E Perle of a LIFETI

E PERlE E OF A LIFETI E People, Personalities and Leaders in the First World War Edited by John Crawford, David Littlewood & James Watson \ MASSEY~· UNIVERSITY PRESS MASSEY ~ ~~~~~RSITY j ~ I CONTENTS First published in 2016 by Massey University Press Introduction David Littlewood 8 Massey University Press, Private Bag 102904 North Shore Mail Centre, Auckland 0745, New Zealand www.masseypress.ac.nz II HIGH COMMAND EXPERIENCES II Text copyright © individual authors as credited, 2016 CHAPTERl Images copyright as credited 1915: The Search for Solutions Hew Strachan Design by Kate Barraclough 14 Cover photograph by Ish Doney, showing diaries from the First World War, courtesy of Alexander Turnbull Library CHAPTER2 The moral right of the authors, illustrators and photographers The Road Not Taken: Churchill, Kitchener and Alexandretta has been asserted James Watson 32 All rights reserved. Except as provided by the Copyright Act 1994, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or CHAPTER3 introduced into a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or Ottoman Third Corps in Crisis: Esat Pasha by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording Mesut Uyar or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the 43 copyright owner(s) and the publisher. A catalogue record for this book is available from the National II SOLDIERS' EXPERIENCES • Library of New Zealand CHAPTER4 Printed and bound in New Zealand by Printlink The New Zealand Soldier of the First World War 1914-15: Johnny Enzed ISBN: 978-0-99413-001-3 GlynHarper EISBN: 978-o-99413-254-3 62 New Zealand MASSEY DEFENCE UNIVERSITY W. H. OLIVER HUMANITIES FORCE CHAPTERS RESEARCH ACADEMY A Prince of Riflemen: Jesse Wallingford at Gallipoli John Crawford \ This volume of the First World War Centenary History was made possible by the generous 83 support of theW. H. Oliver Humanities Research Academy of Massey University, the New Zealand Defence Force and the Ministry for Culture and Heritage. CHAPTER6 CHAPTER 12 A Leader in the Making: Major Lindsay Inglis Kiwis Rising: New Zealanders and the War in the Air Nathalie Philippe Simon Moody 102 194 CHAPTER13 •IMPERIAL EXPERIENCES • 'As for Sacrifice .. .':The Royal Naval Motor Boat Patrol Peter Dennerly CHAPTER 7 211 'The Finest Type of Coloured Men': Indians' and New Zealanders' Encounters on Gallipoli Peter Stanley ·EXPERIENCES BEHIND 120 THE FRONT LINE • CHAPTERS CHAPTER 14 Neither Natural-born British Subjects Nor Aliens: Chronicler of the Front Line: Clutha Nantes Mackenzie Indians in the New Zealand Expeditionary Force Carolyn Carr Michael Roche and Sita Venkateswar 232 138 CHAPTER15 CHAPTER 9 Sketching New Zealand's War: Hero of Fiji as a Soldier of France: Ratu Sukuna William Blomfield and the New Zealand Observer He1ene Goiran Steven Loveridge 153 249 CHAPTER 16 ·EXPERIENCES IN THE AIR AND AT SEA • 'God is on Our Side': Chaplain Colonel (William) John Aldred Luxford CHAPTER 10 Zane Kidd From Artilleryman to Airman: Keith Park 268 Adam Claasen 166 Endnotes 291 Contributors 336 CHAPTER 11 '\J Acknowledgements 341 'Pretty Small Potatoes': John Slessor in Darfur and on Index 342 the Western Front Katherine Moody 183 overthrown following the appearance of a British fleet at Constantinople was CHAPTER 3 certainly not absurd, given the recent history of such governments, though nor was it as inevitable as he made out. The problem was that a way through formidable defences had to be negotiated in the Dardanelles before the fleet reached Constantinople, and the difficulties posed by this were never properly investigated before the campaign was launched and the British Empire's reputation committed by Churchill. Whether success at Alexandretta would have overthrown the Ottoman government cannot be guaranteed either, but it certainly would have inflicted a crushing strategic defeat on that government by transforming the military OTTOMAN THIRD situation in the Levant and Mesopotamia. The loss of most of the Ottoman Empire's remaining territory, and in particular of control over Islam's three CORPS IN CRISIS holiest sites- Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem- would likely have spelled an end to the existing government in Constantinople. In addition to the horrendous Esat Pasha human and material costs of Gallipoli for the Entente, and not least New Zealand, we need to factor in the opportunity cost of the cancelled landing at Alexandretta that the safe pessimist Kitchener had favoured. 