When compared with my own knowledge this source is proved to be even more unreliable as the conditions may have been bearable for the soldiers at first in the campaign but the trenches soon became crowded and unhygienic. Also with the prospect of a failing campaign to lower the troops moral it doesn’t seem likely that such a carefree attitude that is portrayed in source A could have been generated in the Gallipoli campaign. Even if Australia or New Zealand did have such attitudes then the conditions of the campaign would have quickly crushed them. However when referring to the film ‘Gallipoli’ you can see that the Australians have this laid back attitude that is presented in the cartoons. This is shown in the film only when training occurs and a small part of the war. If you believe that source A is reliable enough to follow, which I do not, then you can assume that this carefree attitude is continued until 1916, which is when these cartoons were published. If you look at other facts, like the increasing lack of space, organisation and hygiene, then you can probably assume that this attitude would soon disappear and be replaced by bitterness.
Source B is as extract from John Keegan’s book, ‘The First World War’, which was published in 1998. Within this extract is a lot of positive information about the Anzac soldiers;
The extract within this source is from C. Pugsley. We do not know who this man is and so could just be a witness from the war, with biased and therefore unreliable views. He also wrote this extract 70 years after the event and so Pugsley’s memory could be suffering from age, which could make him an unreliable source. Since we can assume that the extract given with source B is quite unreliable, which is judged upon the above two reasons, then we now know a large part of the source is also rendered unreliable, which leaves the descriptions.
‘…skills with rifle and spade…the best soldiers in the twentieth century…dash and individualism…intense spirit of comradeship…formidable offensive power…’
These descriptions are very extreme, aren’t based on any evidence and, although may be true to a certain extent, are likely to be unreliable views. Also, when linked with my own knowledge, I can see that these statements can’t be too true because if the Anzacs were that good then they wouldn’t have lost the campaign so badly.
This source is also a secondary and so may be unreliable from information being distorted by time.
When compared to the film ‘Gallipoli’ you can see that these views in the source of the Australians are justified as peer pressure to join the army did occur and the Australians did seem to have ‘dash and individualism’. However I still agree with my initial analysis that some of the statements are exaggerated. Source B also tells us of how many people left their lives for the army and also praises them for their skill in rifle and spade, their dash and individualism and their comradeship. This source may have been true, the Anzac troops may have been brilliant and the entire defeat of the campaign could be blamed fully on bad planning but this is unlikely. The most probably truth is that the soldiers were good enough but the bad planning lost the campaign. However if the soldiers were as good as the source says then the campaign probably would have been won, but it was lost, which makes the usefulness of this source low.
Source B therefore has a very positive view of the Anzacs, one that would have been useful for the soldiers at Gallipoli, however there are a lot of facts that make it quite an unreliable source.
Source C is an extract from a diary from a person in the Gallipoli campaign. It has a very positive view of the Australians;
“…fine to watch…great to watch them…unaffected by bullets…faces were set…determined faces…”
This is a view of a person who wrote a diary of the Australians in Gallipoli, during the campaign. It is therefore a primary source, which makes it a reliable source for what information is there. However these descriptions are quite extreme and may have been affected by the confusion of war. This person may have also hated the Turks and so the Australians would have contrasted them to seem better. As well as the confusion of war it seems that some of these descriptions are a bit too exaggerated and a false image in one of them is also created. When he describes the Australians as ‘unaffected by bullets’ he doesn’t mean that they are invincible, he means that they unaffected mentally by bullets. This could however easily have created that first thought and make a false image.
This extract may also be biased because it is only one person’s view, it doesn’t necessarily sum up the entire war. It is also only an extract, meaning that only an extract of an opinion will be given. The entire diary may have to be read to get the diary writer’s entire view of the Anzacs. The language of this extract also suggests that the writer didn’t take part; he’s always watching them, not fighting alongside them. This implies that he’s not a soldier, so maybe he’s a reporter instead. Reporters generally bias their information to what the public want to hear. A date is not given and so it could be talking about the beginning of the campaign, when hopes were high and moral equally high. This lowers the source’s reliability.
Source C has quite reliable information because it’s primary. This means that the information is correct, but what could have happened is that this information has been made more extreme than it actually was by the confusion of war. This source therefore should only be taken as fully reliable information to a certain point.
I feel that this source is exaggerated, but is a primary source, which is what information is based on. This therefore makes the source exaggerated but also reliable. I therefore think that this source is the most useful out of the three sources to give views on the Australians but you must keep in mind that the descriptions may be exaggerated by the factors of war like confusion or patriotism.
