by heavy Skoda artillery from Bohemia. His field general would be Mustapha Kemal. Von Sanders was aware of Kemal’s Germanophobia, but he also knew he was fiercely patriotic and the best combat commander in the country. Both leaders were exceptionally talented. Their troops were ready. And they had plenty of time; five precious weeks intervened between the break-off of de Robeck’s naval attack and the arrival of Hamilton’s transports off the peninsula.

  Gallipoli offers the invader four beaches: Bulair, at the neck, where de Robeck wanted Hamilton to land; Suvla Bay, halfway down the peninsula; Ari Burnu, south of there; and at Cape Helles, on the toe, where Royal Marines had walked in complete safety a month earlier. Five major landings were made on the cape, near the village of Sed
d-el-Bahr. Casualties were heavy. A naval aviator flying overhead looked down on the Aegean, usually a brilliant shade of blue. He saw a strip “absolutely red with blood… a horrible sight to see” between the beach and fifty yards out.108 The Anzacs were supposed to come ashore at Gaba Tepe, in the vicinity of Ari Burnu. A navigation error put them a mile to the north, where they faced precipitous cliffs from whose scrub-covered ridges the Turks could deliver a murderous, scything fire. Ian Hamilton remained at sea, riding around in the conning tower of the Queen Elizabeth, out of touch with his shore commanders and his staff. He refused to intervene, even when it became apparent that everything had gone wrong; officers on the spot, he said, were better qualified to make decisions. They, playing for safety, tried to establish beachheads—venturing inland was considered either impossible or too hazardous—while each evening their commander in chief, before retiring to his bunk on the battleship, wrote five-thousand-word entries in his diary, reflecting upon the mysteries and ironies of life.

  Later another landing was made at Suvla. It was the same story. The force commander was an elderly, ailing officer who had made his reputation as a teacher of military history and had never commanded troops in war. Coming ashore, he sprained his knee. He sent word to Hamilton that “if the enemy proves to be holding a strong line of continuous entrenchments I shall be unable to dislodge him till more guns are landed. All the teaching of the campaign in France proves that continuous trenches cannot be attacked without the assistance of large numbers of howitzers.”109 There were no trenches and very few Turks. He had twenty thousand men ashore. Still, he was reluctant to advance. Following his commander in chief’s example, he returned to his ship and spent a safe, comfortable night aboard. Meanwhile, Mustapha Kemal arrived and occupied the heights overlooking the beach.

  Winston’s brother, Jack, who had seen action as a major at Ypres and was now serving on Hamilton’s staff, wrote him from Helles that Gallipoli was “siege warfare again as in France. Trenches and wire beautifully covered by machine gun fire are the order of the day. Terrific artillery fire against invulnerable trenches and then attempts to make frontal attacks in the face of awful musketry fire, are the only tactics that can be employed.” In the first month Hamilton lost forty-five thousand men. The pattern continued. It was over-the-top carnage, with no gains of consequence. Jack wrote: “I don’t think another big push will be attempted until reinforcements arrive. We shall have to dig in and await the Turks’ attacks.” Gallipoli had become a mere extension of the deadlock on the western front. Hamilton knew it. He telegraphed Kitchener that he was watching his attack “degenerate into trench warfare with its resultant slowness.”110

  “Damn the Dardanelles,” said Fisher. “They will be our grave.” Churchill had told Riddell that “Fisher and I have a perfect understanding.” In fact, they had no such thing. The old admiral had raised no objections to Hamilton’s landings, but the general’s subsequent frustration had depressed him. Winston kept trying to stir Fisher’s fighting spirit. “It is clear,” he wrote him on May 3, “that the favourable turn to our affairs in S. E. Europe arose from the initial success of our attack on the Dardanelles, was checked by the repulse of the 18th, & can only be restored by the general success of the operation. It is thus necessary to fight a battle, (a thing wh has often happened before in war) & abide the consequences whatever they may be.” The old salt was unconvinced. And he was beginning to recite his litany of complaints to outsiders. One afternoon at No. 10 Margot Asquith faced him down. She bluntly told him: “You know you have talked too much—all London knows you are against the Dardanelles expedition. Why didn’t you resign?” He muttered: “It’s a lie—I’ve seen no one, been nowhere, I’m far too busy.” But it was true. Word of the rift at the Admiralty had reached back-benchers in the House. An MP asked “whether Lord Fisher was consulted with regard to the March action on the Dardanelles by the Fleet; and whether he expressed the opinion that the attack ought not to be made in the circumstances in which it was made.” Winston replied: “If the insinuation contained in the question were correct Lord Fisher would not now be at the Admiralty.” Asquith had asked Churchill to carry on secret negotiations with the Italians on the terms under which they would enter the war against Germany. This entailed commuting to Paris, and during one of his absences Clementine, hoping to perk up the old salt, invited him to lunch at Admiralty House. It went well until, after Clementine thought he had left, she found him lurking in a corridor. She asked: “What is it?” He said: “You are a foolish woman. All the time you think Winston’s with Sir John French he is in Paris with his mistress.” Clementine was speechless. She was convinced Fisher was losing his mind. When Churchill returned, she told him what had happened. Fisher, she said, had been “as nervous as a kitten.”111