23 MESUT UYAR or most contemporary observers, veterans and modern scholars, the turning point of the Gallipoli campaign was, undoubtedly, the 25 April landings at Anzac, Helles and Kumkale. Speculation about opportunities lost and 'what ifs' still haunt the literature. Therefore, it is no surprise that so \ many books and articles have been published about the landings and the roles played by various Allied and Ottoman commanders. However, we still know very little about some key players, chief amongst them the Ottoman Third Army Corps commander, Brigadier General Esat Pasha. Although the word 'forgotten' is used with unnecessary frequency in association with various military events or personalities, in this instance it is the best adjective to describe the lack of current scholarship on Esat Pasha. Esat Pasha was the operational commander of all Ottoman Army units defending the Gallipoli Peninsula on 25 April. In addition, he was well known and respected within Ottoman military circles. He was the hero of Janina's defence during the Balkan wars, and also a famous military intellectual and army trainer. Not only was he acting commander-in-chief of the Ottoman military during the First World War, but also most of the field-level officers, 42 E X P E R I E N C E 0 F A L I F E T I M E 43 including Mustafa Kemal (Atati.irk), were his former students. So his absence within the English and Turkish literature is very surprising. In comparison, we know a great deal about the role played by major figures like Mustafa Kemal and Liman von Sanders, or even some minor figures like ~efik Aker. This chapter focuses on Esat Pasha on 25 April1915, because doing so helps us understand not only the Ottoman war machine, its strengths and failures, but also the army corps' structural problems during the First World War. sat Pasha's personality and military background, while complex, were not extraordinary at the time.' He was born in Janina (now Ioannina in Greece) in 1862, the scion of an aristocratic family, and entered Kuleli Military High School in 1880. 2 Although he was very clever and had a good education, he failed in his first year because of h!l; poor Turkish language skills. At that time the medium of communication in Janina was Greek, even for Muslims, so he had to work hard to speak fluent Turkish. From the beginning, Esat Pasha was serious about the military profession, and did not take this failure lightly. It taught him a life-long lesson not to underestimate anything. He worked hard and graduated at the top of his class from the Imperial Military Academy in 1887. His military education continued at the General Staff College, and he again graduated at the top of his class, in 1890, whereupon he was selected for practical training in Germany, spending four years in different Alsatian and Prussian units and headquarters. He made full use of this chance and, instead of simply enjoying his stay, worked even harder, learning to speak German fluently, albeit with a thick Schwabisch accent. His Schwabisch (Swabian) German was a matter of continuous annoyance to German officers, and even Kaiser Wilhelm II once complained about it. 3 Upon Esat Pasha's return to the Ottoman Empire in 1894, he was assigned to the General Staff Intelligence Division. Although a bright staff officer, he apparently disliked working at the general staff, and preferred to transfer to the c less prestigious position of a professorship at the Imperial Military Academy. .~ c He shortly became the dean of academics and stayed in this position, except ~ for a brief interval, until1906. He excelled in this demanding but essentially b career-stopping job, and gained the honorific title of 'teacher of the teachers' ~ ::J (hocalann hocasl). Although a demanding and rigorous teacher, Esat Pasha's u0 enlightened approach to military education was instrumental in gaining the Brigadier General Esat Pasha, painted by Wilhelm Victor Krausz. respect of young Ottoman officers. Most of the high- and medium-ranking OTTOMAN THIRD CORPS IN CRISIS 45 .....---------- officers of the First World War were his previous students.4 he was assigned one idiosyncratic staff job after another. His sturdiness and Esat Pasha had a late introduction to the realities of the Ottoman Army unquestioning loyalty finally paid off when he was assigned commander of during the Ottoman-Greek War of 1897. He was chief of staff of the 1" Infantry the 5th Division in Gallipoli in December 1910, and then of the Second Army Division, which was attached to the independent Janina Army Corps. While the Corps in Tekirdag (Rodosto) three monJ;hs later. He spent barely a year in this Ottoman Army enjoyed easy victories on the main front, Thessaly, the Janina position before being assigned to his hometown, Janina, to command the 23'd Corps faced all of the army's structural problems. An unexpected Greek assault Division. He did not complain, but went to all these postings loyally and tried on 18 April dislocated the corps and caused the defeat of the 2nd Division in his best under intense political pressure and a lack of job security. As it turned Louros. Although the Ottoman units regained confidence and recaptured the out, all these assignments gave him military expertise regarding Gallipoli and lost ground in two weeks, their commanders learnt about the unreliability of the surrounding area.

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