In conclusion then to this question I believe that the suggested views in sources A and B aren’t very useful because they do not coincide with other knowledge about Gallipoli and there are many things that make them unreliable. Source C however is a primary source and so can only be distorted by the battles and so is therefore useful as a source.
- Source H suggests that poor planning and Winston Churchill were responsible for what went wrong at Gallipoli. Is there sufficient evidence in sources D-J to support this interpretation? Use the sources and your own knowledge to explain your answer.
The aim of the campaign was to break the stalemate between the allies and Germany, which had occurred at the time. Churchill decided to the best way to break this stalemate was to attack Germany in a weaker position, though their allies. Therefore Churchill decided to attack Turkey. Also, as a plus point, by taking turkey out of the war the allies would free up a way to Russia, enabling them to help their Russian ally with resources and information. However Churchill was desperate, which led to poor planning and under-estimation.
To answer this question I will first analyse the sources, hopefully finding out what information each source gives. I will then compare this information to the question and then also to my own knowledge, which should give me a sufficient answer.
Source D is an extract from a book written by soldier at Gallipoli some time after the campaign happened. It tells us how the attacks were ordered light-heartedly, how the attacks were done without method, how the people who were fighting weren’t listened to, that the Turks had sited their trenches well, that the Turks had very good trenches and up to 7 or 8 lines of defence. The Anzac trenches were, as told by the source, congested and shrapnel cut the telephone wires. Apparently, men already in the trenches, not fresh ones, did the attacks, the men were kept too long and crowded in the trenches and so they became lethargic soon after 5 days. The last point the source makes is how the attacks were ordered against long strips of line at once. So this source suggests lack of seriousness because of light-hearted orders. It also suggests the campaigns lack of organisation as the attacks were dealt without method and the trenches became over crowded. As a result of this lack of organisation chaos ensued, the telephone wires were always cut and the men lost moral from lethargy. The lack of working telephones and the fact that frontline soldiers were never listened to meant that poor communication occurred.
This source is primary but is written as a secondary source. This is because someone from the Gallipoli campaign wrote this ‘some time later’. This could mean that the person’s memory may have been affected by this ‘some time’ or it may mean that the person is more reliable because the confusion of war is no longer affecting him. It is hard to say which is more likely because the length of time after the campaign he wrote this is not very accurate. There is also the fact that it’s only one person’s point of view and so could be false.
Source D partly blames the failure of the Gallipoli campaign on poor planning, poor tactics, and poor organisation. In a way this supports the view of Churchill being to blame as it was he who did the fundamental planning, tactics and organisation. Therefore, Source D can be seen as partly blaming the failure on Churchill. The rest of source D blames the failure on the Turks being well prepared.
Source D’s points that agree with source H’s view include congested trenches, poor attacks like attacking long strips of line without much weight, and men kept in too long and too thick in the trenches and becoming lethargic as a result. All this could have been prevented with good planning and so Churchill can be blamed for it, as he was the planner. These points make sense, as the landings were not done very well, which created confusion of where the troops went. Not much ground was taken so the mass of troops would have been crowded in their small amount of space. Lastly, judging by the poor results of the attacks you could justify the poor attacks pointed out in source D were a reason for the losses.
Source E, like source D, is also quite negative about the campaign. The first part of the source tells us that the forces were distributed unequally and in illogical places, sometimes leaving forces with nothing to do all day or to be wiped out as soon as they land. The second half of this source states that there was poor communication from the generals and that no instructions were given to the soldiers. Both halves suggest a lack of organisation from the generals and that the campaign was poorly planned right from the beginning.
2 British soldiers wrote this source after the war. Like source D this comes from a primary source but is written as a secondary source. This therefore makes it slightly unreliable as a source.
Source E tells us how the soldiers were distributed poorly. This is again something that Churchill would have organised and so the source is therefore blaming Churchill for this part of the campaign. The rest of the source describes a lack of communication between the generals and soldiers as another part of the campaign failure. This has little to do with Churchill so he can’t be blamed there.
The points in source E support source H by saying how the forces were outnumbered at some beaches and so were wiped out while other beaches were left alone because their forces were too high to be attacked by the Turks. This point makes sense because at the time of the first landings the boats had had their tows bunched together. This meant that the whole force had bunched together and intermixed. Which would mean that the troops would have been unequally distributed. Now although it supports source E’s point it does cancel out the fact that it was Churchill’s fault because he had probably planned an equally distributed landing but the sea had made that go wrong. This wasn’t Churchill’s fault. Source E’s point, although sounds like a case of bad planning, is actually the sea’s fault. This means that since this was the only supportive point in source E to source H and Churchill wasn’t to blame for it, it makes this source unsupportive to source H’s view of Churchill being blamed for the campaign’s failure.