  In Hamilton’s failure Roger Keyes saw opportunity. Four days after this remarkable scene in London, the commodore persuaded de Robeck to convene all his admirals in the Queen Elizabeth’s wardroom. There he unveiled a new plan of naval attack. Leaving older battleships to shield the army’s beachheads, the destroyers which had been refitted as minesweepers would lead the Allies’ most powerful dreadnoughts through the Narrows. It would be accomplished in a single day. All those present, including de Robeck, enthusiastically endorsed the operation; Guépratte telegraphed his minister of marine: “A fin d’assister l’Armée dans son action énergique et rude, nous méditons vive action flotte dans détroit avec attaque des forts. Dans ces conditions il me faut mes cuirassés Suffren, Charlemagne, Gaulois dans le plus bref délai possible.”112 The plan was forwarded to London for approval, which they took for granted. Fisher didn’t like it, of course; he wanted no part of any further action in the strait. And Churchill, from whom one would expect support, had a problem. Assuming that all hopes of forcing the Dardanelles had been abandoned, he had agreed to provide Italy with four battleships and four cruisers from de Robeck’s fleet. Yet the idea of reaching Constantinople was still exciting. He believed something could be worked out. He was arguing the issue with Fisher when an aide brought them word that a daring Turkish submarine commander had sunk H.M.S. Goliath south of the Narrows.

  The loss could be borne. Goliath was no Goliath. She was a small, senectuous battleship which had been launched when Victoria was still Queen. But the presence of an enemy submarine in these waters frightened Fisher. There might be others. (There weren’t.) He insisted that Queen Elizabeth leave the Mediterranean at once. To appease him, Winston agreed. The meeting of the War Council the next day, on Friday, May 14, was, in Churchill’s word, “sulphurous.” Kitchener was infuriated. He had sent an army to Gallipoli with the understanding that the navy would force the Dardanelles, he raged; the first lord had enticed him by dwelling upon “the marvelous potentialities of the Queen Elizabeth,” and now Hamilton was being left in the lurch. K of K’s “habitual composure in trying ordeals left him,” Winston wrote. “He protested vehemently against what he considered the desertion of the army at its most critical moment.” At this, Fisher flared up. The ship “will come home,” he declared; “she will come home at once; she will come home tonight or I shall walk out of the Admiralty then and there.” He added that he was “against the Dardanelles and have been all along.” That enraged Churchill. “The First Sea Lord,” he retorted, “has agreed to every executive telegram on which the operations have been conducted.” Sending out the Elizabeth, indeed, had been his idea. The wounding words flew back and forth, and Asquith couldn’t stem them. To calm Fisher, the prime minister, on Hankey’s advice, had promised the old admiral on Tuesday that no action would be taken in the eastern Mediterranean without his consent. The Elizabeth would be recalled; two battleships, Exmouth and Venerable, would replace her.113

  Back at the Admiralty that evening Winston went over the details with Fisher in the first sea lord’s office. They reviewed the entire operation. New orders would be drawn up for de Robeck. Churchill confined his recommendations to matters he knew the old admiral would acce
pt. As he left, an aide heard him say: “Well, good night, Fisher. We have settled everything, and you must go home and have a good night’s rest. Things will look brighter in the morning and we’ll pull the thing through together.” Working later, as was his custom, he put everything in writing. At the last moment he added two submarines, which de Robeck had requested, to the Dardanelles naval reinforcements. He left the papers for the first sea lord with a note: “I send this to you before marking it to others in order that if any point arises we can discuss it. I hope you will agree.”114

  At nine Saturday morning, May 15, he called at the Foreign Office to put the final touches on the Italian treaty. He was returning across the Horse Guards when his private naval secretary hurried up and said: “Fisher has resigned, and I think he means it this time.” He handed him the brief note from the first sea lord: “After further anxious reflection,” it began, “I have come to the regretted conclusion I am unable to remain any more as your colleague…. As you truly said yesterday I am in the position of constantly veto-ing your proposals. This is not fair to you besides being extremely distasteful to me. I am off to Scotland to avoid all questionings.” Churchill wasn’t perturbed; Fisher had submitted eight previous resignations. But when he discovered that he was nowhere to be found—that he had literally deserted—Winston took the letter to No. 10. Angered, Asquith instantly wrote Fisher: “In the King’s name, I order you to return to your post.” Delivering this command was another matter. That afternoon the old admiral was run to ground in a dingy Charing Cross hotel room. After a long argument, he agreed to see the prime minister. Lloyd George, encountering him in the No. 10 waiting room, was struck by the “dour change in him…. A combative grimness had taken the place of his usual genial greeting; the lower lip of his set mouth was thrust forward, and the droop at the corner was more marked than usual. His curiously Oriental features were more than ever those in an Eastern temple, with a sinister frown. ‘I have resigned!’ was his greeting, and on my inquiring the reason he replied, ‘I can stand it no longer.’ ” He had made up his mind, he said, “to take no further part in the Dardanelles foolishness.” Lloyd George begged him to wait until Monday, when he could put his grievances before the War Council. Fisher refused to wait “another hour.” He told the prime minister the same thing. After a long argument, Asquith wrung from him a promise to remain in London, but the old man flatly refused to withdraw his resignation, to return to the Admiralty, or to see Churchill.115