Source F is a map describing the amount of ground that the Allied forces managed to take in Gallipoli in April 1915 and also August 1915. Obviously, as a map, it can’t tell us too much about the campaign except how little ground was taken in relation to the entire peninsula before the campaign was called off. This shows how much of a failure the campaign was. The caption below the map tells us that the British Government Minister Lloyd George showed pessimism about the campaign even before it had started, although he didn’t actually say it, he did hint at it. This shows us that even the people high up doubted the campaign’s success and considering that they had the most knowledge of whether anything would succeed or not it sort of doomed the campaign from the start.
Source F merely describes the outcome of the campaign and is not blaming Churchill for the poor result. The caption below it though suggests that a possible reason for a disastrous failure in a campaign is poor planning. This source is therefore suggesting that Churchill is to blame for the result shown on the map because he was the organiser. So this source slightly blames Churchill for the failure.
This source’s only contribution to support source H is that the British Government Minister thought that a reason for a campaign’s failure is poor planning. Connected with a map showing the failure of Gallipoli we assume that the reason for this campaigns failure is also bad planning. To justify this opinion you would need to compare all the factors of the failure of the Gallipoli campaign and see which one is most to blame for it. If bad planning is the most to blame for it then this opinion is justified and source F would be supportive to source H’s interpretation. I believe that the three main factors of Gallipoli’s failures is the bad planning, the fact that it was Turkish homeland and so the Turks had an advantage, and also that the soldiers quickly became demoralised and therefore less efficient because of the failures and losses. Out of the three I believe that the poor planning was the biggest factor. This makes source F, in my opinion, supportive to source H.
The next source, source G, is another textual extract and is from a British historian in 1965. Within the source the historian, A.J.P. Taylor, states that there was a lack of men and supplies, a lack of room to fight, which meant that not much of a force could land on Gallipoli and that if stronger forces did come it would only create congestion. Even though he points out that the campaign was a failure he doesn’t mention so much why it failed within the campaign but why it failed generally. He states that Gallipoli wasn’t as easy a place to take as the organisers thought, as it was a ‘narrow, tight crack, and stronger force would not have made the crack wider’. He also gives the campaign a positive view, saying that it nearly came to success twice and that ‘the campaign would have succeeded only if it had been fought somewhere else’. With this is mind you can argue that the planning couldn’t have been too bad then. He also mentions how the campaign, although a failure, did ‘wear down Turkish strength and made some demand on German supplies’. So this source, instead of blaming the Anzacs or the generals like the other sources, he blames the place on which it was fought and actually commends the campaign.
When compared to my own knowledge, source G becomes invalid. It is true that the Gallipoli campaign was based in a small place, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it was a place where stronger forces were ineffective. I think the initial idea was to land the large amount of troops and push inland with the extra force. This would mean that they would have more space to spread the troops and they wouldn’t be overcrowded. However this seemed to fail as the Turks put up an unexpected resistance and stopped the troops. This meant that they had little space and so the troops became over crowded and confusion occurred.
So when compared to my own knowledge I can see that it wasn’t the place’s fault, although it did lead to problems that contributed to the failure of the campaign, it was all down to poor planning. This means that it was Churchill’s fault.
Source H, as we know, implies that poor planning by Churchill was to blame for the failure of the Gallipoli campaign. In more detail it tells us that the writer of this source thinks that Churchill, unlike his performance in World War 2, made ‘errors of judgement’. He also says that the campaign was a ‘vain hope’, suggesting that he thought Churchill underestimated the task. He states that hardly any intelligence was collected beforehand, poorly trained troops were collected and poor tactics were used. All these faults come down to the people planning it and so Churchill is being blamed here.
As a summary to this question; the interpretation that Churchill was to blame for the failure of the Gallipoli campaign suggested in source H is supported by sources D and F. Sources E and G are not so supportive to source H. Source D blames the failure to poor planning, which is Churchill’s fault. This is then supported further by my own knowledge and therefore its points against Churchill are very supportive for source H. Source F shows how much of a failure the campaign was. It also suggests that the reason for such a failure would have been poor planning, which makes it Churchill’s fault. My opinion backs this up and so I find this source to be quite supportive to source H. Source E tells us of how the soldiers were distributed unevenly. This would seem like Churchill’s fault but with my own knowledge I know that this uneven distribution is due to the sea. This makes it quite unsupportive to source H. Source G blames the failure for other reasons rather than Churchill. However when compared to my own knowledge these reasons become false. Although this doesn’t support source H it does cancel out one view of how Churchill couldn’t be blamed for the failure of the Gallipoli Campaign.
